Feature Article (Apr 05)

An Uncommon Valour: The Battle of Habbaniyah

Part Four: Something Had to Crack, and It Could Not Be Us

Harry George Smart probably didn't sleep much, if any, the night of May 1st, 1941. In all likelihood, he stayed in his office at AHQ, even though his beautiful villa on the banks of the Euphrates wasn't even a hundred yards away. After seeing first hand the horrors of aerial combat in the First World War, Smart knew full well what awaited the young men who would be flying missions against an enemy who outnumbered the defenders of Habbaniya by a ratio of at least five to one. Having just received a wireless from the Prime Minister himself, Smart sipped his tea in the early morning hours, contemplating the many thoughts that were racing through his head: Will the Iraqis strike early? How long can the ground forces hold out? Will the aircraft hold up? And what about the pilots - how long can they go before they reach the breaking point? He thought about his men -- boys really. Most of them were away from home for the first time. Most had only just learned how to fly a plane. How could it be, he wondered, that it had suddenly all come down to a handful of aviators and their pupils being the ones responsible for defending British prestige and honor? He thought about the lives of the 9,000 civilians crammed onto his Station. He took advantage of the quiet time and prayed. The stillness of the morning air was broken by the sound of Kestrel aircraft engines sputtering to life on the airfield, about a half-mile away. It was 0430 on Friday morning, the 2nd of May, 1941. What some historians have aptly called "The Second Battle of Britain" was about to begin...

After being reassured by wireless from RAF Shaiba that the Wellingtons of No. 70 squadron would be there to assist in the early morning assault, during a short meeting with his squadron leaders Smart had tried to sound upbeat, remarking "they should be in full retreat within about three hours." At 0445, a force composed of 18 Audax, 9 Oxford and 6 Fairey Gordon aircraft (the ground attack cousin of the famed Fairey Swordfish torpedo plane) began to take off from Habbaniya in the initial wave of attacks on Iraqi positions on the plateau. It would take a few minutes for all 33 of the aircraft to get off the ground and after a few more minutes of jostling themselves into somewhat loose attack formations, the pilots and cadets were strafing and bombing the Iraqi positions by approximately 0500.

The Iraqi positions were scattered across the plateau and along the bluffs overlooking Habbaniya cantonment from the south. Those positions that weren't in defiles or gullies were actually quite well dug in and at first the pilots were having a hard time locating the field guns, which were the primary targets. The Iraqis, unable to draw good aim on the aircraft buzzing around in the early morning twilight, retaliated by opening fire on the air base. Although the volume of artillery fire was heavy, it was also highly inaccurate and caused little real damage to the cantonment. But the resulting muzzle flashes did, however, give the British the targets they desperately needed. Several of the field pieces were quickly located and knocked out of action by the Oxfords, who were bombing from about 1,000 feet for maximum accuracy. The Iraqis quickly responded by sending up large volumes of anti-aircraft fire. However, due to the fact that the Iraqi anti-aircraft gunners used many tracers, they once again inadvertently aided the British by effectively marking their positions for the airmen to either attack or avoid. The aircraft of the No. 4 SFTS were soon joined by the promised Wellingtons, who concentrated on bombing the Iraqi artillery and succeeded in scoring direct hits on the Iraqi Headquarters and making the Iraqi HQ virtually combat ineffective within the first few hours of the fight.

The Audaxes, being the most nimble and agile of the aircraft in the first waves, concentrated on trying to take out the Iraqi anti-aircraft assets. But, despite the attacks by the Audaxes, the Iraqis still managed to maintain a heavy volume of anti-aircraft fire throughout the day and in his memoirs, Air Vice-Marshall A.G. "Tony" Dudgeon, who commanded "B" Squadron and flew Oxfords during the battle, vividly describes the scene over the plateau:

Ground-fire was both intense and accurate. Over the plateau, the Oxfords were cruising at about 1,000 ft. One would fly steadily on a bombing-run (as was essential with those old-fashioned bomb-sights), sitting and watching bullet-holes being punched up through the wings from underneath. Most aircraft received several bullet strikes through the cockpit itself. The dive-bombing and machine-gunning Audaxes went far lower than we did. Every machine was damaged to some extent but the record went to an Audax flown by Flight Lieutenant Dan Cremin. He brought his aircraft back from a single ten minute sortie with fifty-two new bullet holes in it. Miraculously, he had no bullet-holes through his person, but his pupil-gunner was less fortunate. He was carted off to hospital, seriously wounded.

Due to their large size, it seemed as though the Wellingtons were drawing more than their fair share of the Iraqi anti-air attentions. One of the No. 70 squadron Wellingtons piloted by Flying Officer Anstey was damaged to the point of having to make an emergency landing on the main airfield at Habbaniya. A mechanic quickly drove out in a tractor in an effort to tow the damaged aircraft to safety, but since the Wellington sat in full view of the Iraqi gunners on the plateau, the bomber was soon hit by an artillery shell, set on fire and destroyed. The Iraqi fire was so intense and so accurate over the plateau that nine other damaged Wellingtons would be declared unserviceable when they returned to Basra...

In order to keep up the pressure on the Iraqis, the aircrews flew non-stop, sortie after sortie. Aircraft were constantly landing or taking off from both the main airfield and the improvised field on the polo pitch. Dudgeon continued his narrative:

As soon as any aircraft was back on the ground, one of the two crew-members—we took turns alternately—would report to the Butcher [Operations Officer] in his ops room, telling him the results and also suggesting suitable new targets which had been spotted during a sortie. Butcher would then plot both bits of information on the latest photo-map that I had produced for him, and allot the crewman his next target. While that was going on the other crewman—pilot or pupil acting as bomb-aimer—would help reload the machine and make a quick check for any additional damage which was worse than superficial. ('Superficial' meant any new hole where a bullet or piece of shrapnel had gone through) and which did not appear to have damaged something important—like a main-spar, an oil pipe, or a control-hinge. Usually, this would all be done with the engines still running. Surprisingly, no one got clouted by a spinning prop. When the first chap came back from the ops room with the new targets, off they went again... We, the aircrew, were only too well aware that we had nothing, just nothing, which could stop a tank driving up to the front door of AHQ—except our bombs. Hence we knew our very survival depended on, in effect, knocking out every offensive weapon or vehicle before the Iraqis could pull themselves together and bring it to bear effectively. And to keep on, and on, without respite till they left—which thank goodness should be within hours, as Smart had confidently told us. This drove us into a routine which was to fly, fly, and fly in any offensive aircraft we could get our hands on. We bombed, and gunned, and looked for other targets. Something had to crack, and it could not be us... For man or machine the rule was the same: minor damage, or minor wounds that were not incapacitating, keep cracking. No respite—no breaks. Anyone who had no more than a flesh wound returned to the attack as fast as the planes could be re-armed and re-crewed. The terms 'minor-damage', or 'flesh-wounds' might have been stretched a bit and not assessed in a normal RAF manner—but then our situation was far from normal...

In his book, The Middle East, 1940–1942, New Zealander Philip Guedella recounts the drama of the take-offs and landings made in plain sight of the plateau:

Operations continued under heavy fire all the first day; the aircraft working from the main aerodromes, which lay within half a mile of the Iraqi guns, had 'no time to linger.' Starting up behind the hangars, they took off by opening their throttles inside the iron fence, dashing through the gate, racing across the aerodrome, and irrespective of the wind, making a steep climbing turn to miss the plateau; and when they returned a steep turn between hangars served to elude pom-pom fire followed (if they were lucky) by a landing, a sharp turn inside the gate and a quick run to safety round the corner of a hangar...

Dudgeon described his method of flight operations:

Take-offs and landings on the airfield, after daylight spread, had to be made in plain view of the gunners. There is a vulgar air force expression which is 'split-arse'. It has the meanings 'clever clever' and 'risk-taking'. Hair-raising might be a more couth term. Being 'split' is normally a punishable offence. Now, our lives depended on it... In an Oxford, it went something like this: After completing the cockpit checks in the shelter of the hangars I looked to an airman, positioned to one side and hidden from the plateau, but who could see the airfield. He would give the all clear if another machine was not on its way in and about to scoot round the corner of the hangars, back into comparative safety. Juggling with throttles and brakes, the machine would be made to sweep out, into view of the enemy guns, engines flat out, squirting through the open gate in the camp fence and already doing 30mph before we even reached the airfield's edge. The instant I had just enough flying speed, drag her off the ground, drop a wing and pull her round, away from the plateau in the steepest turn I dared to make. Then, take a deep breath, throttle back a little bit, and retract the wheels (only in an Oxford of course; no one else had retractable wheels) and pile on height before seeking out the targets...

Meanwhile, on the ground, the Kings Own Royals and the Levies were busy countering Iraqi probing attacks along the 8 mile perimeter. Additionally, the Iraqi artillery on the north side of the river began opening up, and soon became enough of a threat that something had to be done about it. In his war diary, a Levy with the Assyrian Rifle Squadron describes a daring daytime water-crossing led by Captain Armstrong, a British Artillery officer, in order to take out the Field Guns north of the river:

Some enemy guns had been shooting into the Cantonment from across the river, and O.C. [Overall Command] C sector (Capt. Cottingham) located them by a bend in the Burma Bund. O.C. Land Defences (O.C. Iraqi Levies) obtained permission from Col. Roberts (AHQ) and No.8 (Kurdish) Company was ordered to cross. Capt. Armstrong, who is a gunner and could therefore deal effectively with the guns when found, commanded it. They were under shell fire on the jetty but all got across in an old motor boat. The country was very open and flooded near the bunds [Berm], without any cover what so ever. Eventually they came under fire from several M.G.s [Machine-Guns] and when their ammunition was nearly exhausted they had to withdraw. Invaluable covering fire was given by No.10 B.H. [Block-House] manned by Assyrians, who reported 30-40 enemy casualties.

The Assyrian Soldier went on to describe the actions taken to repulse an Iraqi armoured foray:

Earlier in the day 8 enemy armoured cars and three tanks approached the camp from the South and were engaged by blockhouses. One S/T [Anti-Tank] rifle of 4 Company [Assyrian] and two of the Kings Own were mounted in armoured cars and went out to deal with this situation. But the enemy scuttled away and thereafter kept out of active action altogether until captured some days later. One enemy armoured car was disabled. The village of Sinn El Dhibban was occupied by the enemy and some well-concealed guns were shelling the camp. There was also a large concentration of the enemy in trenches near the New Lake Road. It was at one time decided to attack the latter with the Kings Own and the 4th Assyrian, but the idea was given up.

By this time, the Iraqi Air Force had started to join in the battle as well and at 1000 in the morning, the first of several appearances over Habbaniya was made by Iraqi aircraft. During one such attack by six Iraqi Mk I Gladiators, (probably flying out of Kirkuk), several strafing runs were made which succeeded in destroying a Fairey Gordon on the ground. A close call during one of the several strafing runs by Iraqi aircraft is recounted in the diary of a Levy Soldier:

At about 11 o'clock Col. Brawn, O.C Land Defences, and one of the Levies were in their car on the North Bund talking to Capt. Armstrong, who had re-crossed the Euphrates with his platoon, when they were machine-gunned by an Iraqi plane that made a direct diving attack. Fortunately there were no casualties.

Air Vice-Marshall Casey also described the air actions by the Iraqis:

...a number of Savoias, Bredas, Northrops and Audax were bombing and machine gunning the Cantonment at intervals. The material damage they did was inconsiderable but they did achieve some moral effect as the lack of prior warning made interception by the only fighter aircraft available (Nine Gladiators) difficult.

During one of the many raids, an Iraqi Savoia Marchetti Bomber was intercepted by a lone Gladiator flown by Flying Officer R.B. "Dicky" Cleaver; Cleaver's guns jammed, however, and the Iraqi plane managed to get away. Later, an Iraqi Breda BA-65 was also attacked by a Gladiator, this one being flown by Flying Officer J.M. Craigie, with the BA65 suffering some slight damage and beating a hasty retreat as well.

Smart's jocular estimate that the Iraqis would cut and run within three hours proved overly optimistic. By 12:30 p.m., after nearly 7 1/2 hours of constant aerial bombardment, the Iraqi field pieces were still shelling the base. Additionally, that afternoon, Iraqi troops had invaded the British Embassy in Baghdad and confiscated every wireless transceiver and telephone, leaving the only two significant English outposts in the region (RAF Shaiba and Habbaniya) isolated from each other. But, although the Iraqi forces on the plateau were still firmly entrenched in their fighting positions, they showed no inclination to launch a ground attack...

During the day, with Iraqi artillery shells falling indiscriminately around and the desperate situation known to all who lived in the immediate area, several local civilians living in what is now "civil-coolie camp" were moved to action and asked the British to be permitted to fight alongside them. This courageous act of duty was recorded in the diary of a Levy Soldier:

On the outbreak of hostilities 85 volunteers reported for duty and were employed on local defense. Another 32 Assyrian ex-levy soldiers who had been living in Humphreya village and had been obliged to take refuge in the camp owing to the shelling were enlisted by Suski Paulos [An Assyrian Soldier]. They remained on duty until the 13th of June when they were released for normal duties. They received free rations and uniform and double pay was issued for the first fortnight while employed volunteers received 100 fils per day for the period they were on local defense duties. A well-merited letter of congratulation was received from the Air Officer Commanding. One volunteer was killed in action [emphasis mine] and a few suffered minor injuries.

By the end of the first day, the British had flown 193 recorded operational sorties -- six per man. The RAF had lost 22 of its precious aircraft, with 10 being destroyed by enemy actions and the other 12 being rendered unserviceable by battle damage. Worse yet, 10 pilots were dead or critically wounded. Ground fire over the plateau had brought down an Oxford flown by Flying Officer D.H. Walsh and Pilot Officer P.R. Gillespy's Audax had failed to return, with the pilot being presumed dead. By that evening, Dudgeon and Hawtrey were the only squadron commanders that were not dead or hospitalized. B.A. Casey reported that:

At the end of the first day's operations, the morale of the Iraqi forces appeared surprisingly high in spite of the very heavy air bombardment to which they had been subjected, and there were no signs of any withdrawal of their forces. On the other hand it was clear that the enemy guns were much less of a danger than had been feared, and the possibility of a determined assault by the enemy now appeared remote.

An excellent summary of the first day's actions was recorded in the diary of a soldier in the Assyrian Rifle Squadron:

The blockhouses were constantly firing at enemy targets all day and estimated they had caused 50 casualties to the enemy. At a quarter past three Major McWhinnie in No. 8 B.H. shot up an Iraqi Staff car on the Fallujah-Ramadi road. Four officers were believed to be wounded and an accompanying dispatch rider was shot off his motor-cycle and killed. C Sector reported Sinn El Dhibban occupied by about 200 of the enemy. Patrols were sent out but the enemy kept their distance and made no attempt to raid our posts or gain information. That night an enemy plane flew over the Camp and later bombs were heard to fall on Ramadi--which says a lot for the blackout and not much for the Iraqi's power of navigating by night. The morale of all ranks was exceedingly good, the Levies suffered only 11 N.O.R.'s [native other ranks] wounded and one British Warrant Officer slightly wounded.

During an evening meeting/planning session at AHQ, it was decided that the next day Hawtrey would command all remaining Audaxes and Gladiators from the base's polo field, which was visually screened from the artillery by a row of trees. Dudgeon would continue to direct all Oxfords and Gordons from the cratered landing field...

In his book, The Grand Alliance, Sir Winston Churchill summed up the first day's actions:

Over forty of our men were killed or wounded that day, and twenty-two aircraft destroyed or disabled. Despite the difficulty of taking off under close artillery fire, our airmen continued their attacks. No enemy infantry assault developed, and gradually their batteries were mastered. It was found that the enemy gunners would not stand to their pieces under air attack, or even if our aircraft were to be seen overhead. Full advantage was taken of their nervousness, and it was possible from the second day to turn a proportion of our air effort to dealing with the Iraqi Air Force and their bases.

B.A. Casey described the methodology:

During the following days therefore, a proportion of the air effort (which had been exclusively concentrated against the investing troops) was directed against the Iraqi Air Force and the bases and lines of communication of the Iraqi Army. Attacks were made by Wellingtons on Rashid Aerodrome and by Fighter Blenheims (four of which arrived on the 3 May as reinforcements), against Iraqi aircraft at Rashid, Baghdad Airport, Mosul, Baquba and Shahraban.

A Levy soldier with the Assyrian Rifle Squadron described the opening actions of May 3rd:

05/03/1941
At half past four at first light, the enemy guns opened up; soon Sector Commanders were able to inform A.H.Q. of some of their positions: our aircraft then dealt with them. The Howitzers on the Burma Bund [the guns on the north side of the Euphrates] and the surrounding trenches had been pretty severely dealt with and some 250 lb. bombs had fallen close. No.8 B.H. disabled a lorry bringing ammunition to isolated posts and estimated that five Iraqi's were killed by M.G. fire. As on the preceding day all B.H.'s were engaging the enemy targets, with reported enemy casualties of 35. On our side one civilian volunteer was killed, and one wounded and one soldier wounded. Ineffective sniping went on at night with intermitted shelling. Patrolling was carried out in all sectors and one patrol of 4 Assyrian company co-operated with 1st Kings Own to the East of the Camp.

Although it seemed the Iraqi probing attacks along the perimeter had been successfully thwarted, in an effort to keep up the pressure on the investing Iraqis, the airmen continued their relentless pounding of the Iraqi positions on the plateau and sent aircraft out in search of Iraqi air bases in an effort to destroy the Iraqi Air Force on the ground.

On May 3rd, Three Wellingtons of No. 37 Squadron bombed Rashid airfield and also claimed to have shot down an Iraqi Nisr, (a radial engine, export version of the Audax) and damaging another. The Iraqi Air Force struck back, sending bombers to Habbaniya; this time however, Flying Officer Cleaver's guns didn't jam and he pumped 1200 rounds of .303 from his machine guns into an Iraqi S.M.79B, last seen diving away with its left engine smoking.

Meanwhile, one of the Gordon pilots, Flight Lt. David Evans, developed a novel and risky but effective method of dive-bombing. He had the ground crew affix fuzes with a seven-second delay to the 250-pound bombs. After takeoff, Evans would climb to about 3,000 feet (comfortably out of range from Iraqi anti-aircraft guns) and scan the Iraqi positions on the plateau. Then, diving at about 200 mph, he would yank back on the stick and drop a bomb from sixty to 100 feet over the target -- too close to miss. This method so terrified the Iraqis that they often abandoned their machine guns without even bothering to fire back at the plunging Gordon. In another instance of individual heroism and courage, the Station's Administration Officer, Squadron Leader Paul Holder, was called to duty as "C" Squadron Leader due to the combat losses of 2 May. From his official RAF biography:

It was during this incident that he twice managed to escape his aircraft before it exploded. On both occasions he managed to force land and fled before the aircraft blew up. However, on the second occasion he landed on a golf-course, (One of the auxiliary landing strips), the aircraft turned over and he found himself upside down in a bunker. He was awarded the DFC (Distinguished Flying Cross) for these operations.

Although the Iraqi artillery kept shelling Habbaniya, their Infantry continued to resist storming the base. Their confidence was further eroded by the arrival of four Blenheim Mk.IVF fighters from No. 203 Squadron in Basra. Eight more Wellingtons of No. 37 Squadron also arrived after being hastily repositioned from Palestine. The No. 37 Squadron Wellingtons bombed buildings and strafed aircraft at Rashid airfield on May 4th, but lost a plane to a combination of 20mm ground fire and an Iraqi Gladiator. (The Wellington crew was taken prisoner.) Two Blenheim Mk.IVFs operating from Habbaniya also strafed Iraqi aircraft at Rashid and Baghdad airfields. The Air Striking Force flew only 53 sorties that day, but they also flew night missions in order to deprive their besiegers of sleep.

Still, the defenders of Habbaniya were suffering much worse than the Iraqis seemed to realize. After three days of combat, just four of the original 26 Oxfords were still battle-worthy. The Audax, Gladiator and Gordon contingents were similarly depleted. Pilots were also becoming even scarcer, as half-trained cadets died in action or suffered from nervous breakdowns. Phillip Guedella described the next days of the battle:

The days that followed were an indistinguishable nightmare. Work began a half-hour before dawn and went on until after dark. Flying was continuous...They took to night flying, a disagreeable pastime, where no flare path could be used and a blind take–off was followed by a landing in the light of the aircraft's own landing lamp, hurriedly switched on when the altimeter registered a height of fifty feet and promptly switched off again on touching down. Their numbers dwindled and the toll of wounded pilots rose. The wastage of aircraft was formidable, only four out of twenty–six Oxfords remaining serviceable after three days of fighting... But a few Blenheims reached them; and ranging farther a field the little force attacked Iraqi aerodromes, destroying a number of aircraft on the ground; supplies intended for the enemy troops on the plateau were sedulously bombed on the way from Baghdad...

On the ground, the actions of the next few days were recorded as follows:

05/04/1941
Heavy shelling commenced at dawn which abated somewhat when our bombers took off. Throughout the day M.G.'s in B.H.'s co-operated with our aircraft in their dive bombing attacks - enemy casualties in the morning estimated at 15-20. In the afternoon Sinn El Dhibban was given special attention and enemy casualties placed at 15. Five Iraqi police were fired on in Abu Fleiss village. There was a great activity by Assyrian Levy Patrols by night, co-operating with 1st Kings Own. Our casualties were Nil.

05/05/1941
A few shots were exchanged by our night patrols and the enemy in the vicinity of the rifle ranges without result. Intermittent shelling started at daylight. The crew of No.4 B.H. foolishly left their door open and suffered two minor casualties from shell splinters. No.10 B.H. caught an enemy patrol in the open and inflicted 20 casualties. In the evening aircraft dispersed on the aerodrome were machine gunned; the position of the enemy guns being reported by our B.H's. Our patrols were out all night.

Although the Iraqi Air Force was still managing to attack Habbaniya, its overall effectiveness was negligible. (Official RAF damage reports do claim, however, that on 06 May, 1 Oxford, 2 Gladiators and an Audax were destroyed on the ground by Iraqi Northrop 8A attack planes.) However, thanks to the persistence of the pilots, ground crew and cadets of the Habbaniya Air Striking force, 06 May would prove to be the pivotal day in the Battle of Habbaniya. The First Kings Own and the Levies had been conducting nightly raids to gather intelligence and to harass the enemy, depriving them of sleep and supplies. A reconnaissance on the night of 05 May indicated that it appeared the Iraqis were leaving their forward positions around Habbaniya. It was decided that depending on what the positions looked like in the morning, more than likely an attack would have to be launched. Like the Iraqis on the plateau, the beleaguered defenders of Habbaniya were on the breaking point as well; the numbers of men wounded and loss of aircraft had taken its toll—it was felt that if the defenders of Habbaniya didn't strike now, they may never have the chance again. And so, after four long, grueling, harrowing days of fighting for their lives, the weary defenders of Habbaniya rested and quietly waited for the sun to rise...

To be continued in next month's newsletter...