Patton in Palestine (A Work in Progress)

Naturally the outgoing Superintendent of the Military Academy was keeping the newly appointed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff waiting. His visit, because of its nature, was being kept low key. He had driven from the train station in a nondescript car. The Superintendent’s secretary had ushered him into the Superintendent’s office to wait.

The office was what might expect, filled with artifacts of a very eventful life. The CJCS had served with the man throughout the recent war and knew his personality well. That was one reason he had argued with the President’s proposal. He dreaded what might follow.

He heard the heavy tromp of booted feet outside the door. A soft, female voice said, “He’s inside waiting for you General.”

“Thanks, Sylvia,” a familiar, falsetto voice replied.

The door opened and the CJCS rose from his comfortable, leather arm chair. “Brad, how the hell are you!” exclaimed the Superintendent of the Military Academy.”

“Never better, George” said Omar Bradley as they shook hands.

“Have a seat, Brad,” said George Patton. “Can I get you anything? By the way, congratulations on your appointment. I knew since you were my best corps commander in Sicily you’d go far.”

“Nothing for me, thanks.”

Patton sat down in another chair in front of the massive desk. He was dressed, as he had always been, in his cavalry boots, jodhpurs, and green uniform with the three stars shining on each shoulder.

They started with small talk, reminiscing about the war, about the situation in Europe, about the problems with the army that had been drastically downsized in the wake of the war, and how the History of World War II Patton was working on was going. Bradley had been skeptical about the reliance on atomic weapons to keep the peace and was going to use his office to urge an expansion of the conventional armed forces. Patton heartily agreed with the sentiment and offered some suggestions, some of which were even sensible.

After about half an hour, they got down to business. “George, I hear you’re stepping down as Superintendent.”

“I’ve done what I’ve set out to do. The last war taught us a few things and I wanted to make sure those lessons are passed along.”

“Have you thought of what you want to do afterwards?”

Patton shrugged. It was well known that he was interested in some kind of job, such as commander of allied forces of the anti Soviet alliance that people were talking about. Usually, Bradley noted, Patton seemed almost puppy dog eager when the prospect of a combat command was dangled before him. But Bradley also knew that one thing George Patton would never have was any post in Europe. After the things he had said about the Soviets soon after the war, the Russians would probably interpret such an appointment as a prelude to World War III and would react accordingly.

“Something has come up in the Middle East.” Bradley picked up the briefcase that stood next to him, opened it, and took out a file. He closed the briefcase, set it back on the floor, and handed the file to Patton.

“What’s this?” Patton asked, opening the file.

“The picture you are seeing was taken in Cairo about two weeks ago. The man on the left, walking down from the Royal Palace in the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin Al-Husseini. He is considered an important religious leader in the Muslim world. He was also a Nazi collaborator and ought to have been hanged.”

“The man on the left looks familiar.”

“He should. His name is Martin Bormann, former Reich Leader of Germany, second only to Hitler himself during the last days. He also needs to be hanged.”

“This has something to do with the partition of Palestine, doesn’t it?”

“Quick as usual, George. Palestine is to be divided into a Jewish state and a Muslim state. The Muslims, including most of the surrounding countries, have vowed to drive the Jews into the sea. That’s bad enough, but now we have suspicions that Nazi war criminals who escaped the fall of Germany may be involved. The last thing we need is someone trying to establish a Fourth Reich in the Middle East.”

“No, indeed.” Patton was suddenly somber.

“The President wants you to travel to Palestine as his official representative. Talk to some of the Jewish leaders and assess their ability to resist an Arab attack. Find out what their needs are in case we decide to intervene after the British leave.”

Patton thought for a moment. “Alright, I’ll do it. It’ll give me a chance to visit the Holy Land.”

Bradley suppressed a sigh. “One more thing, George. You’re going there as an observer only. Don’t get the country involved in anything that the President doesn’t want to handle. And, for God’s sake, keep your mouth shut.”

“Brad, you know me. You have nothing to worry about.”

“George, I know you and that’s why I worry. Now, if you have something to drink in here, I would be glad of it.”

*

When George Patton made his first trip to what was then Palestine, President Truman envisioned that he would meet with some of the Jewish leaders, perhaps pay a courtesy call to the British High Commissioner, and maybe have a look at the meager military of the Jewish Yishuv before returning to the United States and giving a report.

Naturally, as General Bradley feared, things did not go exactly like that.
Patton arrived in Tel Aviv in late February, 1948, and had meetings with Ben Gurion, the Jewish political leader, and Yigael Yadin, the Jewish military leader. Then a young staff officer by the name of Moshe Dayan was assigned to him as his guide and minder to see to his needs and take him where he wished to go.

That was when the trouble started. Dayan was dashing, mercurial, controversial, and an experienced and skilled combat commander. He had lost an eye fighting Vichy forces in Lebanon and wore a patch that made him as rakish looking as a pirate. Naturally the two hit it off famously.

The two had a discussion about the Battle of the Roads that was taking place then. 100,000 Jews were under siege in Jerusalem and were dependent on armored convoys to bring them food and supplies from the Jewish settlements along the coast. The convoys had to fight their way through numerous Arab ambushes. The battle was going badly for the Jews, with many of the convoys being shot up.

Patton, looking at a map, drew his attention to an Arab village called Kastel, a strategically placed hamlet that consisted of a few homes and a mosque. Dayan agreed that things would get less complicated if the Jews could take that position, but pointed out how well defended it was. Then Patton began to ruminate about how during the Third Crusade the Muslim leader Saladin had delayed the Crusader march on Jerusalem by poisoning wells. Dayan, seeing where the conversation was heading, pointed out that any Jewish garrison of Kastel would need the wells to hold that position.

Patton smiled thinly and asked what would happen if the Arabs thought the wells at Kastel had been poisoned but in fact were not.

Dayan suddenly became very thoughtful.

Three days later, a Haganah unit conducted a raid on Kastel. A lot of ammunition and explosives were expended. But all of that was a cover for the tossing of a number of canisters with a skull and crossbones into and around the village wells before the raiders retreated.

Dayan was definitely seen at the battle. Patton until the end of his life denied being there, though some witnesses claim to have seen an older man shooting a pearl handled Colt peace maker.

What is not disputed was the result. The Arab garrison at Kastel and its inhabitants, thinking that they had not water, panicked and fled. The panic spread up and down the road between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem with rumors that Jewish agents were poisoning wells and other water supplies. Two days after the raid, a strong Haganah force occupied Kastel and a convoy with two months worth of food, as well as much needed ammunition and other supplies, entered Jerusalem.

Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni, the Arab commander who had been conducting the siege of Jerusalem, began to plan a counter attack. He would be in for a surprise.

(Note: Sharp eyed readers will note that the POD had advanced the Kastel operation that took place in OTL by about a month, with consequences that will be seen shortly.)

*

Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni did not take long to try to take back Kastel. He knew that if the Jews kept running supply convoys into Jerusalem his position there would become untenable. So he gathered a force of five thousand of his irregulars and set forth to re conquer the town.

Al-Husayni has a man who liked to lead from the front. So when he led the first wave of the attack, he was shocked to find that there was no resistance. They poured fire into the village before charging into it, shouting “Allah uh-Akbar.”

Then they were shocked to find that the village was empty.
Several hundred yards away, General Patton and Colonel Dayan were watching the scene through binoculars.

“Unbelievable!” exclaimed Dayan. “They haven’t figured it out yet.”

“I’m just an observer, mind, but perhaps it is time to give them an education,” said Patton.

Dayan nodded and gestured to the young Haganah soldier. The soldier took out a flare gun and fired it. As the flare burst in the bright, blue Judean sky, Dayan took up a control box and pressed a switch. Kastel suddenly exploded.

The explosives wrecked all of the buildings in the village, including the Mosque. Then mortars and machine guns opened up from hidden positions in the hills around the village.

It was not so much a battle as it was a massacre. The Arab fighters, those still capable of it, turned and ran. However they left behind the dismembered body of their leader Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni. The fact of his death exacerbated the panic, that spread all the way down the road to Jerusalem.

Dayan and Patton were the first to enter the ruined village after the Arab attack force had decamped. It was Dayan who first noticed the blond haired, blue eyed body glad in Arabic robes, with a blue and white checked keffiyeh. He bent down and examined the man’s wrist. As he expected, he found a death’s head tattoo, a sign of an SS soldier.

“Well,” said Patton, “Brad is going to be interested in this
***

Field Marshal Sir Bernard Law Montgomery dreaded the summons to Number 10. His appointment to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff had not gone well. He had spent most of his time squabbling with the service chiefs. It was pretty much a given by the spring of 1948 that his days in that post were numbered.

Much to his surprise, Prime Minister Atlee did not broach the subject at first. He opened the conversation with Palestine. “Damn that man Truman.”

“Prime Minister?”

“What was he thinking sending that man Patton to the Middle East anyway?”

“Patton’s in the Middle East, Prime Minister?”

“And interfering. Our intelligence is pretty sure that he had something to do with the recent action that opened the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem road. The Jews are amateur soldiers and they could not have pulled it off on their own.”

Montgomery, who knew something about the exploits of the Jewish Brigade in North Africa and Italy, disagreed. But he held his tongue. “Where is Patton now?”

“Back in America and I hope they keep him there. In any event, the Jews have shipped enough arms and supplies to Jerusalem to make it virtually impregnable. That serves as a complication for our policy.”

“And what is our policy, Prime Minister?”

“I’m replacing you at CIGC with Slim and I’m sending you to the Middle East in a kind of roving commission. You’re to visit King Abdullah’s court and ascertain what his intentions are and then try to influence them.”

“Isn’t General Glubb already there?”

“Glubb Pasha has gone native, I’m afraid. The King and Country he answers to are Abdullah and Jordan. British interests need to be protected and you’re the man to do it.”

“Yes, Prime Minister.”
***

“George, what in the Hell were you thinking?”

Patton stood at attention in Bradley’s new and resplendent office in the Pentagon. He was used to these kinds of dressing downs and knew how they would proceed.

“Brad, I’m not sure-“

Bradley picked up a newspaper and slammed it on the desk in front of him. Patton looked at it. It was a copy of the New York Times. A headline read: “Old Blood and Guts Beats Arab Fighters in Palestine.”

“Goddamn newspapers. They don’t get anything right.”

“Are you going to tell me to my face that you did not offer advice to the Jewish forces in Palestine?”

“They asked some questions, I gave my opinion. I can’t help it if they followed my advice.”

“And now the Palestinian Jews have opened up the road to Jerusalem and have made that city a fortress. Atlee has been burning up the cables to Washington, all but accusing us of intervening in the conflict.”

“I think we should.”

Bradley looked at him thoughtfully. “I thought you didn’t like Jews.”

“You should have seen those people, Brad. They’ve got more heart and fight than any group of soldiers I’ve ever seen. It was like seeing something out of the Bible. You’ve read my report.”

“So has the president.”

“Is he upset too?”

“I don’t know. He wants both of us in the White House within the hour.”

“Oh.”

“Oh. And by the way, the Brits have sent Monty to Amman.”

“Monty?”

“It seems that you have upset them.”

Despite himself Patton smiled.


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