At the same time that major strategy decisions were being made, command organization, tactical planning, and preparation for political activity were also going forward at lower military levels. For the planning to proceed with the greatest efficiency, directives to the various task force commanders should first have been formulated. Then, as indicated by subsequent World War II experience, from three to five months would have been required to complete tactical plans and mount the expedition. The Army commanders would have selected the beaches to fit schemes of inland maneuver, subject to their suitability for naval operations, and once that major problem was solved, correlated joint decisions would have established: the time of landing (H Hour), detailed requirements, assignment of assault shipping, plans for general naval bombardment, and specific organization by tasks, including the furnishing of naval gunfire, air support, transportation, supply, medical service, administration, and communications.¹ In planning for Operation TORCH, there was no time for this orderly sequence.

The pressure after the first decision in July to have tactical plans ready for the earliest possible D Day made impossible any waiting for directives or fundamental decisions concerning the general outline plan. Tactical and logistical planning began almost at once. Efforts to keep abreast of the shifting concept of the operation prior to 5 September produced a dizzying confusion which was accentuated by the dispersal of the planning staffs at several points on either side of the Atlantic.²

Organizing the Chain of Command of the Allied Force

General Eisenhower's command was officially designated by the Combined Chiefs of Staff to be that of Commander in Chief, Allied Expeditionary Force. For security reasons, he altered the title to Commander in Chief, Allied Force. The original plan to have a deputy commander in chief from the British Army was dropped on British initiative in favor of an American, one able to retain the American character of the expedition in case General Eisenhower was prevented from exercising his command by disability. General Clark (U.S.) was then appointed Deputy Commander in Chief, Allied Force, and took charge of the details of planning.³ Headquarters was established

at Norfolk House on St. James's Square, London, somewhat apart from General Eisenhower's offices as Commanding General, European Theater of Operations, U.S. Army (ETOUSA). There the staff was gradually assembled, the American personnel being diverted in large measure from other assignments which had brought them to the United Kingdom. British personnel was obtained through the War Office from headquarters, offices, and units at home. Official activation did not occur until 12 September, when in General Order 1, the command announced its own birth, gave itself a birth certificate, and officially took the name of Allied Force Headquarters (AFHQ). It was then one month old.⁴

The staff was organized on the principle of balanced national participation. Divisions and procedures were typical of the U.S. Army rather than of the British Army. Operating sections of the general and special staffs were integrated; that is, they were manned by nationals of both countries in equal numbers but without duplications of function. If the chief of a section was of one nationality, the deputy chief was of the other, and their subordinates were each matched by "opposite numbers." Administrative and supply sections, on the other hand, were normally divided into separate segments concerned with the forces of each nationality, because of differences in organization, procedure, and channels of communication. General Eisenhower procured the assignment as chief of staff of Brig. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith (U.S.) upon his release from the secretariat of the Combined Chiefs of Staff in Washington.⁵ The two deputy chiefs of staff were Brig. Gen. Alfred M. Gruenther (U.S.) and Brig. J. F. M. Whiteley (Br.). A British chief administrative officer, Maj. Gen. Humfrey Gale, was included in the organization. The heads of the G-1 and Gñ4 Sections reported through him. The G-2, G-3, and other sections reported to the Chief of Staff directly.⁶ AFHQ deviated from the principle of balanced national personnel only in cases where specialized knowledge of organization, technique, and procedure was the overriding consideration.⁷

The Allies faced a complex problem of command structure in trying, as General Eisenhower desired, to fuse into one integrated force the ground, sea, and air elements of the two national military establishments. The principle of unity of command required that the task force attacking each major area should operate under a single commander and that the entire Allied Expeditionary Force under the supreme commander should avoid subdivisions along either national or service lines which seriously impaired the tactical flexibility. Normal national susceptibilities made desirable the retention of American or of British elements in the largest feasible units under their own commanders, and efficient performance made such action mandatory.

Completing a chain of command for Operation TORCH took several weeks. In the end, the American Commander in Chief, Allied Expeditionary Force, exercised direct command over the commanding generals of the task forces, indirect command through a British Naval Commander in Chief, Expeditionary Force, over the senior naval commanders of both nationalities, and direct command over land-based

Chart 1
AFHQ Organization
1 November 1942

aviation through British and American air force commanders. The task forces, after being reinforced by increments from later convoys to the captured ports, were expected to extend their control ashore and to be consolidated into an American Fifth Army and a British First Army. The naval task forces would eventually disperse, but subsequent naval operations by other units were to be under the control of the supreme commander through his naval commander in chief.⁸

The initial selection of task force commanders was made in the expectation that there would be but two, one American and one British, Maj. Gen. George S. Patton, Jr. (U.S.) and Gen. Sir Harold R. L. G. Alexander (Br.). In quick sequence, the British found it necessary to substitute Lt. Gen. Sir Bernard Montgomery (Br.) for General Alexander, and then Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. Anderson (Br.) for General Montgomery, in order to transfer them to missions of higher priority.⁹

When the plans prescribed a third task force, to be drawn from American resources, the U.S. II Army Corps, which was then in the United Kingdom preparing for the cross-Channel invasion of France, was given the new assignment. General Clark, who had commanded the II Corps in England since June, eventually forfeited the command of this task force because he recognized that his responsibilities as Deputy Commander in Chief, Allied Force, were incompatible with those of the task force commander.¹⁰ General Marshall selected Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall (U.S.) to command the Center Task Force.¹¹

The Eastern Task Force which General Anderson was to command was not expected to participate as such in the amphibious phase of the assault on Algiers. It was to be preceded by a smaller force, with as high a proportion of American troops as possible, under an American commanding general, and known as the Eastern Assault Force. Its actual commander was Maj. Gen. Charles W. Ryder (U.S.), since June the Commanding General, 34th U. S. Infantry Division, which was in training in the United Kingdom, presumably for the projected invasion of Continental France.¹²

These four troop commanders--Patton, Fredendall, Ryder, and Anderson--were directly subordinated to General Eisenhower. His control over British ground forces was defined in directives from the British War Office to General Anderson and to a few other British Army officers:

The First Army has been placed under the Supreme Command of the Allied Commander-in-Chief, Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower, United States Army. In the exercise of his command, the national forces at his disposal will be used towards the benefit of the United Nations and in pursuit of the common object. You will carry out any orders issued by him.

In the unlikely event of your receiving an order which, in your view, will give rise to a grave and exceptional situation, you have the right to appeal to the War Office, provided that by so doing an opportunity is not lost, nor any part of the Allied Force endangered. You will, however, first inform the Allied Commander-in-Chief that you intend so to appeal, and you will give him your reasons.¹³

A naval task force was to land each of the three attacking forces at its objective and support it with naval gunfire and aviation. For the Western Naval Task Force Rear Adm. Henry Kent Hewitt (U.S.) was designated as commander. He was at that time the Commander, Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet, with headquarters at Ocean Beach, Virginia, charged with planning, training, and conducting amphibious operations.¹⁴ He remained in that capacity pending the departure of his naval task force from the United States. The other two naval task forces (Center and Eastern) were drawn almost completely from the resources of the Royal Navy. The Center was under command of Commodore Thomas H. Troubridge (Br.) and the Eastern under Rear Adm. Sir H. M. Burrough (Br.).¹⁵ General Eisenhower exercised command over the naval portion of the Allied Force through Admiral Sir Andrew Browne Cunningham (Br.), Naval Commander in Chief, Expeditionary Force, subject to the limitation that control over the Western Naval Task Force and subsequent convoys from the United States was retained by the Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet, until they arrived at a "chop point" on the fortieth meridian, west longitude. Admiral Cunningham became responsible for sea security and amphibious operations to the supreme commander, but for other wholly British naval operations in either the western

Mediterranean or the north Atlantic he reported directly to the British Admiralty.¹⁶

The land-based aviation in the Allied Force was first organized in two portions corresponding to the initial arrangement of task forces and to the prospective consolidation into British First and American Fifth Armies. The Eastern Air Command consisted of Royal Air Force units under the command of Air Marshal Sir William L. Welsh (Br.). A Western Air Command from the U.S. Army Air Forces (a new Twelfth Air Force) was put under Brig. Gen. James H. Doolittle (U.S.). Each was to report directly to General Eisenhower. The decision to employ a third task force necessitated a division of the Western Air Command, that portion assigned to the Center Task Force to be commanded during the assault by General Doolittle's operations officer, Col. Lauris Norstad (U.S.), and that with the Western Task Force under command of Brig. Gen. John K. Cannon (U.S.), each responsible directly to his task force commanding general. General Doolittle was expected to command the Twelfth Air Force from Gibraltar during the first phase of Operation TORCH. In the subsequent phase, its mission would be determined by contingencies for each of which it had to be prepared. It might have to support Allied operations against Spanish Morocco or Spain, and it might have to support ground operations in Tunisia before subjecting Italy and Rommel's supply lines in Africa to bombing attack. The Eastern Air Command was expected to work with General Anderson in winning the race with the enemy for Tunisia.¹⁷

Directives for Joint Action by the U.S. Army and Navy

The Joint Chiefs of Staff, successor after February 1942 to the Army-Navy Joint Board, directed such joint operations as those of the Western Task Force and Western Naval Task Force. Late in the planning, it validated arrangements already made, and formulated others, in a Joint Army-Navy Plan for Participation in Operation TORCH to which the short title, ROOFTREE, was given.¹⁸ American military and naval support of Operation TORCH was itemized as follows:

1. A Joint Expeditionary Force, including the Western Task Force and naval supporting units to seize and occupy the Atlantic coast of French Morocco;

2. U.S. forces required in conjunction with British forces to seize and occupy the Mediterranean coast of French North Africa;

3. Additional Army forces as required to complete the occupation of Northwest Africa;

4. Naval local defense forces and sea frontier forces for the Atlantic coast of French Morocco and naval personnel for naval base maintenance and harbor control in the sector of the Center Task Force (Oran area);

5. Logistic support for all United States forces.

Army forces placed under command of the Allied commander in chief were to be assigned directly by the War Department; and naval forces, by the Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet. The latter was to provide and to control the naval forces necessary for supporting Operation TORCH in the western Atlantic and for protecting the follow-up

convoys between the United States and the North African theater. As soon as U.S. naval units completed their tasks they were to be released by the Commander in Chief, Allied Force.

The directive provided most clearly for command as follows:

1. The Commander in Chief, Allied Force, will command all forces assigned to Operation TORCH, under the principle of unity of command.

2. The Western Naval Task Force will pass to the command of the Commander in Chief, Allied Force, upon crossing the meridian of 40° West Longitude. This command may be exercised either directly by the Commander in Chief or through the Naval Commander, Allied Force. (Prior to that time these forces will remain under the command of the Commander in Chief, United States Atlantic Fleet, who will arrange their movements so that they will meet the schedule of the Commander in Chief, Allied Force.)

3. Command relations of Subordinate Task Forces are initially set up as given in sub-paragraphs (d), (e), (f), and (g). They are subject to change as found necessary by the Commander in Chief, Allied Force.

4. The command of those units of the Western Task Force which are embarked in the Western Naval Task Force, will vest in the Commander, Western Naval Task Force, until such time as the Commanding General, Western Task Force, has established his headquarters on shore and states he is ready to assume command.

5. When the Commanding General, Western Task Force, assumes command on shore, the naval forces designated to give further support to the occupation of FRENCH MOROCCO will pass to his control, acting through the Commander, Western Naval Task Force.

6. Following the assault operations and when and as released by Commander in Chief, Allied Force, the United States naval forces assigned thereto will revert to the command of the Commander in Chief, United States Atlantic Fleet.

7. The United States naval forces assigned for the operation of ports and for naval local and sea frontier defenses--Sea Frontier Forces, Western Task Force, and the Naval Operating Base, Center Task Force--will be under the command of the respective commanding generals of those task forces, under the principle of unity of command.

8. The Commander in Chief, United States Atlantic Fleet, will exercise command over all forces employed for the cover and ocean escort in the ATLANTIC of follow-up convoys between the UNITED STATES and NORTH AFRICA.

Planning responsibilities were likewise classified as follows:

1. The Commander in Chief, Allied Force, will designate the tactical and logistic plans to be prepared by the task force commanders.

2. The Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet, will be responsible for planning for the organization of United States Naval Task Forces to be assigned to the Commander in Chief, Allied Force, for the operations of the Atlantic Fleet (less the elements assigned to Commander in Chief, Allied Force) in support of Operation TORCH, and for subsequent covering operations and convoy escorts in support thereof.

3. The Army will be responsible for planning for the logistic support and requirements of the Army Forces assigned to Operation TORCH.

4. The Commander in Chief, United States Atlantic Fleet, will be responsible for planning for the logistic support and requirements of the United States Naval Forces assigned to Operation TORCH.

Transportation responsibilities were specified for both services. The Navy would furnish available troop transports, both combat unit loaded and organizational unit loaded, and converted cargo vessels, landing boats, tank lighters, and gear for unloading on beaches. It would also arrange for tankers to carry bulk petroleum products. The Army was to arrange for all other shipping which

its forces required, to provide gear for unloading at docks, and to allot such shipping space in later convoys for the requirements of continuing naval support in the theater, as might later be agreed. Vessels carrying Army troops, equipment, and supplies were to be loaded by the Army at ports designated by the Army, while sailing and routing of convoys would be controlled by the Navy in conformity with the convoy schedule issued by the Allied Commander in Chief. The Navy was responsible for unloading over beaches and the Army for unloading at docks.

Many of these decisions which were so carefully organized and formulated in Plan ROOFTREE in October had been made earlier by the Chiefs of Staff and by an Army-Navy TORCH Committee during the course of the planning and preparations.¹⁹ The committee was an instrument for co-ordinating the planning within the two departments in conformity with decisions reached by the Commander in Chief, Allied Force, or by the Army and Navy task force commanders. The provisions for control of the Joint Expeditionary Force in accordance with the principle of unity of command, including arrangement for eventual transfer of command from Admiral Hewitt to General Patton, were finally set forth as an annex to the Navy's orders of 7 October 1942 from Admiral King to Admiral Royal E. Ingersoll, the Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet. On 10 October, Admiral Ingersoll transmitted them to Admiral Hewitt, as prospective commander of Task Force 34, Atlantic Fleet (the Navy's numerical designation for the Western Naval Task Force).²⁰ Issuance of this annex did not receive a formal concurrence by the War Department but its substance was considered sound, and its incorporation in Plan ROOFTREE followed almost at once. If General Eisenhower had had changes to urge, Patton would also have proposed revisions to make more precise the time for the shift of command from Hewitt to himself, and clearly authorizing him to release Navy forces in the event that communications between him and General Eisenhower should fail.²¹

In most of the joint amphibious exercises preceding World War II, the principle of unity of command in amphibious operations had not yet supplanted that of mutual cooperation. The doctrine on amphibious operations officially accepted in Joint Action of the Army and Navy was silent on this vital matter. Operation TORCH was to provide an important test of a moot feature of amphibious operations, the transfer of command during the critical establishment of the beachhead.

Western Task Force Planning

On 30 July, immediately after General Marshall returned to Washington from the decisive conferences in London, General Patton was summoned to the War Department to take charge of organizing the Western Task Force and of planning for its operations.²² He spent a few days in conferences while Col. Hobart R. Gay, his chief of staff,

and other officers summoned from the I Armored Corps, established a headquarters in the Munitions Building and devised a preliminary plan to capture Casablanca.²³ Patton met there for the first time his prospective associate commander, Admiral Hewitt.²⁴ With Col. Kent C. Lambert, who was to be his operations officer, he flew to England for participation in the planning at AFHQ.²⁵ The effort to arrive at a satisfactory strategic plan had not succeeded when on 20 August he returned to Washington. He carried with him a directive to prepare an attack against Oran instead of Casablanca,²⁶ in conformity with a provisional outline plan then being submitted to the Combined Chiefs of Staff by General Eisenhower. That directive was promptly superseded by another from the War Department,²⁷ but not until the executive agreement of 5 September was the objective of the Western Task Force firmly established.

The Western Task Force's mission was to secure the port at Casablanca and adjacent airfields and, in conjunction with the Center Task Force at Oran, to establish and maintain communications between Casablanca and Oran. (See Map 1.) It was also to build up land and air striking forces capable of securing Spanish Morocco, if that action should become necessary. French ground forces in Morocco were estimated to number from 55,000 to 60,000 troops, stationed along the border of Spanish Morocco, near the coast, and at inland stations such as Marrakech, Meknès, and Fès. French naval forces manned coastal defense guns and at Casablanca, as well as farther south at Dakar, had naval bases in which some powerful warships were moored. The partly completed Jean Bart, with radar and a battery of four powerful 15-inch guns, lay beside a dock in Casablanca Harbor. The damaged battleship Richelieu was based at Dakar. Each warship had a wide cruising range and sufficient power to be a serious threat to any offshore naval expedition. Several French submarines also lurked in Casablanca Harbor and might emerge for strikes against an invader. The French first-line aircraft in Morocco were estimated in September as 13 reconnaissance, 74 fighter, and 81 long-range bomber planes, based for the most part at Marrakech, Casablanca-Cues, and Rabat-Salè.²⁸

The great port and city of Casablanca was so strongly defended that direct frontal assault would have been extremely costly. The objective had to be attacked from the rear by forces landing near enough to reach it before the defenders could organize effective resistance. If the attacking forces used medium or heavy tanks in an overland approach to Casablanca, they would need a port, since landing craft for armored vehicles of those weights were not then available. Also, if they counted on land-based

aircraft to support the attack, they had to have an airfield that could be captured quickly.

In trying to find a suitable port for the Western Task Force's medium tanks, the planners had few from which to choose. The Moroccan coast is exposed, with the only good harbors protected by jetties. All the ports near Casablanca are small, shallow, and inadequate. Safi, the most likely possibility of three ports along the coastal roads to the southwest, is 140 miles from Casablanca. The other two, Agadir and Mogador, are more than 200 miles away. Rabat, capital of French Morocco, is 53 miles northeast of Casablanca, and Port-Lyautey 25 miles farther by road. Both Rabat and Port-Lyautey were under consideration for some time before the latter was chosen. The small fishing and petroleum storage port at Fedala, on the wide Baie de Fedala, is only 18 miles overland from Casablanca, and seemed suited to serve the main infantry attack but not to receive the heavier armored vehicles. The beaches on the Baie de Fedala could accommodate the bulk of the invading force. Most of the coast line elsewhere is flanked by bluffs so near the shore that the beaches are shallow and the exits difficult. East of the Baie de Fedala, a broad shelf with only a few low sand hills extends inland for less than a mile before rising by rounded slopes to a plateau some two hundred feet above sea level. At this point, between two rivers, a considerable force might come ashore on a wide front and have room to maneuver while the small port was used to expedite the landing of heavy equipment. The medium tanks, however, would have to be landed far to the south at Safi.

The most accessible of the good airfields were on the edges of Casablanca and Rabat, but the former was too well defended and the latter was therefore initially preferred, although it necessitated an operation with certain doubtful features.

Rabat, the habitual site of the Sultan's palace, also served as the headquarters of the French Resident General. There too was the post of the commanding general of Moroccan troops. A battle for its capture might have brought injury to the Sultan with serious repercussions among the Moslem population throughout the Mediterranean. Its shallow port was below standard. It was likely to be defended more strongly than the harbor and airdrome just north of Rabat, at Mehdia-Port-Lyautey. The airfield at Port-Lyautey had concrete runways; the adjacent Sebou river had been developed as a seaplane base; the mouth of the river was flanked by excellent beaches; and any possible resistance to inland advance seemed likely to yield quickly to combined operations by parachute troops, saboteurs, carrier-borne aviation, and an amphibious landing force.²⁹

The original sketch of a plan which General Patton took to AFHQ contemplated landings at Agadir, Mogador, and Safi, supplemented by airborne infantry and fighter aircraft flown from the United Kingdom via Gibraltar. The main weight of the attack would have been delivered well south of Casablanca. This conception was changed early in September. The whole attack was shifted northward, with the main effort to be at Fedala and the tanks to be landed in the port of Safi. The airfield at Rabat-Salé

was to be the objective of a third force.³⁰

General Patton was eventually induced to approve the substitution of Mehdia-Port-Lyautey for Rabat as the third objective of the Western Task Force. He assigned the command of the sub-task force (GOALPOST) which would make that attack to Maj. Gen. Lucian K. Truscott, Jr., who had been in the United Kingdom at Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten's Combined Operations Headquarters.³¹ General Truscott returned to the United States on 19 September to organize and prepare for his part of the operation. The armored elements to land at Safi were included in a second sub-task force (BLACKSTONE) placed under command of Maj. Gen. Ernest N. Harmon, Commanding General, 2d U.S. Armored Division.³² The main attack at Fedala (by Sub-Task Force BRUSHWOOD) was to be under the command of Maj. Gen. Jonathan W. Anderson, who at that time was Commanding General, Amphibious Corps, Atlantic Fleet, under Admiral Hewitt, and had been long identified with Army troop training for amphibious operations.³³ Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Keyes was designated as Deputy Commanding General, Western Task Force.³⁴

The major elements of the Western Task Force were transferred to General Patton's command from that of the Commanding Generals, Army Ground Forces and Services of Supply, at the end of 10 September. These units were the 3d and the 9th Infantry Divisions (less the 39th Infantry Combat Team, which was sent to the Eastern Assault Force at Algiers), the 2d Armored Division, the 70th and 756th Tank Battalions, the 603d, 609th, and 702d Tank Destroyer Battalions, the 71st and 72d Signal Companies, and the 36th Combat Engineer Regiment. The 3d Infantry Division was an early Army unit to be trained for amphibious operations while the 9th Infantry Division had already been partly trained, as had Combat Command B, 2d Armored Division. By 24 September, after prolonged uncertainty about the available troop transport,

General Patton had assigned his units to the three sub-task forces in the form which would remain effective, in most respects, in the operation.³⁵ The Navy had readily agreed to furnish destroyer-transports to convey into Safi harbor before daylight two special landing teams of infantry for the immediate seizure of key positions in the port, and to forestall sabotage. The Army Air Forces had assigned the XII Ground-Air Support Command³⁶ under General Cannon to the Western Task Force and planned to send its ground personnel from the United States to meet the flight personnel at the captured airfields.³⁷

Naval planning depended upon a settled scheme of maneuver by the landing force, a plan in conformity with which the combat loading, naval support, and naval air arrangements could be prepared. If the beaches which were best suited to the inland deployment of the troops were feasible for landing operations, the naval planning could proceed without delay. But when doubts arose concerning the character of any beach, more information had to be obtained. Photographic reconnaissance by British aircraft during the planning period clarified some doubts.³⁸ At least one beach, south of Safi, had to be studied from an American submarine. Alternate plans were therefore prepared to use that beach or another, depending upon the report.

Landing operations were subject to two hazards affecting the operation of all boats on the Atlantic coast of Morocco. The long fetch across the Atlantic makes a high surf and swell normal on that shore and, by November, limits the days when boats can possibly be navigated to perhaps one in five. The tide would be ebbing on 8 November during the early morning hours of darkness, so that, even with smooth water, landing craft would have to be speedily unloaded and retracted to avoid becoming stranded or even broached. To escape the latter difficulty, Admiral Hewitt recommended, somewhat to General Patton's dismay, that the operation be deferred one week. The proposal was discussed at higher Navy levels, rejected, partly because the moonlight on the later date would make surprise less likely, partly because of the narrowing likelihood of good weather, but mainly because delay would be generally inadvisable.³⁹

The availability of troops and cargo transports was sufficiently uncertain to delay firm decisions. Interrelated with the transport problem was that of the troop list, which was subject to a stream of minor modifications up to the time of departure. A tentative troop list of 6 September was made the basis for a provisional assignment to transports with an estimated capacity of

2,679 officers and 42,090 enlisted men.⁴⁰ Some of these transports were still being converted from passenger liners to combat loaders, and would become available barely in time to load and depart with inexperienced crews.

The seatrain New Jersey solved the problem of medium tank transport, but one other special transportation problem remained unanswered until a few days before the Joint Expeditionary Force was scheduled to sail. That question was how to deliver aviation gasoline speedily to the Port-Lyautey airdrome for the land-based planes. These American aircraft were either to be flown from Gibraltar or, as actually developed later, to land after being catapulted from an auxiliary aircraft carrier at sea. The answer appeared to be to run a shallow-draft cargo vessel up the Sebou river to the docks near the airfield. Search for such a ship was successful; the Contessa, a fruit carrier normally plying between the Caribbean and the United Kingdom, was chartered, although it could not be brought to the port of embarkation until the day the convoy was finally loaded.⁴¹

Admiral Hewitt received an official letter of instruction dated 10 October 1942 designating him as commander of the Western Naval Task Force (Task Force 34, U.S. Atlantic Fleet) and indicating the ships which would be transferred to his command.⁴² To expedite necessary action by subordinate commanders, his operations plans had already been issued the day before. The Western Naval Task Force, besides its Southern, Center, and Northern Attack Groups, was to contain a covering group and an air group. Standard operations annexes were included. But two major matters which had been under discussion ever since a conference of American and British naval officers in Washington on 16 September remained to be firmed up.⁴³ What would be done if the weather made the scheduled landings impossible? How should French forces be treated in case they resisted?

Alternative plans were necessary in case bad weather prevented the troops from being landed near Casablanca. The ships would soon have to refuel. Submarine attack would become much more likely during any prolonged waiting offshore. Of four possible alternatives, serious faults could be found with all; those most favored provided for landings inside the Mediterranean between Oran and Spanish Morocco, or in Spanish Morocco and southern Spain if the Spanish Government opposed the Allied operations. General Patton, after the subject had been thoroughly reviewed, concluded that the only tenable plan was "a direct naval attack on the moles at Casablanca and Port Lyautey. . . . We should plan either to conquer or be destroyed at Casablanca," he wrote.⁴⁴ He was so concerned lest the naval task force commander, during a failure of communications with General Eisenhower's command post at Gibraltar, insist on diverting the convoy from the primary objective that he sought a secret authorization from the Allied commander in chief to require the admiral to bombard

Casablanca. The request was met with the advice that no bombardment should occur without reference to General Eisenhower, but in the unlikely event of a complete failure of signal communications, he should use his own discretion.⁴⁵ To destroy Casablanca would have been entirely contrary to Allied policy, for the harbor was scheduled to serve as a major Allied base, and any destruction would have had an adverse effect upon relations with the French. Such an interference with the command relations prescribed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (in Plan ROOFTREE) could have had many regrettable consequences. But in view of the confidence which developed between General Patton and Admiral Hewitt during the approach voyage, and Admiral Hewitt's own determination to wait offshore until forced to leave, it is doubtful that such an authorization would have been used even if it had been issued.⁴⁶ The existence of approved outline plans for alternative operations was not known to Admiral Hewitt's planning staff or to General Patton's sub-task force commanders until the eve of departure, a fact which made hard work at drafting operations plans necessary during the voyage.

How should French forces be treated in case of resistance? The previously mentioned directive of 5 October to the Allied Force laid down three general principles: (1) the French must be permitted to take the first hostile action, (2) a hostile act by an isolated unit should not necessarily be interpreted as indication that all units in that area had hostile intent, and (3) once resistance in any particular area ceased, Allied forces should abandon hostilities unless the French resumed their opposition. The difficulty of this position was manifest. General Patton denounced the idea that his forces should wait for the French to fire. It would be tantamount, he said, to giving an opponent the draw in a gunfight. Many believed that the risks to naval units from enemy aircraft and coastal batteries were disproportionately high. But the entire force ought not to be precipitated into general attack by purely local resistance. Western Naval Task Force plans, as revised during the approach voyage, recognized the unmistakable directive to let the French start any fighting and instituted two signals--"Batter Up" and "Play Ball"--to govern American response.

Anyone about to return French fire could signal "Batter Up," while the task force and task group commanders would have discretionary authority to signal "Play Ball." The former indicated a local encounter; the latter, general American offensive action. One was a report; the other, an order.

General Patton interpreted the policy to his subordinate commanders as making necessary attempts to capture alive any foreign troops who did not resist but at the same time to avoid all unnecessary risk. "We must do our best to avoid combat," he said, "but not to the extent of endangering the lives of our troops." Enemy batteries or machine gun nests were, if merely trained on American troops, to be attacked unless the crews indicated a desire to parley. Use of antiaircraft weapons against the planes of the Western Air Command would be the signal for attack either on airfields or troop columns.⁴⁷

General Patton's Outline Plan for the Western Task Force was ready for distribution on 16 October 1942.⁴⁸ It provided for simultaneous landings on beaches in the vicinity of Safi, Fedala, and Mehdia (west of Port-Lyautey). Subsequently, the Fedala force was to attack Casablanca from the east, reinforced by armored elements of the Safi force. Other elements of that force would prevent the enemy garrison at Marrakech from reinforcing the defenders at Casablanca. The Mehdia force was expected first to seize the airport at Port-Lyautey in time for its use as a base for aircraft not later than noon on D Day, and next to capture and occupy the airport at Salé, while protecting the northern flank of the entire operation. Five regimental combat teams, three armored landing teams totaling nine companies of tanks, and a reserve consisting of one battalion of combat engineers, one company of military police, and an antiaircraft battalion made up the three sub-task forces. They were to be carried in twenty-two combat-loaded transports, six cargo transports, and one seatrain.

The outline air plans for the Western Air Command provided for 160 short-range fighters, 13 fighter-observation aircraft, and 15 light bombers to be operating in the Casablanca area by D plus 6, beginning on D plus 2 and growing by daily flights from Gibraltar. When the French Air Force in Western Morocco ceased to be a threat, 80 of the fighters were to be shifted to the Oran area.⁴⁹

Protection and regulation of coastal shipping after the occupation became a responsibility undertaken by the British for the Mediterranean and by the Americans for the Atlantic coast of French Morocco. The Sea Frontier Forces, Western Task Force, commanded by Rear Adm. John Leslie Hall, Jr., were established for the latter task, with a planned strength of two seaplane patrol wings, over forty patrol craft, mine sweepers, tugs, and salvage vessels, and approximately 5,600 officers and men. Admiral Hall's command was to maintain antisubmarine patrols, control harbors, operate base facilities at Port-Lyautey, Fedala, Casablanca, and Safi, and assist in local defense at each of them.⁵⁰

Center Task Force Planning

The plans for taking Oran were devised in London in co-ordination with AFHQ by a planning group of the U.S. II Corps in September and early October. The group began with planning materials originally assembled for General Patton, but which were transferred to them when Casablanca finally and firmly supplanted Oran as the objective of the Western Task Force. The top planners included Cols. Arthur Nevins, Edwin B. Howard, Claude B. Ferenbaugh, and Clarence L. Adcock, and Lt. Col. Francis A. Markoe. Co-ordinated with their work was that of General Doolittle and Colonel Norstad for air, of British naval planners for convoy and ship-to-shore landing operations, Brig. Gen. Thomas B. Larkin for supply, and of the 1st Infantry and 1st Armored Divisions for their respective combat teams and other commands. Early in September, offices at Norfolk House were

occupied by Maj. Gen. Terry Allen, commanding general of the 1st Infantry Division and his chief of staff, Col. Norman D. Cota; Brig. Gen. Lunsford E. Oliver, commanding general of Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division; and later by Col. Paul McD. Robinett, commanding officer of a segment of Combat Command B which was destined to operate for a time as a separate task force. The commanding general of II Corps, General Clark; the operations officer of AFHQ, Brig. Gen. Lyman L. Lemnitzer; and the chief of staff of II Corps, Brig. Gen. Lowell Rooks, supervised the planning and made the high level decisions.⁵¹ General Fredendall, who was named late in the preparatory phase to command the Center Task Force, joined the planning group on 10 October, a few days before the final stage of ship loadings and landing rehearsals.⁵²

Oran had a population in 1942 of over 200,000 with an eighteenth-century tradition of political subordination to Spain, followed by about a century of French rule. The site is on the southern shore of a wide bight between Cap Falcon on the west and Pointe de l'Aiguille on the east. (See Map V.) Two other headlands projecting into the bight subdivide it into three bays, and Oran is on the center bay, between Mers el Kébir and Pointe Canastel. The small secondary port of Arzew, about twenty miles east of Oran, nestles in the western shore of the Golfe d'Arzew, on the eastern side of a wide and hilly promontory. Topographical features furnish Oran natural protection of great strength. Looming above Mers el Kébir and Oran on the western side of the center bay are the crests of Djebel Santon and Djebel Murdjadjo.⁵³ These crests rise from a high and rugged hill mass sheltering the communities at its base and restricting access to Oran from the west to well-defined and narrow channels. Steeply sloping bluffs rim the southern and eastern shore of Oran's bay. Inland six to twelve miles from the coast, the plain bears a broad ribbon of shallow, marshy depressions and saline lakes, or sebkras. The largest of these sebkras is southwest of Oran, where it covers an area more than twenty-five miles long and from four to six miles wide, becoming wider and muddier after rainfall has drained into it from the closely adjacent hill mass west of Oran, but whitening and contracting during the drier summer season. Just north of the Sebkra d'Oran's western end lies the village of Lourmel, which in 1942 had a small airstrip. In a corresponding position north of the salt lake's eastern end is La Sénia, which had a more fully developed Army airfield. Several much smaller lakes and marshes lie inland from the Golfe d'Arzew, and eastward from Oran. Between them and the coastal hills is an area of flat, cultivated vineyards crossed by highways and branch roads. Masonry buildings and walls are characteristic of both the villages and scattered farms.

The defenses of Oran included forty-five fortified coastal guns of considerable strength; and of Arzew, six more.⁵⁴ The most important were those on Djebel Santon, west of Mers el Kébir; on Djebel Murdjadjo, west of Oran; on Pointe Canastel, northeast of Oran; and on Cap Carbon, at the western edge of the Golfe d'Arzew. Fort du Santon had four 7.6-inch guns and a heavy concentration of antiaircraft artillery.

The Oran Division, estimated at 16,700, was stationed partly in barracks near the port and the main approaches to the city from southwest, south, and east, and partly at inland stations within one day's march. The Army airfield at La Sénia, about six miles south-southeast of Oran, and a Navy airfield at Tafaraoui, twelve miles southeast, as well as a naval seaplane base at Anew, twenty-two miles northeast of Oran, were part of the defense system. About one hundred combat aircraft were normally based there. Landing strips at Lourmel, Fleurus, Oggaz, and St. Denis-du-Sig supplemented the airfields. At the western extremity of the harbor of Oran, and at the naval base of Mers el Kébir, several French naval vessels were usually moored.

The Center Task Force plan for seizing Oran prescribed a double envelopment by forces landing simultaneously at three major beaches and one minor beach, all in bays outside of the bight.⁵⁵ Total strength consisted of about 37,100 Americans and 3,600 British, including Royal Navy personnel in the landing craft. These forces were to push inland to seize airdromes and block approaches, and to drive along the coast to capture shore batteries. To gain and hold air superiority, the Center Task Force planned to use four elements: (1) an airborne force from the United Kingdom was scheduled to drop before daylight south of Oran, near La Sénia and Tafaraoui airfields; (2) armored columns were to drive directly from their beachheads to the same airfields and to the subsidiary airstrip at Lourmel, southwest of Oran, in support of the paratroopers, and to aid in defending the fields against counterattack; (3) from first light until darkness, dive bombers and fighters from three aircraft carriers were to neutralize the French airfields and clear the air of hostile aircraft; (4) as soon as an airfield had been secured, land-based planes of the Twelfth Air Force were to be flown in from Gibraltar.

While French air power at Oran was thus being eliminated, American ground elements were to secure the southwestern and southeastern flanks, to seize control of the high ground west of the city and of the port and village of Arzew, east of the city, and, by encircling the objective in conjunction with naval units off the coast, to isolate its garrison. The westernmost landing was to occur at Mersa bou Zedjar (X Beach) in a narrow bay about twenty-eight miles airline from Oran. In the bay of Les Andalouses, seventeen miles farther east, was Y Beach. From Cap Carbon and along the southwestern sector of the Golfe d'Arzew as far as St. Leu, about twenty-two miles airline easterly from Oran, lay Z Beach, to be used by the bulk of the attacking force.

Light armored columns were to be brought to X and Z Beaches on modified Lake Maracaibo oil tankers, forerunners of the famous Landing Ship, Tank (LST). Through openings in the bows, the tanks could move over ponton bridges to shallow water, cross the beaches, shed their waterproofing equipment, and press inland. More

than half of the armor of Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division, in the Center Task Force, including all the medium (M3) tanks of the 2d Battalion, 13th Armored Regiment, were aboard transports for discharge at a dock in Anew harbor. These medium tanks were barely too large to clear the openings into the Maracaibos.

At Les Andalouses, one regimental landing team (Combat Team 26) was scheduled to come ashore and drive eastward to seize the fortified coastal batteries on Djebel Santon and Murdjadjo and engage French defenders along the roads over the hill mass west of Oran. Southeast of Cap Carbon, four companies of the 1st Ranger Battalion were to land near the 4.1-inch battery of Fort du Nord, to capture it, and to occupy the high ground commanding the town and harbor of Arzew, while two companies seized the other battery near the harbor level. From Arzew to St. Leu, in addition to the armored column, two regimental landing teams (Combat Team 18 and Combat Team 16) and other ground troops were expected to land, to capture Arzew and its port, to occupy flank-protecting positions, and to close in on Oran from the east and southeast. In so doing, they would gain control of a small airstrip at Oggaz and traverse an area containing several villages.

The British Admiralty was to furnish the units of the Center Naval Task Force (with minor exceptions) to convey the troops and their matériel, using American troops of the 1st Engineer Special Brigade as hatch crews on ten of twenty-three troop transports and as operating crews for some of the landing craft.⁵⁶

The Center Naval Task Force was planned to consist of 61 escort and 9 combat-transport ships, and 34 merchant vessels. Commodore Troubridge would command it from the special headquarters ship Largs. The battleship Rodney and the fleet aircraft carrier Furious were the 2 capital ships assigned to this force, with 2 auxiliary aircraft carriers, 2 cruisers, an antiaircraft cruiser, an antiaircraft ship, 13 destroyers, 26 lesser vessels, 10 motor launches, and 2 submarines to engage in protective tasks. Commodore Troubridge's force was subdivided into ships carrying assault personnel and landing craft for initial landings at the four beaches, groups of motor transport and tank landing ships expected to discharge before daylight, and vehicle and personnel carriers scheduled to begin debarkation at the Golfe d'Arzew after daylight.⁵⁷

The shift of command from Commodore Troubridge to General Fredendall was to occur as soon as the latter felt that he could control the situation ashore. His troops were to pass to his control as soon as they reached the beaches.⁵⁸

Operation RESERVIST, a direct assault on Oran Harbor by two small shiploads of American troops and naval personnel under Royal Navy Command, with the mission of forestalling sabotage in the port, was appended to the Center Task Force plans late in the period of preparations. The port of Oran was vital to the program of logistical support. Serious risks to prevent its being wrecked by scuttled ships and demolished facilities were deemed justifiable. That the bold entry into a defended harbor by two light vessels with a few hundred men as passengers was deeply hazardous, if not

foolhardy, was well recognized. Strong objections were overruled.⁵⁹

Although the British assumed the responsibility of protecting and controlling coastal shipping along the Mediterranean shores, following the occupation of French North Africa, Oran was to be an American-operated supply base. Rear Adm. Andrew C. Bennett (U.S.) as Commander, Advance Group, Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet in the United Kingdom, was ordered to organize an advance U.S. naval base unit including a harbor patrol and detachment to operate one major and three minor ports in the Oran area.⁶⁰ He assembled at Base Two, Rosneath, Scotland, for departure as part of the Center Task Force, a total complement of 82 U.S. Navy, 3 U.S. Marine Corps, and 9 U.S. Army officers, 520 U.S. Navy, 30 U.S. Marine Corps, and 209 U.S. Army enlisted men. The Army personnel was taken from elements of the 1st Engineer Amphibian Brigade, which had been placed under his command upon its arrival in the United Kingdom. Admiral Bennett was to be responsible to General Fredendall.

At Oran, land-based aviation from Gibraltar would begin with one group of fighters arriving by D plus 2, and reach a total of 160 short-range fighters, 13 observation-bomber aircraft, and 13 medium bombers within a week. These aircraft were to be supplemented by another 80 fighters as soon as conditions nearer Casablanca allowed them to be flown from that area. Almost daily increments would build up a total American air strength in North Africa of 400 long-range and 240 short-range fighters, 228 medium bombers, observation-bombers, and photographic reconnaissance planes. Of these 1,244 aircraft, 282 were to be reserves for wastage. The planes would be flown by seventy-one squadrons in nineteen groups, and used for fighter defense, Army co-operation, tactical and strategic bombing, long-range reconnaissance, and airborne operations. General Doolittle's headquarters was at first to be at Gibraltar, then shift to Oran.⁶¹

Planning for Operations at Algiers

In planning for the operations at Algiers, Allied capacity for co-operation was subjected to a substantial test at the outset. Planning began before the executive agreement of 5 September with the assumption that the operations would fall to a British force to be led by Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. Anderson (Br.) as Commanding General, British First Army. Almost a month of work by First Army planners on the project preceded the decision on 5 September that during the assault all three landing forces should be under American command. Two American regimental combat teams were to participate in the assault on Algiers and were to try to make the American character of the force as conspicuous to the French as possible; but part of the assault elements and all of the reinforcements afloat, two thirds of the total, were to be British. General Ryder left his headquarters in Northern Ireland as Commanding General, 34th U.S.

Infantry Division, to report on 5 September at Norfolk House as Commanding General, Eastern Assault Force. General Anderson's plans for the drive into Tunisia had to be adapted to the capabilities and requirements of an Allied task force serving at first under another commander. After Algiers had capitulated, Anderson was to relieve Ryder and, as Commanding General, Eastern Task Force, to control the critical operations to seize Tunisia. The shift of command at Algiers was clarified in a conference of Generals Clark, Anderson, and Ryder on 8 September.⁶²

Further to preserve the attack's American character, which British intelligence reports had declared to be prudent, General Ryder was authorized to name Brig. Gen. Ray E. Porter (U.S.) as Deputy Commander, Eastern Assault Force.⁶³ His two American regimental combat teams were the 168th from his own division, recently put under the command of Col. John W. O'Daniel, and the 39th (from the 9th Division), under Col. Benjamin F. Caffey, Jr. The 39th, embarking in the same transports it expected to use in the assault, was shipped from the United States in time to reach the United Kingdom on 7-8 October.⁶⁴ All other troops were necessarily furnished from British First Army.

The military problem at Algiers had certain resemblances to that at Oran.⁶⁵ The city is on the western shore of the bay of Algiers, which extends for about twelve miles between Pointe Pescade on a broad headland at the west and Cap Matifou, a sharper promontory at the east. (See Map 3.) The bay is somewhat deeper than Oran's, but is sheltered by western heights which, although lower, correspond to Djebel Murdjadjo and Djebel Santon, west of Oran. The suburbs of La Bouzaréa and Lambiridi (formerly known as El Biar) occupy the western heights at Algiers. Industrial towns and resort villages line the southern shore of the bay east of Algiers. The headland, cape, and heights along the coast furnish sites for coastal defense batteries, with positions and ranges covering the bay's entire rim. From the crest of the ridges west of the city, the land slopes gradually westward until it reaches a section of the coast between the small communities of Castiglione and Guyotville. The sixteen miles of coast between them trends northeast and southwest and, at Cap Sidi Ferruch, is divided into two unequal portions. A jutting promontory at Cap Sidi Ferruch, four miles west of Guyotville, separates two bays on either side of it. Here in 1830 an expedition of about 37,000 men had once landed as the first step in the French conquest of Algiers, then under a Moslem ruler. A modern fort at Cap Sidi Ferruch was intended to prevent history from repeating itself.

Beyond Cap Matifou and the small village of Jean-Bart at its base, the coast is low and unprotected for many miles past Aïn Taya village to the east-southeast. Directly south of the bay is Maison Carrée, about eight miles from Algiers. It is a commercial town of perhaps 30,000 through which run the main highway and railroad connections with the great port. Husseïn Dey, an industrial suburb almost as large as Maison Carrée is halfway between the two, and Birmandreïs, a smaller residential suburb, is less than five miles directly south of Algiers. South and southwest of the bay of Algiers

is a ribbon of undulating plain, one of the most fertile sections of Algiers, extending to the foothills of the Atlas Tellien. Of the streams which drain northward from the mountains to the coast, two cross this region to enter the bay of Algiers and two others skirt the outer edges of the headlands bounding the bay. At Husseïn Dey, Maison Blanche, and Blida in November 1942 were airfields which an occupying force must bring under control.

The coastal defense batteries near Algiers, twelve or thirteen in number, were known to be strongest at Pointe Pescade and Cap Matifou and very effectively placed for resistance to landings at Cap Sidi Ferruch or near the port at Algiers. The Batterie du Lazaret near Cap Matifou had a range of more than fourteen miles. Weaker batteries, as well as antiaircraft guns, were sited along the bay, on the heights of the city, and near the airfields. No naval force comparable to that at Casablanca was likely to be found in Algiers harbor, but a few smaller ships could be anticipated.

French combat aircraft in Algeria were estimated to consist of 2 reconnaissance planes, 39 bombers, and 52 fighters, supplemented by 20 transport planes. German bombers from Sardinia could also be expected to intervene, although the distance from their bases would deprive them of fighter escort and leave them without enough fuel for prolonged operations near Algiers. Ground troops in Algeria included the Algiers Division of about 16,000 and the Constantine Division of 13,000, plus the 7th Legion of Guards, 1,500, and an antiaircraft regiment numbering 3,000. An armored force which could muster 6 medium and 60 light tanks, some armored cars, and an uncertain amount of motorized 75-mm. artillery had to be taken into consideration. The main resistance to an approach to Algiers from the east could be expected from a garrison of 1,200 at Maison Carrée and from the armored unit, seven miles southeast of the objective. Coastal defense exercises against surprise night attack were held late in September.⁶⁶

The Eastern Assault Force's plan of attack prescribed three simultaneous landings by major elements, two of them to be west of Algiers and the third, east of Cap Matifou near the village of Aïn Taya.⁶⁷ Each landing was to be in the strength of one regimental combat team, that by British troops to be made by the 11th Infantry Brigade Group of the British 78th Division. The two American units were to drive inland and to converge, thus sealing off Algiers from reinforcements, while the third sub-task force protected the western flank and held itself in readiness for commitment either against the city or in securing the airfield at Blida. The 168th Combat Team was to seize coastal defenses west of Algiers, aided by a Commando unit, and press into the city through the suburban heights while the 39th Combat Team was capturing other coastal defenses near Cap Matifou, occupying airfields and the powerful Radio Alger (THA) station,⁶⁸ and closing on the city from the east. A floating reserve available for landing on the afternoon of D Day, either to assist in the attack on Algiers or to capture Blida airfield and protect the south flank, would be furnished by the British 36th Infantry Brigade Group. One squadron of the British 56th Reconnaissance Regiment was also scheduled for landing with

the 11th Infantry Brigade Group and for subsequent availability in force reserve.

Operation TERMINAL, a direct assault on Algiers harbor by a special force combining British naval with American Army elements, was inserted in the plans in much the same general form and manner as Operation RESERVIST at Oran harbor.⁶⁹

After General Anderson relieved General Ryder on orders from the Allied commander in chief, Ryder's command would be transformed. His American units would be redesignated the 34th Infantry Division and come under General Anderson's command as the Algiers garrison. His British units would revert to the British 78th Division.

These plans for the Eastern Assault Force were completed with persistent concern for the subsequent mission of the Eastern Task Force. General Anderson was responsible for establishing a base in Algiers and then speedily occupying eastern Algeria and Tunisia. He had urged without success that assault landings be made on D Day at Philippeville and Bône. He sought to accomplish some of the same objectives while conforming to the decisions of 5 September by planning to assemble a seaborne assault force from the British units released by General Ryder, and sending it to take the airdrome at Djidjelli and the port of Bougie, escorted by naval units from the Eastern Naval Task Force which could be spared from Algiers. He had hoped to have at sea for early arrival and debarkation at easterly ports most of the troops and matériel with which he expected to penetrate Tunisia. Transport on the scale required to meet his proposals could not be supplied, although the rate of build-up for the Eastern Task Force was greatly to exceed that at Oran.⁷⁰

The capture and employment of the eastern ports--Bougie, Philippeville, and Bône--required air defense by fighter planes from adjacent landing grounds if the losses to enemy bombing attack were to be kept within bearable limits. A British parachute force using American transport aircraft would be in Allied Force reserve and probably be available, as also would be whatever American parachute forces in the Center Task Force were not expended in taking Oran. But whatever commitments of these elements were made to gain control of airfields along the coast would naturally delay airborne attacks at Bizerte and Tunis.

Air support was to be furnished to General Anderson's forces by the Eastern Air Command under Air Marshal Welsh, perhaps reinforced by units from the U.S. Twelfth Air Force. The prospects were well below General Anderson's desires, for the 45,000 British and 10,000 American troops that he would have in the Algiers area by 12 November would be supported by at most five squadrons of fighters, one light bomber squadron, one Army Co-operation squadron, one photographic reconnaissance squadron, and a general long-range reconnaissance squadron for co-operation with the Royal Navy. Service and maintenance units might by 12 November be able to operate at Maison Blanche airfield or even at Blida. The air build-up was expected to

enlarge this force as rapidly as possible during the remainder of November, but, at the time when the Eastern Task Force might be reaching its objective in Tunisia and under the strongest enemy resistance, the Eastern Air Command would still be much too weak for the needs of full-scale offensive action with the troops. Fighter planes were to be shipped in crates to Gibraltar and assembled at the airdrome there. Ground units were to be brought by sea in order that air transports might be available to the paratroop units to the fullest possible extent.⁷¹

The Eastern Air Command was intended to reach, in seven weeks, a total of 454 aircraft, in twenty-five and one-third squadrons, more than half of which would be short-range fighters, 43 would be general reconnaissance planes, and less than 100 would be bombers of all types.⁷² Eastern Air Command headquarters was to be in Algiers.

Plans for the Eastern Task Force were made in alternative forms since French resistance or French acceptance of the advance might so gravely affect the rate of eastward movement. If the French resisted, a methodical overland advance was expected to yield the capture of Bône in about three weeks. If the French either passively or actively aided the march, the Eastern Task Force would push boldly along the coast, with parachute drops at Bône, Bizerte, and Tunis on successive days, commencing on D plus 3.⁷³

Political Preparations

Tactical plans for the occupation of each of the major objectives were founded on the knowledge that the size and equipment of all French military forces had been severely restricted by Axis limitations, and in the hope that actual resistance might be minimized by political activity. Indeed, an underlying objective of the whole operation was to promote conditions which would bring the French back into the war on the side of the Allies. To effect a purely nominal resistance to the landings, followed by association in arms against the Axis powers, was the purpose both of Allied representatives in French North Africa and of pro-Allied Frenchmen (in the armed services, civil administration, or private life) who were enrolled in secret organizations. The Allied agents worked in French North Africa under instructions from AFHQ.

A special staff section at AFHQ was created in August to furnish political information to General Eisenhower and to draft plans applicable to political aspects of the undertaking. Many of these problems had been anticipated by the British. The chief of this Political Affairs Section, Mr. W. H. B. Mack (Br.), was transferred to that position from the British Foreign Office. His first instructions were actually signed by Anthony Eden, the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Mr. Mack's administrative task with reference to Operation TORCH was to co-ordinate five agencies, four British and one American: the Special Operations Executive, Political Warfare Executive, Secret Intelligence Service, Ministry of Information, and Office of the Coordinator of Information (later, the Office of

Strategic Services).⁷⁴ A draft plan for political warfare was submitted to General Gruenther, Deputy Chief of Staff, Allied Force.⁷⁵ It sketched elaborate preparations for propaganda, for the terms of possible armistices between each of the task forces and the local French commanders, for the conduct of civil affairs following the termination of hostilities, and for the ultimate status of the French colonies and of the government at Vichy. This tentative plan was considered in trying to arrive at an outline plan for the entire operation which would be likely to succeed.

Mr. Robert Murphy served in North Africa as the chief diplomatic representative of the United States before the decision in July 1942 to send an Allied expedition there. It was well understood by General Marshall that the President would assume personal direction of political activities, but it was expected also that he would so manage them that General Eisenhower, as the Allied commander in chief, was kept fully aware of all details and in immediate control. General Eisenhower believed that "subversive activities, propaganda, and political warfare had to be carefully and completely co-ordinated with military plans if they were to avoid being not only inappropriate but also a positive menace." In furtherance of this aim Murphy was designated to become a member of his staff, to take up the position when the Allied Force arrived in French North Africa. Before that time, he acted less as a staff than as a line officer in his leadership of the political negotiations and preparations from Casablanca to Algiers.⁷⁶

The Joint Chiefs of Staff assigned control over all the American agencies concerned with undercover preparation for TORCH in North Africa and Spain to the Allied commander in chief. The British agencies were brought into co-ordination with the American by putting them all under the supervision of G-3 at AFHQ. Colonel Eddy (U.S. Marine Corps) directed them from Tangier and Col. Brien Clarke (Br.), acting as his deputy, directed them from Gibraltar. Murphy was empowered to control the schedule and order any necessary modifications of secret operations, and even to direct them in Algeria and Tunisia should that become expedient.⁷⁷

Murphy flew to Washington from Algiers early in September for conferences with the President, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and officials of the Department of State. He presented his own estimates of the prospective operation's political aspects and reported that a reputable military group in Algiers recommended Allied association with Gen. Henri Giraud as a French leader. He then learned from the President that a final decision to occupy French North Africa had actually been reached.⁷⁸

Murphy then went to London bringing a draft directive from the President for General Eisenhower to review, and voluminous data for the Allied military leadership

to consider. Disguised as "Lt. Col. McGowan," and traveling by air without revealing his identity to fellow passengers, he then spent almost twenty-four hours at General Eisenhower's rural cottage near London. His grasp of matters of military significance and his evident judgment and discretion gained General Eisenhower's "utmost confidence." He satisfied both American and British members of Eisenhower's group that their plans were well founded and that he could serve them without breaking the tight barriers of security. The topics under discussion ranged widely. Murphy learned that the size of the projected expedition would closely approximate that which the French in North Africa had estimated would be necessary. He indicated the civilian and military co-operation which could be expected. The conference reviewed the problem of how long an interval should elapse between notification of the friendly French and actual Allied landings, the risk of losing surprise being balanced against the necessity for enough time secretly to mobilize the fifth columnists.

The draft directive from the President to Murphy under which he was to return to Algiers as the President's personal representative authorized him to give at least a twenty-four-hour notice to reliable friends and to identify for them the approximate landing beaches. Although more than a twenty-four-hour notice would be needed, he was persuaded by General Eisenhower that no French leader should be notified until D Day was imminent. On the theme of the supreme command over inter-Allied forces in French North Africa, a post which, Murphy reported, General Giraud's adherents in Africa clearly expected him to hold, General Eisenhower foreshadowed the position he later took in direct discussion with General Giraud--the French forces must first be rearmed by the Allies and in condition to defend Northwest Africa successfully before the Allies could consider permitting them to exercise supreme command there. French forces could remain under French command, but would have to co-operate fully with an Allied supreme commander.⁷⁹ The President's draft directive to Murphy specified that no change in the civil administration of each of the three territories of French North Africa was contemplated. The Allied leaders intended to leave the non-co-operating French there to the mercies of the friendly French, while preventing acts of private vengeance. Although de Gaulle might be bypassed in Operation TORCH, he would have an essential role in connection with the cross-Channel attack, and the Allied commander in chief expressed strong interest in including de Gaulle in planning for that operation as soon as possible.⁸⁰

These conferences with Murphy in Washington, Hyde Park (New York), and London consolidated the broad planning for activities involving the friendly French. The precise secret operations ashore which were to facilitate the landings were determined in separate conferences in London and Washington until instructions from the Commander in Chief, Allied Force, to Colonel Eddy were issued on 14 October.⁸¹ The

instructions provided alternative programs of sabotage and subversive action near the main objectives of each of the task forces, one program in case of resistance by the French armed forces and a second in case of their acquiescence. These programs involved either destructive sabotage or close control over communications and transportation, neutralization of coast defenses, immobilization of ships and submarines in port, sending up signal flares and supplying guides for the Allies, and other such activity.

Careful attention was given to the preparation of written material in furtherance of political and propaganda aims. These documents included a set of formal communications, prepared partly in London and partly in Washington, from the President to the rulers and chiefs of government of Portugal, Spain, Vichy France, Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. Proclamations were formulated, both in French and in Arabic, to be issued in the name of the President or of the commander in chief. Propaganda leaflets were prepared to be dropped from airplanes. Radio technicians and broadcasting teams were brought to the United Kingdom from the United States to accompany the Center Task Force. Other field units were organized to produce and distribute leaflets and to work with local newspapers.⁸²

Civil Affairs Planning

Most of the political preparations thus far described were concerned with minimizing armed resistance to the occupying forces and with obtaining active co-operation from the French in driving the Axis from northern Africa. But other arrangements looked to the maintenance of security in the rear areas after the Allies were established ashore, when French North Africa would become a base for further operations. The Civil Affairs Section of AFHQ under Mr. H. Freeman Matthews (U.S.) formulated the requisite plans to prepare for such responsibilities.

The Allies had no political course in mind other than to win campaigns in the field while allowing the French to work out their own internal problems, unhampered and unaided. This policy was avowed by the President and set forth as approved military doctrine.⁸³ They allowed for two contrasting contingencies. A friendly reception from the French would warrant one set of arrangements; strong opposition, followed by conditions which necessitated stringent military control, would justify another. The planners therefore prepared armistice terms for use by the task force commanders to fit either situation, and also devised two alternative series of proclamations and ordinances.⁸⁴ The fundamental purpose was to avoid any interference with the population except what was inescapable and necessary to assist military operations. The basic method would be to supervise the operation of existing civil agencies by the French. The past political sympathies of officeholders were to be treated as of small significance compared with their ability to discharge the technical duties of their respective positions.

Foreign exchange transactions and the use of bank accounts were to be subject to

licenses which a task force commander might grant or withhold. Taxes were to be collected in the normal ways, but those formerly devoted to the national government were to be applied to meet any expenses of military government.

Large expenditures would be made by the invading forces within French North Africa for labor and rentals, as well as for the payment of the troops. Damage claims by individual proprietors could be expected. The currency to be used by the Allied Force was the subject of careful study and discussion. It was not possible to obtain in advance adequate amounts of the local currencies of the three French colonies without forfeiting surprise. Insufficient amounts were therefore to be supplemented by special invasion currencies, American and British, to be used prior to a negotiated agreement with the local government and bank of issue at rates of exchange somewhat more favorable to the franc than in the free market in October 1942. These provisional rates were 75 francs to the dollar, 300 francs to the pound sterling.⁸⁵

Agreements reached after the invasion could provide for the use in specific areas of local franc currencies issued against dollar credits in the United States. Local currencies were to be obtained from local banks, being printed if necessary in the United States and furnished to those banks for issue. The rates of exchange would be fixed in the agreements.⁸⁶ Finance officers were commissioned directly from civilian positions which equipped them for their military roles. The Treasury, War, and State Departments cooperated in preparing for the currency problems.⁸⁷

Control over importation of civilian necessities such as cotton goods, tea, and sugar, in great demand by the Arabs, and coal, gasoline, kerosene, candles, and soap, items wanted mainly by other groups, was recognized as an instrument of political influence. It was deemed prudent to relate the distribution of consumers' goods to employment in the service of the Allies, making it possible for the natives to convert their labor at the ports and along the lines of supply into possession of scarce and highly desired commodities.⁸⁸

Plans applicable to civil affairs were completed in time for issue in AFHQ General Orders on 11, 12, and 21 October.⁸⁹ Arrangements were also made for the inclusion in each task force of a civilian deputy civil administrator, a military assistant civil administrator, and a section of some seven additional specialists. At AFHQ, the Political Affairs Section under Mr. Mack and the Civil Affairs Section under Mr. Matthews were combined into one section to be headed by the latter until Robert Murphy could assume his position as chief civil administrator and political adviser of the commander in chief. The Propaganda Operations subsection and the Psychological Analysis and Planning subsection, headed by members of the Office of War Information and Office of Strategic Services respectively, were to be supervised by Col. Julius

Holmes in G-1, while the special operations sections of the Office of Strategic Services (U.S.) and the Special Operation Executive (Br.) Section would remain under G-3 for co-ordination with other activities.⁹⁰

Thus in most respects, the strategic decisions, tactical plans, and political preparations took form early in October, with the interval before the prospective departure of the assault convoys narrowing to a matter of days.

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Footnotes

1. U.S. Navy Dept CNO, Amphibious Warfare Instruction (USF 6), 1946, pp. 3-21.

2. (1) Clark, Calculated Risk, p. 48. (2) Butcher, My Three Years With Eisenhower, pp. 56ff., utilizing Clark's daily reports as Deputy CinC AF to the CinC AF.

3. (1) Ltr, Gen Clark to author, 12 Apr 49, cites entry in his diary of 11 August 1942 for confirmation of his appointment. (2) Clark, Calculated Risk, p. 42. (3) The abbreviations (U.S.) for American and (Br.) for British will be used to indicate nationality.

4. History of Allied Force Headquarters, Pt. I, DRB AGO. August 1942-December 1942, pp. 3ñ4, 18, 23-26.

5. General Smith reported on 15 September 1942, relieving General Clark. Hist of AFHQ, Pt. I, p. 18.

6. See Chart 1, p. 34.

7. See Hist of AFHQ, Pt. I, pp. 13-14.

8. (1) CCS 75/3. (2) CCS 45th Mtg, 23 Oct 42. (3) Msgs: USFOR to AGWAR, 16 Aug 42, CM-IN 6000, and 7 Sep 42, CM-IN 2710; AGWAR to USFOR, 9 Sep 42, CM-OUT 3034.

9. (1) Msg, AGWAR to USFOR, 31 Jul 42, CM-OUT 9255. (2) Butcher, My Three Years With Eisenhower, pp. 43, 45-46. (3) Fifty-six years old, General Patton had been a cavalryman prominent in the newer Armored force since his World War I service in France. At the time of his summons to Washington at the end of July 1942, he was commanding the I Armored Corps at the Desert Training Center in California, with corps maneuvers imminent. (4) General Anderson had entered the British Army in 1911. After serving through World War I, he rose to command the 11th Infantry Brigade in 1930 and the 3d Division in 1940 in France. He had also been the commander of British troops in Palestine in 1930-1932. When he assumed command of the Eastern Task Force he was in his fifty-first year.

10. Ltr, Eisenhower to Marshall, 3 Oct 42. WDCSA 381 TORCH.

11. General Fredendall, fifty-eight years old, with much experience in Army training, had succeeded Maj. Gen. Joseph Stilwell (U.S.) as the prospective commander of an American force in Operation GYMNAST had worked at plans until that project was dropped, and had previously commanded the II Corps. General Marshall proposed him for task force commander, if needed, on 24 August 1942 (CM-OUT 7500). General Eisenhower requested him on 1 October 1942 (CM-IN 0176). Fredendall arrived in London on 9 October 1942.

12. General Ryder was fifty years old, with a record of distinguished service in France in World War I, occupation duty in Germany, four years in China, and previous assignment as Chief of Staff, VI Corps, during 1941 maneuvers.

13. (1) Rev Draft Dir, COS to Anderson, 21 Oct 42. These paragraphs appeared unchanged in the actual directive sent to General Anderson, 23 October 1942. Identical paragraphs were contained in the COS directives to Lt. Gen. Mason MacFarlane (Br.) at Gibraltar and Lt. Gen. Frederick Morgan (Br.), Commanding General, Northern Task Force. Ltr, Director Mil Opns to Eisenhower, 28 Oct 42. See Hist of AFHQ, Pt. I, p. 10, 10n. (2) The relation of national to Allied commander was thus made more subordinate than in 1918 after an initial proposal that it remain the same. CinC AF Diary, 9 Oct 42.

14. Morison, U.S. Naval Operations, II, 21-23.

15. (1) TSD/Hist Sec Admiralty Naval Staff, Battle Summary 38, Operation "TORCH," Invasion of North Africa, November 1942 to February 1943. B. R. 1736 (31), 1948 (cited hereafter as Br. Battle Sum 38, Opn "TORCH"). Copy in OCMH. (2) Admiral Burrough, whose service in World War I included the Battle of Jutland, had already seen some bitter fighting in World War II off the Norwegian coast, on the hazardous Murmansk run, and in an August dash through the gantlet to Malta which persevered against extremely heavy Axis opposition. Commodore Troubridge had participated in Royal Navy operations in Norwegian waters in 1940 and in the expedition which seized Madagascar from the Vichy French in May 1942, an operation which had benefited materially from the success of a special raiding party of Royal Marines taken by destroyer directly into the port of Diégo-Suarez. See Churchill, The Hinge of Fate, pp. 233-34.

16. NCXF (Admiral Sir Andrew Browne Cunningham), Report of Proceedings, Operation TORCH, 31 Mar 43, with incls. AFHQ Micro Job 8, Reels 16A-17A.

17. Craven and Cate, The Army Air Forces, II, 53-55.

18. JCS 127/1, 13 Oct 42.

19. Partial records of its meetings are in CNO, TORCH Planning Minutes. Div of Naval Hist, Env 96, Box 7, Job 4622.

20. Copies in OPD Exec 5, Item 2, Tabs 13, 14.

21. (1) Msg, AGWAR to USFOR, 9 Oct 42, CM-OUT 02981. (2) Eisenhower applied the same principle as that of the annex in Dir, CinC AF to Comdr WTF, 13 Oct 42. Copy in Col Gay Opnl Misc 1942 file, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.

22. Transcript of phone conv, Gen Hull with Patton, 1045, 30 Jul 42. OPD Exec 8, Bk. 6.

23. (1) Intervs with Col Gay and Col Halley Grey Maddox, 11 Feb 48. (2) Sgt Sidney L. Meller, The Desert Training Center and Calif.-Ariz. Maneuver Area, Hist Sec, AGF, Study 15 (1946), pp. 31, 103, citing records of phone convs, 7 Aug, 20 Aug, and 1 Sep 42. Camp Haan, Desert Training Center 319.1 (2). (3) Memo, Patton for ACofS OPD, 3 Aug 42, sub: Notes on WTF--TORCH Opn. OPD Exec 5, Item 3, Tab 14.

24. Interv with Admiral Henry Kent Hewitt (Ret.), 23 Jan 51.

25. Interv with Col Maddox, 11 Feb 48.

26. Dir, Clark to Patton, 19 Aug 42. OPD TF "A" Rcds.

27. Dir, Brig Gen St. Clair Streett to CG WTF, 24 Aug 42. OPD Exec 8, Bk. 6.

28. (1) For anticipated coastal defenses near the landing points, see pp. 100-101, 118-19, 154 below. (2) WTF Rpt, Analysis of Military, Civil and Economic Facilities, Sep 42. OPD TF "A" Rcds.

29. (1) Memo, Truscott for Clark, 12 Sep 42, sub: Comments on WTF Tentative Plan (Outline Plan). AFHQ AG 370.3-21, Micro Job 24, Reel 79D. (2) Ltr, Patton to CinC Joint Opns, 24 Sep 42. AFHQ G-3 Ops 77/5, Micro Job 10A, Reel 23C.

30. Ltr, Patton to Eisenhower, 10 Sep 42. Copy in OPD Exec 2, Item 9.

31. Truscott, who was then forty-seven years old, had entered the Army in 1917 as a cavalry officer, was one of the Army's well-known polo players, and had experience with the 13th Armored Regiment and as plans and training officer of IX Corps at Fort Lewis, Washington, before going to the European Theater. He was to rise to command successively the VI Corps, Fifth Army, and Third Army.

32. Harmon, then forty-eight years old, graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1917, was commissioned in the Cavalry, served in France in 1918, studied or taught in various schools in the next decade, and graduated from the Army War College in 1934. He was to rise to command the XXII Corps in 1945 and to organize and command the U.S. Constabulary in Germany in 1946 before retiring to become president of Norwich University in 1950.

33. Anderson, then fifty-two, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1911, was commissioned in Field Artillery in 1912, and rose to the grade of lieutenant colonel in France during World War I. After graduating from the Army War College in 1930, he remained as an instructor and later taught for four years at West Point, and attended the Naval War College. He was assigned to the War Plans Division before going to the 3d Infantry Division and was later to command successively the X, III, and XXXVI Corps and the Field Artillery Replacement Training Center at Fort Sill.

34. General Keyes, then fifty-four, graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1913, saw service with the Pershing Expedition and elsewhere as a cavalry officer, attended the école Supérieure de Guerre in Paris, 1931-1933, and the Army War College, 1936-1937, before commanding a mechanized cavalry unit at Fort Knox, Kentucky. He had become Commanding General, 9th Armored Division, before becoming Patton's deputy commander, and was later to command II Corps in Italy and an Army in Germany during the occupation.

35. (1) Memo, ACofS OPD for CG's AGF and SOS, 2 Sep 42, sub: Prep of units for overseas service; Memo, ACofS OPD for CG's AGF, SOS, and TF "A," 3 Sep 42, issued 5 Sep 42, sub: Creation of TF. OPD 370.5 TF. (2) Ltrs, Patton to CinC AF, 24 Sep 42, and to CG's Sub-Task Forces and ASC, 10 Oct 42. AFHQ Gñ3 Ops 77/5, Micro Job 10A, Reel 23C.

36. On 1 October 1942 the XII Ground-Air Support Command was redesignated the XII Air Support Command.

37. General Cannon, then fifty, entered the Army in 1917 from the Reserve Officers' Training Corps, trained as a pilot in 1921, served in the Hawaiian Islands and Argentina, graduated from Command and General Staff College in 1937, and was Commanding General, I Interceptor Command, in 1942. He was later to command the Twelfth Air Force, 1943ñ1945.

38. AAF Director of Intell Service, Photo Intell Rpt 99, 28 Sep 42, Defenses of Atlantic Coastal Cities in Northwest Africa. AAF Archives.

39. Memo, Rear Adm Charles M. Cooke, Jr., for King, 29 Sep 42. Div of Naval Hist, Cominch 35, AC/S F-1.

40. The Western Task Force was eventually cut down to 33,843 men, including personnel of the XII Ground-Air Support Command.

41. (1) Joseph Bykofsky and Harold Larson, The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas, UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II (Washington, 1957). (2) Maj. William R. Wheeler, ed., The Road to Victory (Newport News, Va., 1946), Vol. I, Ch. VIII.

42. See n. 20.

43. Mins are in CNO, TORCH Planning Minutes. Div of Naval Hist, Env 96, Box 7, Job 4622.

44. Memo, Patton for Maj Gen Thomas T. Handy, 21 Sep 42. OPD Exec 5.

45. Msg, USFOR to AGWAR, 13 Oct 42, CM-IN 05483.

46. Interv with Hewitt, 23 Jan 51.

47. (1) Information supplied by Rear Adm Edward A. Mitchell, then Operations and Senior Plans Officer, Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet. OCMH. (2) Memo, Patton for Sub-Task Force and AAF Comdrs, 19 Oct 42, sub: Policy toward French. Col Gay Opnl Misc 1942 file, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.

48. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 6, 16 Oct 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

49. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 1a to Annex 1 (Air Outline Plan), 20 Sep 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

50. Sea Frontier Forces WTF, Opn Plan A-42, 16 Oct 42, with annexes. Copy in OCMH.

51. General Rooks, then forty-nine, entered the Army in 1917, served as an infantry officer in France, studied and taught at The Infantry School and the Command and General Staff College, and graduated from the Army War College in 1937. He became Chief of Staff II Corps, in June 1942 after service at General Headquarters and Army Ground Forces. Later, he became G-3, AFHQ; Deputy Chief of Staff, AFHQ; Commanding General, 90th Infantry Division; and Deputy G-3, Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force.

52. II Corps CTF, Roster of Officers, Warrant Officers, and Enlisted Men. DRB AGO 202-10.6. General Larkin of Services of Supply, ETOUSA, was prospective Commanding Officer, Mediterranean Base Section, at Oran.

53. The word "djebel" is the customary French North African term for high hill or mountain.

54. See p. 193 below.

55. CTF FO 1, 4 Oct 42.

56. (1) Brig Gen Henry C. Wolfe, Lessons from Operation TORCH, 30 Dec 42. (2) Brig. Gen. William F. Heavey, Down Ramp (Washington, 1947), p. 30.

57. Br. Battle Sum 38, Opn "TORCH."

58. CinC AF Diary, 5 Oct 42.

59. On record most emphatically was Admiral Bennett (U.S.) at whose training station at Rosneath, Scotland, the RESERVIST Force got ready for the operation. See NCXF, Report of Proceedings, Operation TORCH, 31 Mar 43, Incl 6 (Miscellaneous Reports of Proceedings), Rpt of Commander U.S. Naval bases, Oran Area, Incl B.

60. Cominch Secret Despatch 1645, 22 Sep 42, cited in Rpt, Adm Bennett to CinC US Fleet, 30 Nov 42. Div of Naval Hist, File A16-3. It was to be Task Group 26.8, U.S. Atlantic Fleet.

61. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 1a to Annex 1, 20 Sep 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

62. CinC AF Diary, 5 Sep, 9 Sep, and 14 Sep 42.

63. CinC AF Diary, 17 Sep 42.

64. 39th Inf Hist, 1942.

65. Terrain and defenses as shown in EAF FO 1, G-2 Annex.

66. Msg, Dyer to Marshall, 26 Sep 42, CM-IN 11647.

67. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 3, 11 Oct 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

68. At Les Eucalyptus.

69. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 3a, 13 Oct 42. OPD 381 TORCH. (2) Provisional Convoy Programme with AFHQ Troop List 2 (Order of Battle), 3 Oct 42. 1942 TORCH Plans UK Col Gay file, Kansas City Rcds Ctr. This list allowed for 116,000 reinforcements to the Eastern Task Force while 58,000 were brought to the Center Task Force up to D plus 33.

70. CinC AF Diary, 14 Sep, 15 Sep, 17 Sep, and 13 Oct 42.

71. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 1c to Annex 2 of Annex 1 (Air Outline Plan TORCH), 20 Sep 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

72. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 1a to Annex 1, 20 Sep 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

73. Outline Plan TORCH, 8 Oct 42, Annex 4, 28 Oct 42. OPD 381 TORCH.

74. (1) Dir, Eden to Mack, 15 Aug 42; Ltr, Mack to Eden, 19 Aug 42. Copies in OPD ABC 381 TORCH, Sec 1. (2) Msg 1381, London to AGWAR, 21 Aug 42, CM-IN 8420. ETOUSA Outgoing Cables, Kansas City Rcds Ctr. (3) Ltr to All Concerned, 15 Sep 42. AFHQ 330, 31-5.

75. Ltr, Eisenhower to Clark, 16 Aug 42; Ltrs, Mack to Gruenther, 20 Aug and 23 Aug 42; Memo, Political Warfare Executive Policy in the Light of TORCH. AFHQ AG 336-97, Micro Job 24, Reel 78D.

76. Telg, London to AGWAR, 7 Aug 42, CM-IN 2389 (paraphrase).

77. (1) Telgs, London to AGWAR, 7 Sep 42, CM-IN 11538, and 16 Oct 42, CM-IN 6797. (2) Hist of AFHQ, Pt. 1, pp. 84-86. (3) Langer, Our Vichy Gamble, pp. 307-16.

78. Langer, Our Vichy Gamble, p. 311, prints Murphy's Memorandum. CM-IN 3151, 22 Sep 42, CM-IN 9484, 26 Sep 42.

79. Butcher, My Three Years With Eisenhower, p. 108.

80. Min, Discussion with Mr. Murphy. AFHQ AG 336-97, Micro Reel 78D, Job 24. The minutes were kept by Col. Julius Holmes.

81. (1) Ltr, Gen Lemnitzer to Commodore Douglas-Pennant et al., 8 Sep 42. AFHQ Micro Job 24, Reel 136D. (2) Memo, ACofS G-3 AFHQ for CofS's of ETF, EAF, CTF, and WTF, 24 Sep 42, sub: SOE/OSS. Copy in 1942 TORCH Plans UK Col Gay file, Kansas City Rcds Ctr. (3) Secret Opns Instrucs to Col Eddy, 14 Oct 42. AFHQ Micro Job 24, Reel 81D.

82. (1) Msgs: USFOR to AGWAR, 6 Nov 42, CM-IN 2625; AGWAR to USFOR, 15 Oct 42, CM-OUT 04949; USFOR to AGWAR, 13 Oct 42, CM-IN 05515. (2) Msg, Murphy to Hull for Eisenhower, 30 Oct 42. Copy in WDCSA 381 TORCH Sec 2.

83. Albert K. Weinberg and Harry L. Coles, Jr., Soldiers Become Governors, a volume in preparation for the series UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II.

84. (1) CCS 103/9, 16 Oct 42. (2) CCS 44th Mtg, Supp Notes.

85. Msg 1498, USFOR to AGWAR, 25 Aug 42, CM-IN 9685; Mag 2417, USFOR to AGWAR, 19 Sep 42; Mag R-1576, AGWAR to USFOR, 5 Oct 42, CM-OUT 1597; Mag R-2395, AGWAR to USFOR, 24 Oct 42, CM-OUT 8579. ETOUSA Outgoing and Incoming Cables, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.

86. Msg R-1735, AGWAR to USFOR, 9 Oct 42, CM-OUT 02966. ETOUSA Incoming Cables, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.

87. Msg R-1844, AGWAR to USFOR, 12 Oct 42, CM-OUT 03901. ETOUSA Incoming Cables, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.

88. JCS 136. Copy in OPD 381 (7-25-42) Sec 3.

89. AFHQ GO's 4 (11 Oct 42), 5 (12 Oct 42), and 8 (21 Oct 42).

90. Msg R-1901, WD to CG ETOUSA, 13 Oct 42, CM-OUT 04257; Msg 3633, London to AGWAR, 15 Oct 42, CM-IN 6797. ETOUSA Incoming and Outgoing Cables, Kansas City Rcds Ctr.