Operation Musketeer
( Operation Mousquetaire )
Chapter 14
The destiny had chosen his target and hit strongly.....The smashing hand was so powerful and mighty... we were knocked out... we lost balance...we laid on our back and the counting bagan.The Days after Port Said Under Sieg
The sound of rattling machine guns did not stop...though single shots were to be heared here and there, but they faded slowly during Wednesday the 7th. November.... At sunsust, there were mostly nothing to hear, but the sound of sadness and doubt.... Many have lost all their belongings, many more have marked the day as damned day of their life...more have lost every thing.... It is the terrible moment that follows war.......
A remarcable calmness has come upon the city,..
every one was walking around trying to find out the rest of his whereabouts..,
the family,..the friends,..the people we knew.... Many of the building
that stood there for ages were
only a rubble...seceral collapsed....
Port Said was never built to face war...... and we were NOT prepared for
such...
All of a sudden, we saw British soldiers around every corner....and patrolling every where, ....military cars, armoured vehicles ...., helicopters hovering above the city..... Leaflets of the invadors were no remedy.....
The air was not only full of tense, but also a piculiar penetrating smell has dominated the air.... Not only we have smelled the burned buldings with all its contents....and inhabitents, but the worst of all was the small of death that dominated the city. Corpses laid tévery where and the Red Cross could not move them all as soon as possible.... many citzens have forgotten the moment and have helped removing them.....many were burried any where there was sand to cover them... Egyptians and particularly Moslems do respect death.... it will hit every one of us...
The tense was felt every where you go... Sadness,....doubt...were
soon replaced by determination to overcome this
status.....Many many patrolling British soldiers
(most of them as young as I was),... faces we saw 5 months
ago full of joy living side by side with us, were now carrying their rifles
with bayonettes...walking carefully and slowly along the streets.....
we wereleft alone....and we were besieged...
A fact for the records
We have noticed a look of guilt in many eyes....many have apologized and asked for forgiveness.... It was the politician's decision and not theirs.... It was not the war of some days ago... it was something else we also faced ..
This was the strange attitude we have noticed from several soldiers .... They were asking for our understanding to what has happend....it was a piculiar situation...
This attitude was represented later in the way how in PORT SAID, things were different to Port Fouad, where the french have took control
But all that did not stop the fact, that Port Said and Port Fouad fall and was besieged..... and that we were occupied militarly, we lost our freedom. The flow of military equipment began to roll... and the harbour was filled with several huge gray structures of death.... The Royal Navy has blocked the line of horizon with his large ships, the French were doing the same and were witnessing the occupation which no Hollywood movie could have presented as real as it is......
Though the British troops were around the city,
but they did not gain control of it completely.... We have started to build
our Resistance pocket, not only in the Arab town, but also within them.....in
El Efrang ( the European part
of the city)....
It was a disillusioning period for every one....
A dangerous tension began to build up...
 |
Sir General H. Stockwell has hesitated to let the British ships enter the waters of Port Said to dislodge their loads of war equipment before the minesweapers have swept the area and confirmed that it is free of mines - particularly the soviet made mines -. Consequentlly, this hesitation has caused a serious delay of implementing the war plans and created an additional tension between him and his deputy, the French General Andree Baufre. The result was that neither the rest of 6 RTR nor the armoured cars, field guns,transport lorrys, jeeps, batallions logistic materials, amunition, mobile Radar units, weapons or etc., which mounted to 30.000 tons were at the disposal of the fighting units in after more than 48 houres. |
| General Stockwel seems to have anticipated the Egyptian tactics or their eventual plans, to draw his troops to the desert plains south of El Qantara, where the Egyptians would have launched a possible armoured counter attack. He had 48 Centurions and 30 light AMX-13 at his disposal to face the outnumbering heavy Stalin Russian tanks, several T34 mediuum tanks, SU-100 self-propelled antitank guns, the new type of Czeh anti-tank gunand the 32-barrelled rocket launchers which has been deployed against 3 Para the day before may have added more eventual reasons to his concerns. |
May be , because the cease fire was ordered,
General Stockwell was simply avoiding pulling him and his troops in a needless
attrition and Guerella war against his soldiers, where the Egyptians have
the advantage a backing infrastructure - both geographically and in Human
resources - knowing their own terrain.
Was he a far sighted tactician ? or did he
have intellegence information about what would come ???
The fact is, his hesitation has saved eventual
greater British and French human losses.The information available and published
about the Egyptian counter-attack plan, to drag the Anglo-French soldiers
in a savage attrition Guerella war confirms his (assumptions)
by the British Forces in Port Said
 |
The amount of
captured Egyptian military equipments in Port Said is a sad indication of the
city's preparation for ther war and the to be expected outcome.... No
wonder....!!
The captured military equipments by the Anglo-French
forces during the operations were listed by the British Ministry of Defence on
the 21st November included many rifles and a pair of field guns in addition to 3
Self-propelled antitank guns SU-100 Self-propelled anti-tank guns, Rocket
launchers, new type of Czeh anti-tank gun, Praga 10-ton vehicles Lorries,
32-barrelled rocket launchers, light machine-guns, Rifles and sub-machine-guns,
Personal weapons (Enfield and similar), Large quanteties of ammunition, Amounts
of British origin anti-tank mines, 6-pdr anti-tank guns, 3.7-inch guns, Field
guns(All equipment details are available in my book):
by the French in Port Fouad
General Jaques Massu, has listed on page 264 of his
book " Vérité sur Suez 1956" the captured Egyptian military equipments by the
French forces during the operations as follows: although he does not explain
that the French trrops have captured the Port Fouad local police station, of
which weapons a large part is included, and that of many retreating soldiers from Sinai
who were found helpless in the surroundings of Port Fouad)
1. Captured by 2e R.P.C and enforcement units on 5th an 6th November,
(All equipment details are available in my book
The War toll of the Anglo-French Operations
Both these figures do not include the post-invasion loses and casualties correcting the definate final total figures of operation Musketeer. The real truth about the war toll of death, casualties, handicaped and lost seems to will stay for ever in dark on both sides.
The first published Britsh and French casualties sustained in Port Said landing appear to have been, 32 killed, 132 wounded And 1 missing (French pilot).
| |
Killed |
Wounded |
Missing | Royal Navy |
1 |
0 |
0 | Royal Marines |
9 |
60 |
0 | Army |
8 |
36 |
0 | Royal Air Force |
4 |
1 |
0 | British Totals |
22 |
97 |
0 | |
| |
Killed |
Wounded |
Missing | Navy |
4 |
0 |
0 | Army |
10 |
33 |
0 | Air Force |
0 |
0 |
1 | French Totals |
14 |
33 |
1 | |
