Quentin Tarantino’s 2009 film Inglourious Basterds tells the story of a group of Jewish commandos who go around killing Nazi officers for revenge. While the movie is obviously fictional, there were groups of Jewish commandos who operated during and after World War II against the Nazis. Their exploits are not as bloody as the Tarantino movie, but their stories show that reality is just as interesting as fiction. Those three groups were the X Troop, Operation Greenup, and the Nakam.
10. The X Troop
Unlike the other troops in the No. 10, the X Troop had various nationalities in it. The X in its name signified “miscellaneous,” since they did not fall into any one nationality. Even though they came from diverse places, the X Troop members all had one thing in common. Nearly all of them were German-speaking Jewish refugees, mostly from Germany and Austria.
The X Troop was kept secret from the rest of the Allied war effort due to their special training. While they had the normal skills expected of commandos, members were also trained for deep penetration raids to get behind enemy lines and conduct operations that no other commando team could. The commandos usually came from other units where their commandersrecognized their special skills. Their job was extremely dangerous since they were traitors to the German war effort and also Jewish. Any captured commando would inevitably face the death sentence and would risk the lives of their extended family in Nazi-occupied Europe. Still, the X Troop knew they needed to fight.
9. X Troop Fought In Insane Conditions
Throughout the war, there were only 88 members of the X Troop, and they never fought as a single unit. The commandos would split up on various missions behind enemy lines. The X Troop commandos would often fight alone and at night, getting deep behind enemy lines to conduct missions of sabotage or recon. They were also known for their adept interrogation skillsand their knowledge of German training and weaponry, gleaned from years spent in Germany and Austria.
Peter Masters was an X Troop commando during the D-Day invasion and later wrote a book about his experiences in the war. When his commando team landed on the beaches, they were only armed with a few weapons and collapsible bicycles. Once the beach was secure, Masters’s group rode their bicycles ahead of a unit of English soldiers to get information about German troop locations.
When they approached a German village, the captain of the regular English troops decided to use the X Troop commandos to draw the fire of the German soldiers. The Germans took the bait and fired on the bicycle commandos, and one was hit and killed. Diving for cover, Masters found himself face to face with a young German soldier. Both soldiers fired at each other but missed. As he scrambled around in the dirt, the British soldiers led a bayonet charge into the city, having seen where the gun emplacements were. When the battle ended, the British commander had Masters go and apologize to the injured German soldiers. This was all in a day’s work for the X Troop.
8. Accent Shenanigans And Being Captured
Because the X Troop identities and missions were heavily classified, they had to keep much of their lives secret. British commanders thought it was important that their true nature as Jewish refugees should stay a secret. All were German-speaking, so they usually spoke English with an accent that could easily tip off other soldiers to their true identities. Thus, each soldier had convoluted stories about why they had weird accents. Peter Masters relied on a story about being raised in Vienna by British traveling salesmen.
Due to their Jewish identities, the accents, stories, and fake backgrounds also had practical value in the field. The Germans would not show mercy to theseJewish commandos if they could capture them, so each one had to know their cover identity extremely well. Along with the fake background was a fake, English-sounding name they could use. (“Peter Masters” is one example.)
The fake identities saved one X Troop commando named George Lane. German soldiers captured him while he was commanding raids on the French coast before D-Day. Instead of executing Lane on the spot, they brought the commando to Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, pictured above. Knowing that he was in danger, Lane pretended he didn’t understand German. To not arouse the field marshal’s suspicions, Lane told Rommel that he was Welsh, which explained why he spoke English with a strange accent. Rommel believed him, and the two had a lengthy, friendly conversation. Instead of being executed, Lane spent the rest of the war in a German POW camp and survived to tell the story.
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