The International City of Tangier

The flag of the International City of Tangier

At first glance, Tangier (طنجة) seems like an unremarkable seaside town, a stone throw away from the strategic strait of Gibraltar, connecting the Mediterranean to the Atlantic ocean. But this odd town has a disproportionately rich history. Founded by the Carthaginians in the early 5th century BC, ruled by Romans, Vandals, (Eastern) Roman again, Arab and the Portuguese. In fact, it was part of the dowry of Princess Catherine of Portugal to the recently crowned Charles II of England, transferring the settlement to English control in 1662. The English had planned to convert the town to their main naval base in the region (akin to Gibraltar but of course, the English only controlled Gibraltar in 1713) but abandoned & destroyed the town when it was besieged by the Moroccan Sultan in 1685. In the 19th century, Tangier became a hub of international diplomacy and politics. Amongst the curious notabilities in the town's history include it being the site of the USA's first consulate, being the focus on an international confrontation between the French and the Germans, and infamous for espionage during the Cold War.

A map of the International Zone

The year is 1912; Morocco has been divided between the Spanish and the French. France wants to incorporate Tangier into its Moroccan possessions, the Spanish likewise. The British, on the other hand, wanted nothing of the sort and advocated that the city and its hinterlands be declared an international zone with no prevailing foreign power. Disagreements continued and were interrupted by the outbreak of World War 1 in 1914.

The European dispute was resolved with the signing of the Tangier Protocol in 1923, which declared the city a 373-square-kilometre demilitarised international zone, to be co-administered by an international multi-tiered legislative body representing the UK, France and Spain. The treaty was mediated by the League of Nations and the city's native population was under the 'nominal sovereignty' of the Moroccan Sultan. Portugal, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United States later joined to co-administrate the zone.

The full text of the Tangier protocol can be viewed here

For an intimate portrayal of life in the Tangier International Zone, I redirect you to this wonderful essay.

A scene in Tangier

Suffice to say that the native Moroccan population were not favourable to the foreign presence nor to the International Zone itself which they called "a plague zone infested and infected by infidels".

On 14 June 1940, the day Paris fell to the invading Germans during World War 2, the Spanish army occupied Tangier, incorporating it into its Moroccan possessions and assumed policing powers of the zone, calling it a 'wartime measure'. This drew international condemnation, particularly from the British government, worried about the Spanish entering the war on the side of the Nazis. The Spanish guaranteed rights of British subjects in the city and to not fortify the zone. In May 1944, German diplomats from the city were expelled. 
Following the end of World War 2, the Spanish withdrew from the city and the international zone was reinstated. 

The nine Western powers met in 1956 and agreed to abolish the zone and to secede it to the newly-independent Moroccan state (treaty text here). Pre-1956 Tangier had a population of 40,000 Muslims and 31,000 Europeans.

Further reading:

• Susan Gilson Miller (2013). A History of Modern Morocco. ISBN 9781139619110, pages 88-104
• Finlayson, Iain (1992). Tangier: City of the Dream. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-00217857-5.

The Polish Exodus To Iran in World War 2

In light of the horrific deaths of refugees & migrants crossing into Europe and the alarming xenophobic sentiments that are being spouted on the radio waves, I have decided to bring attention to an almost forgotten footnote in history; the Polish refugees of Iran.

A Polish woman decorates her tent, in an American Red Cross camp in Tehran, Iran. 1942

Why were the Polish in Iran?
Time for some backstory. It's September 1939 - Germany and the Soviet Union have invaded Poland and partitioned the country between the two. To say life was miserable for the Polish at this time would be an understatement. The Soviet Union interned over 320,000 Polish citizens and deported them to Siberia for work in the infamous Gulags. Another 150,000 Poles died, in gruesome massacres such as the Katyn massacre. Stalin began emptying Poland of anyone who could resist the occupation. First went military officers and their families, then the intelligentsia, and last anyone with wealth, influence or education.

Fast forward to 1941 and Nazi Germany launched a full-scale invasion of the Soviet Union (Operation Barbarossa, the largest military campaign in history). Officially on the side of the Allied powers in July 1941, Joseph Stalin signed a Polish-Russian agreement that led to the foundation of a Soviet-backed Polish army that was to be made up of Polish prisoners of war who were 'pardoned' from the Gulags. The formation of such an army would take place in British-occupied Iran.

With news of their mass release, Poles began to slowly make their way towards Iran. With the Polish government in exile unable to assist their compatriots, and the Soviets refusing to allow access to trains to facilitate their exodus, fatalities due to hunger, the Siberian cold, violence, disease and simple exhaustion were high. By August 1942, a conservative estimate suggests more than 115,000 Poles (included 40,000 civilians) fled to Iran. At most, it is thought 300,000 Poles fled.

Camp Polonia:

The soldiers who enlisted in Anders' Army (named after its commander Władysław Anders) regrouped in Bandar Pahlavi, Mashhad and eventually Ahvaz, before being transferred to British command in Mandatory Palestine.

Young Polish refugee at a camp operated by the Red Cross in Tehran, Iran. Nick Parrino, 1943

The civilians were left in the refugee camps that sprawled up around the country. Having first arrived in the port of Bandar Pahlavi (now Bander Anzali) on the northern Iranian coast, a makeshift city comprising over 2000 tents (provided by the Iranian army) was hastily erected along the shoreline of Pahlavi to accommodate the refugees. It stretched for several miles on either side of the lagoon: a vast complex of bathhouses, latrines, disinfection booths, laundries, sleeping quarters, bakeries and a hospital. Every unoccupied house in the city was requisitioned, every chair appropriated from local cinemas. Nevertheless, the facilities were still inadequate.

The Iranian and British officials who first watched the Soviet oil tankers and coal ships list into the harbour at Pahlavi on the 25th March 1942 had little idea how many people to expect or what physical state they might be in. Only a few days earlier, they had been alarmed to hear that civilians, women and children, were to be included among the evacuees, something for which they were totally unprepared.[4] The ships from Krasnovodsk were grossly overcrowded. Every available space on board was filled with passengers. Some of them were little more than walking skeletons covered in rags and lice. Holding fiercely to their precious bundles of possessions, they disembarked in their thousands at Pahlavi and kissed the soil of Persia. Many reportedly sat down on the shoreline and prayed, or wept for joy.

They had not quite escaped, however. Weakened by two years of starvation, hard labour and disease, they were suffering from a variety of conditions including exhaustion, dysentery, malaria, typhus, skin infections, chicken blindness and itching scabs. The spread of typhus in particular was deadly to such an extent that 40% were hospitalised and a large proportion later died.

Overcrowded ship crossing the Caspian Sea to Pahlavi

Gholam Abdol-Rahimi, a struggling photographer in Pahlavi, emerged from bed to witness ships disgorging disheveled refugees. Abdol-Rahimi's photographs are perhaps the most complete account of the catastrophe. But his work was never recognized or published.

Pahlavi was only a temporary shelter. Refugees were later dispersed to more prepared camps in Isfahan (Isfahan in particular being dubbed as the 'City of Polish Children'), Tehran and Ahvaz.

More than 13,000 of the arrivals in Iran were children, many orphans whose parents had died on the way. In Russia, starving mothers had pushed their children onto passing trains to Iran in hopes of saving them.

As the war dragged on, most refugees continued their journey away from the Soviet Union, reaching Pakistan, Palestine and British East Africa & South Africa, eventually to the United Kingdom and the United States.

The Polish cemetery in Bander Anzali (Pahlavi)

In all, 2,806 refugees died within a few months of arriving and were buried in cemeteries around Iran. Their alien names and the dates on their tombstones chronicle a calamity, even to a visitor without knowledge of their history. Etched on row after row of identical tombstones is a single year of death: 1942.

Polish military cemetery, Tehran.

Further reading:
Forgotten Polish Exodus to Persia - Washington Post
The Exile Mission: The Polish Political Diaspora and Polish Americans, 1939-1956. Anna D. Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann. page 26-27 
The Polish Deportees of World War II: Recollections of Removal to the Soviet Union and Dispersal Throughout the World. Tadeusz Piotrowski. page 10-12.

"Your Spitfires At Work!" British Propaganda Poster in the Persian Gulf

© IWM (Art.IWM ART LD 5268)

The nature of propaganda is intertwined with that of human nature. Propaganda served as a way to solidify public support, decimate the reputation of the enemy, further one's ego and reputation (indeed, one of the earliest pieces of propaganda are those detailing the rise of Darius of Persia). In times of war, the home front is as crucial as the battlefront and propaganda is always an effective tool in a government's arsenal. In this post, I'm sharing this poster made by the British (likely the British Civilian Organisation) destined towards the British protectorates of the Persian Gulf whom had donated funds to the war cause (indeed, the hakim of Bahrain donated £30,000)

The title reads "Your [Persian Gulf] Spitfires in Action". Official transcript of the poster lies below:

[top left] One of the four fighter aircraft donated by the people of the Persian Gulf. The other three aircraft are called 'Bahrain', 'Kuwait' and 'Oman'.

[top right] When enemy bombers come close to Britain, fighter aircraft go to chase them and drive them away. The picture shows one of your fighter aircraft shooting down an enemy bomber.

[bottom left] Your fighter aircraft participate in sweeping raids on enemy territory, and their machine guns inflict huge losses on enemy ships, transport and communication routes.

[bottom right] Your fighter aircraft protect the Allies’ commercial ships against the attack of enemy aircraft. Good surveillance and vigilance of the fighter aircraft only played a major role in the arrival of many military shipments into their destination ports.

[bottom text] Countries of the Persian Gulf voluntarily participated in the daily punishment administered by the RAF to the aggressive Nazi State.

This photograph shows the spitfire (entitled Bahrain) that was donated to the Royal Air Force after raising £15,000 to buy it. The plane itself was piloted by Air Vice-Marshal (Flying Officer during the Battle of Britain) Francis David Stephen Scott-Malden.

His entry at ‘The Airmen’s Stories’ section of the Battle of Britain London Monument website reads:

‘Bearing the initials "S-M" below the cockpit and the legend "Bahrain", Scott-Malden's Spitfire W3632 - built at the Supermarine factory at Woolston, Hampshire - was a gift from the people of Bahrain, who had raised £15,000 to buy it.’

In his Bahrain plane, Scott-Malden led one of the Free Norwegian fighter squadrons leading three sorties in one day during the disastrous Deippe raid of August 1942. Scott-Malden was later awarded the Distinguished Service Order and decorated by the King of Norway.

 If you are interested, you can read about the role of Bahrain during the Second World War

The Strangest Battle of the Second World War

Castle Itter in the 1970s

On the 5th of May 1945, five days after the suicide of Adolf Hitler, the usually serene Castle Itter in the Austrian countryside was the site of what may possibly be the strangest battle of the Second World War. Soldiers of the United States, anti-Nazi German soldiers, Austrian resistance and an eyebrow-raising collection of French VIPs (including several former prime ministers and a tennis star) fought off invading loyal remnants of the 17th Waffen-SS Panzer division. This is thought to be the only ever time in the war where Germans and Americans fought on the same side. But how exactly did this scenario arise? And why isn't this an adapted Hollywood movie starring Brad Pitt?

The Castle And Its Prisoners:

The castle was located in western Austria in the quiet village of Itter. It was privately owned but was seized by the German Army (Wehrmacht) in 1943 for use as a prison camp under administration of the infamous Dachau Concentration Camp.

Its prisoners were rather famous VIPs who included tennis star Jean Borotra (later General Commissioner of Sports in the Vichy regime, former prime minister Édouard Daladier, Charles de Gaulle's elder sister Marie-Agnès Cailliau, former commander-in-chief Maxime Weygand, former prime minister Paul Reynaud, former commander-in-chief Maurice Gamelin (instrumental in the Phony War), right-wing leader François de La Rocque (the leader of the right-wing Croix de Feu movement), and trade union leader Léon Jouhaux.

The Battle:

On 4 May, the garrison of the castle abandoned the castle, having realised that German surrender was imminent. The French prisoners took control of the castle and armed themselves with whatever weaponry remained. A Yugoslavian prisoner, Zvonimir Čučković, was sent to find help. Zvonimir encountered elements of the American 103rd Infantry Division near the city of Innsbruck who agreed to rescue the prisoners. A defected German unit under the command of Major Josef Gangl which collaborated with the Austrian resistance and later surrendered to the Americans, agreed to accompany the rescue.

The rescue force consisted of 14 American soldiers, 10 defected German soldiers and a Sherman tank. Upon reaching the castle, the French prisoners were dismayed at the small size of the rescue but however had elected to focused on fortifying the castle in anticipation of a Waffen-SS assault on the castle. The Sherman tank was placed towards the entrance whilst positions were taken on the towers. The Allies were joined by a defected Waffen-SS officer who was recovering in the nearby village.

On the morning of the 5th, the castle came under attack from 100-150 soldiers of the 17th Waffen-SS Panzergrenadier division. Major Gangl telephoned in Austrian resistance members in the vicinity for reinforcements, 3 Austrian resistance members arrived soon after. Despite being ordered to take refuge inside the castle, French prisoners joined the battle alongside the Americans and Germans. The battle raged on for six hours, resulting in the destruction of the Sherman tank and the death of Major Gangl, before the SS were defeated by a relief force from the American 142nd Infantry Regiment.

Further reading:

• The Battle for Castle Itter, written by Stephen Harding

US news report during the war:

Yang Kyoungjong - A Conscript's Story

It was 6 June 1944 and the D-Day landings were in full swing. The largest seaborne invasion in history saw almost 160,000 troops cross the English Channel in a single day and pour into German-occupied Normandy. Amongst the several thousands of German prisoner of wars (POW), American paratroopers captured what they believed was a Japanese soldier in German uniform. Eventually, it turns out he was Korean, why only puzzled the Americans more. What was a Korean doing in the middle of Normandy, thousands of miles away from home?

His name was Yang Kyoungjong and this is the story of how he was an unwilling veteran of the Japanese, Soviet and German army during the most devastating conflict of all times. 

Yang Kyongjong (left) in Wehrmacht attire following capture by American paratroopers in June 1944 after D-Day

Let’s turn the clock back to 1938 to a Japanese-ruled Korea. Japan was at war with China, the Soviet Union threateningly loomed above Japanese Manchuria, border clashes, and skirmishes were common. Yang Kyoungjong, a native from Northwest Korea, was amongst thousands of Koreans conscripted into the Kwantung Army of the Imperial Japanese Army, in response to Soviet border hostilities. In 1939, the unofficial conflict climaxed at the Battles of the Khalkhin Gol in Mongolia that saw the defeat of the Japanese Sixth Army and the capture of 3,000 Japanese soldiers, including Yang Kyoungjong. All were shipped to labour camps across the country. 

Fast forward to 1942 & Operation Barbarossa, the largest land invasion in history (with over four million Axis soldiers deployed along a 2,900km Soviet front) was in full gear . The Soviets, having lost enormous portions of land and manpower, began drafting thousands of prisoners (our friend Yang included) to fill in the ranks. 

In early 1943, at the Third Battle of Kharkov which saw the destruction of 52 Soviet divisions, Yang was captured and conscripted into the newly-formed Ostlegionen (German for “Eastern Legions”). Now why would the German Wehrmacht (Army) conscript an “inferior race” into its ranks when it has gone so far in spouting its racial supremacy rhetoric? Simple; manpower, manpower, manpower. Thousands of German soldiers were stuck in German-occupied France and the Balkans, to deal with partisan activity. The general idea was that the Ostlegionen would free up troops to be sent to the Eastern Front. 

Yang, now in German uniform, was sent to the Cotentin Peninsula of Normandy in occupied France, later that year. When the events of D-Day occurred, Yang was captured and sent to a POW camp in the United Kingdom, before being transferred to another camp in the United States. At the end of the war, this war veteran became a US citizen and settled in Illinois, where he lived a quiet life. He died in 1992, age 72.