Free The Secret Ministry of Ag. & Fish by Noreen Riols Page A

the ‘confirmation’ not be broadcast, the operation was automatically cancelled.
    These drops didn’t happen overnight. It took time to organize them, especially since they were taking place every night during the ‘moon period’ – the ten to twelve
nights each month when the moon was bright enough for the pilots to navigate by – to the numerous
réseaux
not only in France, but in every other German-occupied country. And
this is where the cooperation between the RAF and SOE was invaluable.
    It’s all very well to train agents and prepare them for infiltration behind enemy lines, but if you can’t get them to where they need to be, and once there they cannot receive
supplies, the whole system collapses. There were always submarines, fishing boats and feluccas which discharged agents into enemy-occupied territories, but by far the most popular and most tested
method was by parachute. And for that SOE needed the cooperation of the RAF, which was not readily available at the beginning of the war, when ‘gentlemanly warfare’ was still the order
of the day among the ‘top brass’. Lord Portal, the Chief of the Air Staff, even declared that he was not prepared to use the RAF to drop civilians into enemy-occupied territory to act
like bandits and kill regular soldiers, even if they were the enemy. It wasn’t cricket! But eventually the strategic importance of SOE’s operations overcame the hierarchy’s
opposition, and in August 1941, 138 Squadron was formed as a ‘Special Duties’ squadron, with 161 Squadron being added in late 1942.
    All the same, this obstacle overcome, dropping thousands of tons of stores and equipment to the Resistance didn’t happen without planning. They were not dropped randomly into a field
‘somewhere near Paris, or Lyons or Marseilles’. A complex, detailed, but sadly not always foolproof plan had to be carefully worked out beforehand: the precise ‘dropping
ground’ sought out, measured and prepared by the
chef de réseau
before any drop could take place, and résistants made ready on the ground before the plane arrived to
collect and dispose of the supplies dropped. 161 Squadron flew 6,000 sorties between 1943 and 1945 and 138 Squadron, which began dropping supplies a year earlier, flew considerably more. The
history of the Special Duties Squadrons is intimately linked with the history of SOE, since supplies, and often agents, were carried by Hudson, Stirling and Halifax aircraft, the mainstay of both
supply- and agent-dropping activities for most of the war.
    The two squadrons flew solely on SOE missions and were soon known as the ‘Moonlight Squadrons’. The pilots were all very young, mostly between nineteen and twenty-three. One, who was
actually twenty-seven, was called ‘uncle’ by the others in deference to his great age! The members of the squadrons were among the most experienced pilots in the RAF. They had to have
at least 250 hours’ night flying time behind them before even being considered. They flew at night without lights, navigating only by the moon, following the course of rivers, church
steeples, cathedral spires, chateaux, towns and villages; it was rare that they missed their target. These pilots all signed the Official Secrets Act and lived apart from other RAF squadrons at
Tempsford, near Bedford, and Tangmere, near Chichester. Only these two airfields were used by agents departing on missions. They were never used by any commercial traffic during the war and were
completely unknown to the general public.
    When the supplies were ready for despatch, the BBC broadcast the
message personnel
the organizer had sent, to warn him that the drop would be parachuted to him within the next few days.
As soon as the organizer heard his own message broadcast at the end of the BBC French Services’ evening programme, he would inform the courier, who would then cycle into the nearest town and
stop at the
bar-tabac,
where the owners were usually very