Special Air Service Historical Foundation

Establishing Special Forces in Australia

Adapted with kind permission from 'SAS Phantoms Of The Jungle' by D.M. Horner

Churchill Carries the War to German Occupied Europe

1940:
British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, seeking to carry the war to German occupied Europe formed the Special Operations Executive (SOE) to coordinate all action, by way of subversion and sabotage against the enemy overseas.

Initially SOE was the responsibility of the Minister for Economic Warfare and spanned three organizations: a propaganda organization, an organization within the Foreign Office to conduct sabotage and a War Office section to conduct guerilla warfare. As a result of a re-alignment of responsibilities, the guerilla warfare element remained with the War Office and grew into the Directorate of Combined Operations and eventually Combined Operations Headquarters.

These activities had a flow on effect in Australia when the Chief of the Imperial General Staff in Britain sent a cable to Australian Army Headquarters outlining a proposal that special branches be established in the dominions to conduct para-military activities against the enemy, including raids, demolitions, and organizing civil resistance and sabotage in enemy or enemy occupied territories.

To assist in this the British proposed sending a Military Mission headed by Lieutenant Colonel J.C. Mawhood who arrived in Australia in November 1940.

Australian Commonwealth Military Forces badge

Establishment and Training of Independent Companies

1941:
Royal Australian Navy (RAN) intelligence officers were appointed to supervise the civil servants, plantation managers and missionaries in the islands to the north of Australia, who had been organized prior to the outbreak of war, to provide intelligence and coast watching information should their islands be occupied by the enemy.

Concurrently, the Australian Army, acting on British advice had begun to train Independent Companies whose role would include raids, demolitions, sabotage, subversion and organizing civil resistance, as these activities would be carried out by SOE in Europe. Initially it was planned to send the first trained Independent Companies to the Middle East, however, perhaps anticipating a Japanese advance, it was decided to use them in the islands to the north and north-east of Australia to warn of the approach of Japanese forces and to remain behind and harass the invaders.

British SOE Officers Arrive in Australia

March 1942:
Two British SOE officers arrived in Australia after service in Singapore and Java to assist in establishing a SOE organization, which supported by General Thomas Blamey, Commander in Chief of the Australian Military Forces, had the approval of the Prime Minister of Australia, John Curtin.

In May 1942 a new special operations organization, the Inter-allied Services Department (ISD) was set up in Melbourne under General Blamey's control.

Realignment of Unconventional Warfare Responsibilities

April 1943:
ISD became the Services Reconnaissance Department (SRD) after an internal re-alignment of responsibilities in the Allied Intelligence Bureau (AIB) which coordinated the various unconventional warfare organizations within General MacArthur's Headquarters.

SRD was created to conduct SOE-type operations, including obtaining intelligence, and the 'execution of subversive and highly specialized sabotage chiefly by means of undercover methods'. While SRD took time to gain operational momentum, the surviving Independent Companies, renamed Cavalry (Commando) Squadrons and later Commando Squadrons, conducted offensive operations against the Japanese in Timor and New Guinea.

Transfer of Personnal from Commando Squadrons to M and Z Special Units

1944:
The Commando Squadrons had been brigaded to form the 2/6th, 2/7th and 2/9th Australian Cavalry (Commando) Regiments, the headquarters of which had originally been the Cavalry Regiments of the 6th, 7th and 9th Australian Divisions. Many Commandos eventually transferred to SRD and were allotted to either M or Z Special Units.

These units were the administrative holding units for Army personnel serving with the AIB. M Special Unit was the North-East Regional Section operating in New Guinea and the Solomons, while Z Special Unit was SRD and operated in Borneo and the Netherlands East Indies.

SRD also assisted SOE in providing manning and assistance in the conduct of Operation JAYWICK, the successful raid against Japanese shipping in Singapore in 1943 and Operation RIMAU, which was the unsuccessful attempt in 1944.

Parallel Between AIB Operations and SAS

1945:
AIB realizes its full operational potential and although the Philippines Section had been separated completely from the organization, there remained 1659 Australian and British personnel, 1100 natives, 268 Dutch and 19 Americans on the AIB establishment.

In addition, AIB possessed its own flight of aircraft and its own surface fleet. General Sturdee, commanding the First Australian Army at this time, claimed that half his operational intelligence was collected by AIB parties.

Further it was estimated that AIB had killed 7061 Japanese, taken 141 prisoners and rescued 1054 servicemen and civilians from enemy-occupied areas and with this emphasis on small groups operating deep behind enemy lines the AIB provided the closest parallel to what later became the Special Air Service (SAS) although Australian Special Forces actually owe their beginning to the Coastwatchers and the Independent Companies as well.

General Demobilization and Establishment of Full-Time Infantry Battalions

Post WWII:
The Government of Australia demobilized most of the wartime Army, but did however establish three full-time infantry battalions in order to provide the Australian contribution to the British Commonwealth Occupation Force in Japan.