The Final Bombing Raids Over Nazi Occupied Europe Drop Life Instead of Death.
Now That Should Be A Holiday Season Movie Release.
Today’s book I would like to pitch as a movie is Operation Chowhound: The Most Risky, Most Glorious US Bomber Mission of WWII by Stephen Dando-Collins, from St. Martin’s Press.
On 10 May 1940, The Netherlands, which had remained neutral during World War One, was invaded by Nazi Germany. By May 15, Dutch forces had surrendered and the government and royal family, including the German-born Prince Bernhard, had fled into exile. What followed were five years of draconian rule by the Nazi regime in which over 500,00 Dutch men were rounded up and sent to work in German factories and over 140,000 Jews, including Anne Frank, were sent to concentration camps in Eastern Europe. In response, the Dutch began to resist, with at least six different resistance groups operating within the country.
By Early September 1944, it appeared that the Netherlands would soon be liberated. However, Operation Market Garden, the major Allied thrust into the Netherlands, was stalled at the Battle of Arnhem. After their Bridge Too Far, the Allies changed tactics and bypassed the northern Netherlands, leaving large Dutch cities, including Amsterdam, The Hague, and Rotterdam at the mercy of their Nazi occupiers. During Operation Market Garden, America General Dwight D. Eisenhower had asked via radio for the Dutch railroad workers to go on strike, crippling the transit system and thus the German military response to the Allie’s movements. After the failure of the campaign, many workers chose not to return to work. The Nazis responded by cutting bread rations to two pounds per person per week, removing and sending the electric transit system to Germany, imposing a total prohibition on the civilian use of electricity, forcing the Dutch to burn furniture and woodwork, and even flowers for fuel. Thus, began the Netherlands’ darkest period of World War II, The Hunger Winter.
During the Winter of 1944-45, 3.5 million Dutch, 15% of the population, bordered on starvation. With rationing set at 600 calories per day, many would scavenge the countryside looking for food for which they would trade their valuables. Many resorted to eating tulip bulbs. Between 18,000 to 25,000 Dutch civilians would perish due to starvation and related diseases. Disproportionately affected were the very young and the elderly. By March, the supplies of the Germans, who had refused to share with the civilian populace, were also beginning to dwindle.
Soon there were calls for the Allied high command to send relief to the Dutch people. One of the most vocal was Prince Bernard. Perhaps to redeem himself for being a part of the Nazi Party during the 1930s, but more out of his love for the Dutch people with whom he identified, he pressured American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to do something to alleviate the situation, taking to the airwaves to give impassioned speeches about the need in Holland. Eisenhower and his subordinate Walter Bedell Smith were also proponents of relief for the Dutch and even began making plans to implement such action even before Churchill had given the green light. On the German end, The Nazi occupation governor of Holland, Arthur Seyss-Inquart, called “Six and a Quarter” by the Dutch, to save his skin, began secret negations with the Allies through the neutral Finnish Consul for relief for the Dutch.
What followed is a political drama filled with plenty of twists and turns. Officers of varying degrees of rank and authority on both sides began working out details over a series of meetings. Seyss-Inquart had to make sure that the Allies understood he was only asking for a truce and not surrendering the country lest he face the firing squad back in Germany. The German army officers like Johannes Blaskowitz had to assure the Allies that they would not transport or shoot any more political prisoners and would not destroy any of the dikes, flooding the country like Hitler had ordered. The Allies had to assure the Nazis that they were not using the food drops as cover for an invasion using paratroopers. James Doolittle, of the famed raid over Tokyo, came up with the idea of air corridors in which the airplanes would stay during their flights. If they strayed out of them, they were fair game for the German anticraft gun crews. The crews in turn were supposed to send up a red warning flair before opening fire. Surprisingly, those who were most resistant to the idea of a truce were the varying Dutch resistance movements. They either wanted to keep fighting or were reluctant to join forces with other resistance groups with differing political ideologies, ranging from the far left to the far right. However, they too eventually came around.
After all the details were ironed out, the first test run was made on April 29th by Royal Canadian Air Force pilots from the 101 Squadron. Their airplane, Bad Penny, was a guinea pig. If the Germans were not genuine or if Seyss-Inquart could not control his men, then their mercy mission would be a suicide mission. Despite heavy cloud cover and Bad Penny’s propeller being clipped by waves as she flew over the North Sea, the crew continued. On over the coast where they could see the faces of the German anti-aircraft gun crews who were pointing their barrels at them. On over Holland’s tulip fields, for six miles until they dropped their load of food at a racetrack. Then Bad Penny turned and flew over a hospital where the nurses were standing on the roof, waving a Union Jack. Nearby a German tank pointed its cannon at the plane but did not fire. And on back to England. The first mercy mission had been a success. Soon broadcasts were sent out to the people of the Netherlands saying that help was on its way.
It was a glorious site as over the next 10 days nearly 12,000 tons of food, over 4,000 tons by the US 8th Airforce and over 6,000 tons by the RAF, were dropped to the Dutch people at 11 drop sites. 5,356 flights were made by the Allies, with 900 heavy bombers in use at the height of the operation. 25,000 allied servicemen would be involved in the operation. All the pilots were volunteers who were learning on the go as there was not enough time for training. Personnel from the German Air Force, the Luftwaffe, also helped by laying out bed sheets to make massive crosses marking drop sites. The Dutch acted with civility, as civil officials, resistance groups, the Boy Scouts, air raid wardens, fire brigades, and even elements of the German Army organized and distributed the supplies. Some Dutch jumped into canals to retrieve K-rations that had fallen into the water. It is even a report of a German soldier being killed by failing supplies when he a pushed Dutch woman out of their path. 200 trucks would also participate in a ground operation known as Faust to deliver a thousand tons a day to Dutch civilians.
However, not everyone was cooperating. On May 7th, two days after Germany’s surrender to the Allies, radicalized elements of the army, including the Waffen-SS, still had not turned over their arms and were still occasionally exchanging shots with resistance forces. The deadliest occurrence was when Waffen-SS troops appeared in windows and on rooftops and balconies overlooking Dam Square in Amsterdam in which a crowd had gathered to celebrate liberation. The soldiers fired into the civilians, killing between 19 and 30 and wounding many more. A five-hour gun battle with resistance forces followed.
The Shooting at Dam Square highlighted the risks the aircrews were taking. After Bad Penny’s test run, a 9mm bullet from a German Officer’s Pistol was found in the fuselage. Instead of pointing their guns to the ground, some German anti-aircraft crews pointed them upward and tracked the Allied airplanes which were flying just a few hundred feet from the ground. The crews were right to be nervous since the official cease-fire agreement was not signed until May 2. There were at least two more cases of German anticraft or individual soldiers opening fire on Allied aircraft. Since the K-rations were dropped, not parachuted, from the bombers’ bays, the aircraft had to be flown at low altitudes. Some planes flew so low they had foliage stuck in their wings from clipping treetops. One pilot remembered looking up to check the time on a clocktower because that was easier than looking down at his wristwatch. There was also the danger of accidentally falling through the bomb bay doors while kicking supplies out of the aircraft. If they fell, the airman would not have enough time to open a parachute.
Surprisingly despite these risks and the number of aircraft included in operations Mana and Chowhound, only three aircraft were lost. Two collided on the tarmac in England and one was lost due to mechanical failure over the North Sea. The last one was the only occasion of fatalities during the operation, in which 11 members of the USAAF, including photographers, were killed either during the crash or died of exposure from being in the frigid waters too long.
Many of the crews who participated in the drops believed that it was their greatest action during the war. Instead of taking lives as they had done for the past four years, they were giving life. Instead of dropping death from their bomb bays, they were dropping life. Instead of saying “Bombs away,” They were saying “Groceries away.” Pathfinders, formally used to mark bombing sites, were now used to mark food drop sites. Some crewmen donated their K-rations and chocolate from the commissary to the Dutch. Air Commodore Andrew Geddes used skills perfected in mapping and organizing bombing raids to map and organize relief efforts and was dubbed The Miracle Worker.
The enthusiastic displays of gratefulness by the people of the Netherlands brought a tear to many pilots’ eyes. The Dutch would spell out “Thank You Boys”, “Thank You Yanks” and “Many Thanks” with tulips or stones. Others would climb up on rooftops and wave handkerchiefs and Dutch flags, which had been illegal to publicly display for five years, at the airplanes as they flew by. For airmen, these celebrations were the most worthwhile thing they took away from the whole war.
It is estimated that the operation saved 3.5 million Dutch from starvation. Many of them would stay in contact with the airmen who had dropped them the live-saving supplies. Airmen would receive Thank-you letters from The Netherlands for years to come or even meet Dutch individuals on special occasions, including their birthdays. One of those saved by the operation was Audrey Kathleen Ruston, better known as Audrey Hepburn. She would give back by spending her final years working in some of the poorest communities in Africa, Asia, and South America as a UNICEF Ambassador.
There are many reasons I believe the story of operations Chowhound and Mana has the potential to be a Holiday Season movie release. The story of pilots risking their lives to brink the gift of food to needy people not only needs to be honored, but it is also in sync with the true meaning of Christmas. There’s a pageantry to airplanes soaring through the air that is best captured with the power of cinema. If CG can portray spaceships zipping through the galaxy engaging in laser battles, then surely it can show the B-17 Flying Fortress flying over the tulip fields of the Netherlands as they drop living-saving food. If VFX can make superheroes fly through the air as they fight giant monsters, then it can also capture de Havilland Mosquitos and Lancaster bombers sailing passed rooftops as grateful Dutch civilians wave in thanks. During Christmas, audiences would much rather have their spirits lifted by an epic depiction of a grand display of humanitarianism than a generic old action film. Because the story of Operation Chowhound is one in which the heroes really did save the world.
Because it is an inspirational story of military might being used to give life is why I believe that Operation Chowhound should be a feel-good Holiday Season movie release.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider a donation so I can continue posting in the future.
