8-minute read
A little background.
Operation Torch – the Anglo-American invasion of French North Africa in November 1942 – was the first ground operation conducted by Allied forces against the Axis powers of WWII. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica (with a little summarizing assistance from Copilot), the Allies launched Operation Torch to open a new front against Germany, relieve pressure on the Soviet Union, and secure control of the Mediterranean by eliminating Axis forces in North Africa. By gaining access to Atlantic and Mediterranean ports and positioning forces just 100 miles from Sicily, the Allies aimed to set conditions for later offensives into Europe while preventing further Axis expansion in the region.
France had established control over Algeria in 1830, Tunisia in 1881, and Morocco in 1912. When Germany defeated France in June 1940, the Armistice of 22 June 1940 put northern and western France under German occupation while the pro-Nazi government of Vichy France was allowed to control the southern, unoccupied portion of France as well as French Algeria, the French protectorate in Morocco (think of the police chief, Captain Louie Renault, in the movie Casablanca), the French protectorate of Tunisia, and most of the rest of the French colonial empire.
Since France was an Ally, President Roosevelt’s guidance for North Africa was to “preserv[e] French Sovereignty in Algeria, and the French administrations in Morocco and Tunisia. No change in the existing French Civil Administration is contemplated by the United States. Any resistance to an American landing will, of course, have to be put down by force of arms” (U.S. Army in World War II Special Studies publication, Civil Affairs: Soldiers Become Governors (SBG), p. 33). Consequently, on 11 October 1942, the Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ) issued General Order 4, which stated in part:
“1b. It is expected that all governmental officials, officers and employees of the local government in all of its branches, and who are trustworthy, will remain in office, and that all officials and employees of the civil administration, civilian public services and facilities, will carry on their normal duties.
3a. The principle upon which all relations with the civilian authorities is to be based, is that regardless of resistance, the French are friendly and are to be maintained in their government.”
[Source: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/445715694349372329/]
Civil affairs under civilian control.
Operation Torch began on 8 November 1942, with three task forces landing in Morocco and Algeria, as shown in the map above. The Western and Central Task Forces consisted of U.S. forces, while the Eastern Task Force was a combined U.S. and U.K. force under British command. Lieutenant General (Lieut. Gen.) Dwight D. Eisenhower was the senior commander in overall charge of the operation. Vichy French forces resisted the invasion until the Allies secured Algiers on 10 November, and a ceasefire was reached in Morocco the next day. The next objective was Tunisia, which had been receiving German reinforcements from Sicily since 9 November.
The only CA capability Eisenhower had at the outset of this operation was a small civil affairs staff section – officially activated in London on 15 September 1942 and composed of recent graduates of the first military government course in Charlottesville – and one State Department senior foreign service officer, Robert D. Murphy, former Counselor of the American Embassy at Vichy. Murphy was “the Operating Executive head of the Civil Affairs Section and Advisor for Civil Affairs under General Eisenhower” by direction of President Roosevelt (SBG, p. 32). Eisenhower also had on the AFHQ staff a small, British-led political section that served in an advisory role on French political factions, Vichy loyalties, and political negotiations, and worked closely with the civil affairs section.
Although Lieut. Gen. Eisenhower had these elements on his staff, the U.S. and British governments established civilian-led organizations in Washington, D.C., to set political, economic, administrative, and other policies for North Africa. The table below lists the organizations mentioned in SBG Chapter II.
These organizations were created rather hastily after the start of Operation Torch, with no central, unifying mechanism. As you can imagine, having so many separate, civilian organizations working on some of the same issues in parallel, each providing different guidance, direction, and resources to a military commander 4,000 miles away, was problematic. In addition, differing priorities among American and British agencies often required mediation. This arrangement created much friction, delay, and confusion for Eisenhower’s headquarters.
Adding to this complexity was the Vichy government’s ineffectiveness in maintaining political, economic, and social stability in the region. Issues such as political fractures and fragility, popular mistrust of the government, the continued activities of pro-Axis elements, corruption, mismanagement of resources, social tensions, and an inability to maintain economic viability or provide adequate supplies for the population threatened security in Allied rear areas as Eisenhower pushed toward Tunisia. This was particularly true after Admiral Jean François Darlan, the Commander-in-Chief of the French Forces, was assassinated on 24 December 1942. He had been designated French High Commissioner of the new government in North Africa under U.S. oversight following the ceasefire in Morocco.
It’s not working; the senior commander asks for help.
When I read the message traffic between Lieut. Gen. Eisenhower and Gen. Marshall regarding the operational environment as early as 26 November 1943 – only 18 days into the North African campaign – I see a commander pleading for a capability to manage civil security issues in his rear area. These issues could not be handled by the one State Department civilian and the small military civil affairs team on his staff. His solution was for State to send a robust team to handle those issues for him.
“There is an acute need for such a body [of economic and other experts from the State Department to assist Chief Civil Administrator Murphy] because the success of future operations from this base will depend very largely on the speed with which the economy of this country is rehabilitated, at least to the point of sustaining a majority of the population above the starvation level…No one could be more anxious than General Clark and myself to rid ourselves completely of all problems other than purely military, but the fact remains that, at this moment and until North Africa is made thoroughly secure, in which process the capture of Tunisia will be an important incident, everything here directly affects the military situation” (SBG p. 43).
Two days later, Gen. Marshall responded, “When the military situation permits, and the time of arrival of this condition cannot be forecast now, the State Department desires to relieve you of the responsibility for civil matters” (SBG pp. 43-44).
The Allied push to Tunisia immediately met with strong Axis resistance. After months of offensives and counteroffensives, the Allies finally succeeded in taking the cities of Tunis and Bizerte on 7 May 1943, resulting in the surrender of over 250,000 Axis prisoners and the end of the North Africa campaign.
The military situation never quite permitted the arrival of civilian administrators from State or other U.S. or U.K. agencies to relieve Eisenhower of direct personal involvement in political, economic, and social issues in North Africa. Most of the practical work of restoring order, distributing supplies, and stabilizing liberated areas fell to the French civil administration, since the Allies had deliberately left “the ordinary administration of civil affairs… to Admiral Darlan’s government” (SBG, p. 29) and directed that French officials remain in office to continue their duties (SBG, p. 32). French military, naval, and civil authorities also provided essential cooperation, as Eisenhower noted that at “every principal port we would be badly handicapped without the assistance… of French military, naval and civil groups” (SBG, p. 35).
When the French administrative system in Tunisia broke down under the strain of the final battles, AFHQ civil affairs officers intervened directly, obtaining trucks and distributing supplies after finding that “the French distribution system did not work” and that only “a few carloads of supplies had arrived” (SBG, p. 53). At the same time, AFHQ’s Political Section, led by Murphy, worked to maintain political stability among competing French factions – Murphy was expected to “practically live in Darlan’s pocket” to manage these relationships (p. 34) – and played a key role in preventing a political crisis after Darlan’s assassination, including blocking an attempt to invoke a Vichy succession ordinance (SBG, p. 47).
Allied military commanders and logistics units also became de facto civil affairs units, as Eisenhower emphasized that “everything done here directly affects the military situation” (SBG, p. 43) and that civil matters had become “a great burden” (SBG, p. 46), requiring military intervention to stabilize economic conditions and prevent disruptions in the rear during the final push toward Tunis (SBG, pp. 49–50, 53).
As the U.S. Army Center of Military History concluded: “It appears that instead of relieving General Eisenhower of responsibility and concern over the economic and political problems which arose, the civilian setup actually interfered with his freedom of action…While the absence of sufficient organizational preparation seems also to have been a contributing factor, yet military men considered the essential error to have been the attempt to divorce the control of civil affairs from military organization even though every civil affairs problem is bound up with military operations. Some leading War Department authorities decided as the result of the TORCH experience that they could not safely acquiesce in its pattern of control in future operations, least of all those in enemy areas” (SBG, pp. 30-31; bold font added for emphasis).
Questions for our teammates: Do you have any observations of CA in LSCO from your experience in named operations, training events, or exercises you’d like to share?
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