Behind the Lines

Mar 2019
Forgotten Voices of the Secret War - Roderick Bailey – Ebury Press, 2009
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This is a history of the Special Operations Executive, the secret organisation that encouraged resistance and sabotage in Nazi-occupied Europe. The main thing I got from it was that the TV programme 'Allo 'Allo, a comedy series from my youth that I remember with more affection than I probably should, was in fact a fairly accurate representation of what went on. The stories of derring-do in such diverse theatres as Norway, France, Italy, Greece and Poland are told through the recorded reminiscences of those who were there. Unfortunately they have been chopped up into bite-size chunks that spoil the through-lines of their respective narratives. They have also been heavily edited which means that you get relatively little sense of them as people.

Like Remembrance Sunday, true-life war stories always make me uneasy. I know that I should celebrate the heroism and sacrifice of those who put their lives on the line so that I could have the comfortable existence that I do, but I can't help thinking that to do so ennobles a situation that should never have been allowed to arise in the first place. We shouldn't let politicians and generals - and ourselves - off the hook by pretending that killing and maiming people is a good solution to a political problem rather than - maybe - a lesser evil than the alternatives. It was entirely predictable that successful sabotage operations would lead to horrible reprisals being taken against ordinary people by the Nazi regime, which explains why some SOE operatives found the local support that they received to be more ambivalent than they expected. I do not for a moment deny the bravery of the people whose stories are (badly) told in this book, but I wish that they had not been put in the position where they had to be.