In an account of the Lechi attack on a carpark bivuac of the British Army in April 1946, I found two remarkable sentences written by Major General Dare Wilson CBE MC, author of Cordon and Search.
In 1945, Wilson was
officer commanding a squadron of the 6th Airborne Armoured Reconnaissance Regiment. He was promoted to captain on 1 July 1946. He then worked in the headquarters of the 6th Airborne Division. Near the end of the British Mandate, he commanded a company of the 1st Battalion, Parachute Regiment.
Here are the sentences:
It might be explained here that up to this point the stage had not yet been reached when deliberate attacks on British Army personnel were expected. Thus the defence for this guard in the shape of protective sandbag walls around the tents, gunpits for sentries, and a well-defended gate at the entrance had generally not been adopted.
The Lechi had begun its armed anti-British campaign in 1940 until just after Yair's murder in early 1942 and renewed it at the end of 1943. The Irgun commenced its revolt in early 1944. The Hagana and Palmach had been coordinating attacks on the British with the Irgun and Lechi since November 1945. British soldiers had been targeted, shot, wounded and killed.
Now do you know why the British lost the battle?
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2 comments:
"Gloat"?
Where?
I pointed out what David Charters, Michael Cohen and Bruce Hoffman have pointed out: British intelligence was woefully inadequate and that almost three years into an urban guerrilla campaign that a British camp did not take into account an attack on their camp when scores of attacks had taken place is astonishing.
As for Arab terrorism, I think I am not far from wrong that over 90% or more of Arab attacks have been on civilians which is the benchmark for terror rather than a national liberation armed campaign.
The key in the sentence is British ARMY personnel. The wartime attacks were aimed at the police, in the main, and as Wilson writes, "the stage had not yet been reached when deliberate attacks on British Army personnel were expected." Until this 'brilliant' action, there had been no attacks directed at British soldiers in this way.
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