First SEALs (18 page)

In 1943, Angleton joined the U.S. Army at the age of twenty-five before being recruited into the X-2 or counterintelligence branch of the OSS. During World War II, he was considered one of the preeminent “experts” on the unit; this, coupled with his deep knowledge of Italy and fluency in the language, made him ideal for interacting with the
Decima MAS
operatives and the men of the San Marco Battalion.

Most within the OSS viewed Angleton as the right man to revamp the operation in Rome. Security and compartmentalization were lax, and his predecessor at X-2 had recommended the OSS cease operations with the San Marco men. Though betrayals were a possibility, like Kelly, Angleton felt the short- and long-term benefits of working with the group outweighed the security risks. He emphatically urged the OSS to keep the San Marco unit active, arguing that it would allow him to strengthen X-2's relationship with the Italian Secret Intelligence Service (ISIS) of the Italian Royal Navy, which had been key in eliminating the German intelligence network and saboteurs north of Florence. Angleton had intelligence indicating the Germans were intending to plant “sleeper” or “stay behind” Italian agents in key centers in Italy upon evacuation of the areas to report on Allied troop movements and provide other actionable intelligence. Many believed Borghese, the former leader of
Decima MAS
, was likely overseeing some of these activities.

Angleton was convinced the San Marco commandos now working for the OSS would prove to be invaluable assets. He also believed that ISIS could be a powerful partner in eradicating the covert Axis network and participate in a myriad of other joint intelligence operations. Angleton's and the OSS's renewed confidence in ISIS was a tremendous boost to their relationship. This prompted an offer from the Royal Navy Intelligence Service to allow the OSS to “
take over the Gamma frogmen school in Taranto, Italy,” which boasted specialized equipment and expert instructors, so the “OSS could prepare its own naval sabotage group for operation in the Pacific.”
The OSS cataloged and inventoried the
techniques and equipment of
Decima MAS
, though they were never deployed in the Pacific.

OSS records report, “
It was the San Marco Battalion which eventually enabled MU to perform its most valuable work.” The portion of the battalion that had come over to the Allied side was divided into two groups: surface swimmers and underwater swimmers. Those who had been trained in the use of human torpedoes and other underwater devices were based at Taranto under the supervision of the British. However, their usefulness was limited because “
lack of German targets prevented this division from engaging in sabotage activities.” As operations officer, Jack Taylor played a key role in the negotiations with the group and had a hand in setting up their training and organization under the OSS. Ward Ellen was initially tasked with commanding the surface swimmers.

Under Taylor and Ellen, men from the group immediately started contributing to the Allied war effort in Italy as the OSS peeled off select San Marco men for missions. During the Allied invasion at Anzio, a bloody amphibious landing resulting in a months-long battle that raged on the western side of Italy near Rome, one former sergeant in the San Marco Battalion infiltrated behind German lines, and as he returned through friendly fire with a “
rough but accurate plan of German fortifications,” was seriously wounded by an American soldier who thought he was an enemy combatant. He refused medical treatment until he made his full report to the OSS officer. In and out of consciousness and revived with injections of plasma, the Italian operator made his report and received an American decoration for his valiant efforts.

In May, Richard Kelly was ordered to “
take charge of MU activities in Italy, also to contact members of the Italian San Marco Battalion, who had been assigned to OSS.” His fellow Navy officer Ward Ellen would continue to assist Kelly in training the Italians and integrating them into MU.

MU oversaw the second group of “surface swimmers,” which was based in Naples. It included “six Italian officers and 44 enlisted
men, all surface swimmers.” Although not trained in underwater combat, “
they were, however, qualified to undertake infiltrations by sea for the purpose of attacking supply dumps, beach installations, etc.” For several weeks Kelly and Ellen trained this second group of Italians in demolitions and in the use of MU equipment. However, friction developed between the two men, as Ellen considered himself independent of Kelly's command.

The Italians brought with them the latest in covert maritime tech, including swimming gear, two-man “mattresses” called
tartugas
(turtles) powered by silent electric motors, their own rubber swimsuits, high-speed boats, and “other assault, reconnaissance and demolitions equipment.” However, the Germans retained much of their equipment in addition to the loyalty and services of nearly half the unit's members. One OSS operative reported, “
The duke and his men saved three one-man human torpedoes, similar to the British chariot. They hid them by sinking them in a river. . . . They are there still. The duke said he would be more than pleased to raise them and turn them over to us to use as models for similar craft, that our own men could operate.”

A study of the captured equipment became of paramount interest to the Allies. Donovan ordered an inventory of the equipment and personnel that the duke had offered for Allied use.

One of the earliest studies concerned Italy's MTM explosive craft. Essentially it was a motorized speedboat that contained five hundred pounds of TNT in the bow. “The main charge detonated either hydrostatically or on contact. The operator of the craft could set the method of detonation. . . . If the boat hits head on . . . the operator aims the boat, locks the speed and the steering gear, arms the firing mechanism, and then releases the raft attached to his body and drops off the stern,” the OSS recorded. Hopefully he would survive what was nearly a suicide mission.

P
LANS WERE ALSO UNDERWAY
for the OSS to bring over an entire Operational Swimmer Group, the one led by recently promoted Lieutenant Commander Arthur Choate. However, General Donovan himself rescinded the order “
because of commitments which General Donovan had made in the central Pacific area and because of his own orders in this matter.” MU and Italy continued to press for an entire swimmer group, and they eventually received a couple of swimmers, Norman Wicker, whom Taylor had trained in Annapolis, and John J. Stanaway.

As additional MU officers and enlisted men continued streaming in, the entire Maritime Unit organization in Italy began to take on a more military structure. In May 1944, OSS-METO was designated the 2677th Regiment OSS (provisional). The actual regiment itself remained provisional and was not activated until July 1944. Taylor, who abhorred paperwork, relied on newly arrived MU officers to handle bureaucratic matters while he continued to go on missions. But the days of an operations officer going into the field were becoming numbered, and soon MU put in place procedures and rules to minimize the danger of officers being captured. At the same time, “
Lieutenant Kelly immediately began laying the groundwork for a series of combination sabotage and intelligence missions behind the German lines, on the northern Adriatic coast of Italy,” relying on the expertise of the San Marco Battalion's special operators.

*
Until this time many countries considered this type of covert operation to be bad form. In fact, during the Battle of the Nile in 1798, when a British boatswain suggested planting explosives on an enemy ship, he was charged with “
suggesting methods not compatible with the traditions of His Majesty's Navy” and discharged from duty.

*
Ian Fleming, a World War II British intelligence officer and later author of the James Bond series, immortalized the secret trapdoor of the
Olterra
and the exploits of
Decima MAS
in the film
Thunderball
.

16

OSSINING

THE NIGHT OF JUNE 19–20, 1944, ADRIATIC COASTAL RAILWAY, BEHIND GERMAN LINES

As quietly as possible, the six-man demolition team of Italian San Marco commandos, now under the command of Lieutenant Richard Kelly, climbed off the
MAS
boats and onto rubber boats. The shadowy flotilla managed to avoid a German minefield in the vicinity and slip past enemy boats patrolling the area. Beaching the boats, the team made their way to the mission's intended target, a German rail track on which trains filled with supplies and enemy troops traveled as they hastily retreated north.

This was the third attempt to put the demolition party ashore. “
Considerable [enemy] personnel” and searchlights on the beach had foiled two earlier attempts. Hiding in wait, the team heard nearby “enemy MPs blowing whistles and shouting at traffic” as the German military police ushered men, tanks, and trucks of the retreating army moving to another belt of fortifications known as the Gothic Line.

Finally, one heavily guarded supply train stopped on the track. Under the noses of the Germans, the special operators of the San Marco Battalion stealthily approached the target and set pressure charges to go off as the train rolled over the rails. To ensure the
track was vaporized, the demolition party placed timed pencil detonators set to explode in the morning in the event the pressure detonators failed.

The six commandos and their leader returned to the beach, launched the rubber boats, and returned to the
MAS
transports to await the blast. Tensely, Kelly and his Italian special operators waited in silence for the German ammunition train they believed would soon arrive.

Finally, they heard the whistles of an approaching train, soon followed by deafening explosions as the bombs ripped through the steel and wood, destroying the train and a section of track. Simultaneously, the Italian
MAS
boats opened fire on two trucks in the vicinity, destroying them as well. Air reconnaissance revealed all German traffic was held up for more than thirty-six hours, and Kelly brought back actionable intelligence to the British Eighth Army Headquarters.

Reports indicated that the “
intelligence information, which Lieutenant Kelly brought back from this first mission was considered extremely valuable by British Eighth Army Headquarters, and other operations of a similar type were given high priority.”

This was Kelly's first mission with the San Marco Battalion, and it was dubbed “Operation Ossining I.” Only a small portion of the San Marco Battalion was now working with the OSS—about fifty of the original members. Unlike the frogmen of
Decima MAS
, these men were “
not adept at underwater swimming and the use of one-man torpedoes, etc. Instead, they specialize[d] in sea landings of the commando type, going in to plant demotions and blow up bridges.”

The Italian special operators were noteworthy for their confidence, often bordering on arrogance. One of the operatives at the Italian base noted, “
They are cocky young men, sure of themselves, most of them with no political convictions, but playing this game for the adventure, for the privilege of U.S. support, and U.S. rations, like cigarettes and food. They can be surly, and damned
independent. It has been no easy job for Kelly to win the confidence of these men and their leader, but I believe he has succeeded, and while they seem a little vain because of what they have accomplished for the Allies, I think they deserve our admiration and gratitude.”

At the end of July, Kelly moved his group's base of operations about a hundred miles north, near the city of Ancona on the Adriatic Sea. He would soon be joined by two more MU officers: Lieutenant John Chrislow of the U.S. Navy Reserve and Lieutenant George Hearn of the U.S. Marine Corps.