8 October 1941 Part 2

8 October 1941 Requirements for strengthening the defence of the Channel Islands

[Scan 1111.jpg] Armed Forces Adjutant to the Führer. Führer headquarters, 8 October 1941. Top secret command matter. Requirements for strengthening the defence of the Channel Islands. Operations Branch IIa reference 38059/41, top secret. [Handwritten receipt and presentation notes dated 9–13 October; some names illegible.]

I. Infantry. 1) The combat strengths of the infantry are insufficient to fulfil the tasks assigned to them. Since the thirteenth and fourteenth companies are missing, crews for the permanently assigned weapons (machine guns, antitank guns, infantry guns and mortars) have to be supplied from the rifle companies. This results, for example, in a battalion having only twenty NCOs and nine men left to fill the posts of platoon and section leaders, company and platoon headquarters, telephonists, runners and riflemen. It must therefore be required that the island regiments be brought to the establishment of first-wave divisions and equipped accordingly.

2) Every German, including labourers and members of construction units, will be needed as a combatant in an attack on the islands.

[Scan 1112.jpg] They must be equipped with machine guns. Army High Command had held out the prospect of 400 machine guns for Army Group D.

3) The intervention reserves—one battalion on Jersey and at present two battalions on Guernsey—are ready for action with only about one company per battalion. Training the battalions as complete units is scarcely possible, because supply and guard duties on the islands consume considerable manpower. Each island must be provided with one supply company and one guard company of Landesschützen [territorial security troops].

4) On Jersey, in addition to the intervention battalion, a mobile force of the reconnaissance-battalion type, if possible with cyclists and antitank troops, is desired. Higher Command LV intends initially to transfer elements of the reconnaissance battalion of the 319th Division to Jersey. 5) Further searchlights are desired.

[Scan 1113.jpg] II. Artillery. 1) The range against sea targets is limited to about twenty kilometres. Guns with longer ranges against sea targets are desired. 2) To close the shipping channel between the mainland and the islands by artillery fire, three heavy direct-fire batteries and one of the heaviest direct-fire batteries, with a range of twenty-five kilometres or more, are desired and have been requested by Army Group D. Positions are planned west and southwest of Cherbourg.

3) The personnel strengths of the 15.5 cm (French) Army coastal batteries are insufficient to man the batteries and must be raised to those of cannon batteries. 4) Battalion headquarters are lacking for the heavy mortar battalions on Jersey and Guernsey. The ammunition stock of charge 6 must be increased.

[Scan 1114.jpg] 5) The mobile artillery for the intervention reserves is also employed in fixed positions. Further mobile artillery must be freed and permanently assigned to the intervention reserves. 6) D. T. equipment [Dezimeter-Telegraphie, radar] for firing in poor visibility is required for the artillery on Guernsey.

III. Armoured force. The captured tanks employed on the islands are Renault tanks built in 1917–18. They are unsuitable for mobile tasks and are therefore deployed at airfields and other possible parachute dropping grounds. The intervention reserves are to receive additional heavily armoured tanks to perform the tasks assigned to the intervention troops.

IV. Antiaircraft force. 1) If the British intend a major operation against the islands, mass employment of enemy air forces must be expected.

[Scan 1115.jpg] The antiaircraft force on the islands is in no way adequate to defend against them. 2) The antiaircraft units now deployed cannot simultaneously protect the battery positions, which lack protection against air attack, the harbours and supply facilities (water, gas and electricity works, etc.), or repel parachute attacks. Discussion with Field Marshal Sperrle established that initially he will detach one 8.8 cm and one 2 cm battery for each of the two islands.

V. Luftwaffe. To give effective assistance to the island group from the mainland, further forces must soon be brought up to meet the tasks arising on the coast in an attack on the Channel Islands.

VI. Navy. 1) Personnel reinforcements for the Channel Islands, supplies and ammunition for the deployed forces, and the movement of construction material urgently require a considerable increase in shipping capacity for communication with the mainland.

[Scan 1116.jpg] 2) To escort the steamers, the manning of the ten Siebel ferries with naval personnel is to be accelerated and their commissioning pursued jointly with the Luftwaffe. 3) Faster installation of D. T. equipment on Guernsey is desired.

VII. Fortifications. 1) The current construction consists of field works combined with permanent construction. A decision is requested on whether to proceed with the prepared fortress-style construction. 2) Completion of the mining of the islands is required.

VIII. Signals. 1) The construction of a further submarine cable is urgently requested, above all by the Luftwaffe. 2) Allocation of higher frequencies to the Luftwaffe is necessary.

[Scan 1117.jpg] IX. Motor transport. 1) The motor vehicle stock on the islands is only just sufficient to meet the requirements for motorizing the intervention troops and for construction and supply activity. Further requisitioning of motor vehicles on the islands is impossible and should be prohibited. 2) Passenger cars are desired for company commanders to command their extensive sectors.

X. Ammunition reserves. Four ammunition allocations are insufficient. Stocks must be continually increased.

XI. Treatment of the population. The islands have had their own constitutions since they were separated from Normandy in 1204. The islanders regard themselves neither as French nor as English; as Britons they feel bound only to the former Duke of Normandy, the present King of Great Britain, and as part of the British Empire. A directive for dealing with the constitutional arrangements and the population is desired. Signed Schmundt. [Historical characterization retained as stated.]

German Army High Command records, T-78 Roll 317. Supplied English translation T78_Roll_317_English_Translation.docx. Source images: 1111.jpg, 1112.jpg, 1113.jpg, 1114.jpg, 1115.jpg, 1116.jpg, 1117.jpg.