Popski's Private Army (Cassell Military Paperbacks)

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In the middle of September 1944, the Allies broke through the German Gothic Line stretching across Italy from Pesaro on the Adriatic to La Spezia on the Tyrrhenian Sea, but the German divisions commanded by Field Marshal Albert Kesselring retreated very slowly, fighting stubbornly for every river and canal crossing and defensive feature. During the night, they crossed the main supply route between Spinazzola and Gravina and almost blundered into a German convoy on the road. They drove on into the hill country of the Murge. Here the patrol split up to watch the roads and report all movements to 1st Airborne headquarters. While this was going on, Popski pulled off a coup. The fighting men of Popski’s Private Army were experts in hit-and-run tactics. One of their camps is shown in Italy late in the war as preparations are made for the departure of a patrol. Popski was by now in command of both the partisans and PPA. He appointed Giuseppi Ferri, the university professor, to be civilian governor of Camerino and his brother, the major, commander of partisans, and stayed in Camerino for several days helping to set up a civilian administration until the arrival of the official Allied Military Government of Occupied Territory (AMGOT). He then led PPA north across the Potenza looking for more action.

PPA crossed the rivers Po and Adige and ran into a large force of Germans at Chioggia. Using bluff, as Popski would have done, Caneri laughed off the fact that he had only nine men in three jeeps, saying there were large forces behind him, and persuaded the German commander that to continue fighting was hopeless. The commander surrendered his 700 men. Afghan special forces expand to handle night raids, delicate missions, but training takes time [ dead link]. The Washington Post. Retrieved on 2012-01-01. In April, Bob Yunnie obtained a compassionate home posting upon the death of his only son, and a recently recruited young lieutenant from the 27th Lancers named McCallum took his place as patrol leader. Patrol leaders were now McCallum, Captain John Campbell, and Lieutenant Steve Wallbridge. On 1 October 1909 the War Office's Secret Service Bureau began its work. It soon developed 'home' and 'foreign' sections which became MI5 and MI6. The purpose of MI5 was to protect Britain's secrets while MI6's task was to find out the secrets of potential enemies abroad. In his absence, Jean Caneri took command of PPA and led it on operations until snow bogged down the jeeps. He then organized training for everyone in parachuting, skiing, and mountain climbing.

In the 36 months of its existence, 20 of them spent on operations, PPA had been more of a brotherhood than a military unit, a brotherhood created and led by Popski. Though at its peak it numbered no more than about 120 men, its contribution to the war effort was impressive. The development of cable and wireless communications made messages more secure but methods of eavesdropping soon developed creating the need for ever more sophisticate cryptography. It was a small unit of 22 Senussi Arabs, a British sergeant, and an Arab officer—an independent command—and it had no transport. For that and his supplies, he had to rely on the LRDG. For five months he operated behind the Axis lines in the Jebel Akhdar, the lushly forested and mountainous area between Benghazi and Derna in Libya, keeping a road watch and reporting Axis traffic along the coast, rescuing shot-down airmen, and ambushing when he could. Post-war, in 1947, he was made a Belgian Officier de l'Ordre de la Couronne avec Palme and awarded the Belgian Croix de guerre avec Palme.

On April 21, Caneri led all PPA, with his headquarters organized as a fighting patrol, into the watery maze around Lake Comacchio where, with the partisans of the Garibaldi Brigade and units of the 27th Lancers, they fought Germans for seven days. McCallum and his gunner were killed when a Panzerfaust anti-tank weapon destroyed their jeep as McCallum was leading his patrol into a village on the lake. PPA vehicles are shown during a 48-hour rest and refit period on the campus of the University of Padua, Italy, in the spring of 1945. From the American area, he led his men on raids against the Axis forces north and west of the Mareth Line. In jeeps, each armed with a .30-caliber and .50-caliber Browning machine gun, they raided airfields and shot up aircraft, ambushed convoys, and did as much damage as they could until the war in North Africa ended. They accounted for many vehicles, aircraft, and supplies and sundry other items including 600 Italian prisoners. Of more importance was the confusion the tiny force caused the Germans and Italians. The PPA in the Invasion of ItalyLieutenant-Colonel Vladimir "Popski" Peniakoff DSO MC FRGS (Russian: Владимир Дмитриевич Пеняков Vladimir Dmitriyevich Penyakov, 30 March 1897 – 15 May 1951) was the founder and commanding officer of No. 1 Demolition Squadron, PPA, colloquially known as " Popski's Private Army", during World War II. Throughout history, governments and military commanders have tried to keep their communications secret by the use of codes and ciphers.