r/todayilearned • u/GentPc • 14h ago
TIL about the Filthy 13. The Demolition Section of the Regimental Headquarters of the 506th PIR 101st Airborne. Shaving their heads into Mohawks and wearing Native American war paint before jumping into Normandy they were the real life inspiration for 'The Dirty Dozen'.
https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/NCO-Journal/Archives/2022/November/The-Filthy-13/•
u/1stAtlantianrefugee 12h ago
Jake "McNasty" McNeese was one bad hombre.
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u/Redfish680 9h ago
His grandson, McDreamy, was on Grey’s Anatomy. Really - Google it!
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u/DanielCraigsAnus 9h ago
No fucking shit?!!! That's awesome! My wife and daughter love that show. I'm gonna blow my daughters mind away with that tidbit of WW2 knowledge. That's also her hyperfocus.
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u/Redfish680 8h ago
(I beg you to not mention it. Your wife and daughter are probably more in tune with Google than you might be.)
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u/fortogden 11h ago
Definitely read the article. If you are interet in this kind of thing also read the Seven pillars of Wisdom by TE Lawrence.
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u/Techwood111 9h ago
The article mentions “Carrington” bridges for their Operation Overlord mission. That has GOT to a mistake — Carentan is what it ought to be.
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u/Any-Monk-9395 9h ago
Dudes with mohawks and face paint seems a lot cooler than the dirty dozen film tbh
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u/RonSwansonsOldMan 12h ago edited 4h ago
What History Forgot
Edit: I can't figure out why I'm being downvoted. This story was on a recent episode of a TV show called What History Forgot.
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u/Flipflopvlaflip 14h ago
Mission Command is apparently formally introduced in the American army in 2003. Informally probably earlier. Googling shows the Germans introduced it in 1888.
Hm.
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u/Kidcharlamagne89d 10h ago edited 10h ago
"war is chaos and the Americans practice chaos on a daily basis" - attributed to a nazi general or admiral.
"A serious problem in planning against American doctrine is that the Americans do not read their manuals, nor do they feel any obligation to follow their doctrine." - attributed to a ussr officer
Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.-- Patton.
Mission command as I understand it is the decision making being allowed at lower echelons. A commanders intent is to capture a city but the how is allowed to be changed and decided on by platoon, then squad, then fireteam.
America has been famous for a long time for practicing this. The qoutes above show that the US adversaries knew this.
DDay was famously lucky because the Germans did NOT practice mission command under nazi rule. They had a pander division waiting to reinforce the beaches but without rommels approval the commanders had no authority to advance. So the tanks sat and waited allowing the allies to get a foothold in europe because rommel was on vacation and unable to give the go ahead.
So idk what your point is, but it's not aligned with history. Read the Germans perspective from ww2 to see them even talk about the chaos of american command.
Patton in Africa infuriated both rommel and Montgomery because he disobeyed and acted in an unpredictable manner. Rommel famously pushed ahead of his logistics losing battles because his tanks had no fuel or ammo. Patton famously stole fuel and ammo from other divisions to maintain a supply line while pushing, but those supplies were not allowed to go to the units they were meant for. Meaning rommels intelligence couldnt properly predict weak points or battle sites and Montgomery had to wait for more supplies while the americans surged ahead on stolen fuel.
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u/CateranBCL 7h ago
Point of clarification: Rommel wasn't the one holding things back. It was Hitler insisting that only he could give the order to release those units for combat, while also sleeping in late and everyone being afraid to wake him up because he could be grumpy.
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u/Kidcharlamagne89d 6h ago
Interesting. I'll have to check this later because the book is read said rommel had gone to France for his wife's birthday and the panzer division couldnt advance without command from him personally. He didn't make it back to his hq until the evening and by then the allies were entrenched.
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u/jrhooo 14h ago
Obligatory Fat Electrician - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucJDzgc8_cI
The Filthy 13 were called filthy because they didn’t shower. They got to England for training before Normandy, and decided they hated the mess hall food. So, they snuck into the woods just off post and hunted for their own food. Since everyone was under strict water rationing, they skipped bathing so they could divert that water to food prep.