A number of Islamic soldiers from North Africa (Morocco and Algeria) fought alongside French and American Forces against the Nazis in WWII. The most famous are the Goumiers who fought in Italy and France. See the new film just out on dvd called Days of Glory that shows their sacrifice for the Allied cause despite the racism and discrimination that they endured from the French. It is reminiscent of the treatment given the 54th Mass. during the Civil War.
Below is a summary of the campaigns they particpated in against the Germans and a picture of a typical Goumier in uniform.
World War II
Four Moroccan groups (regimental-sized units) served with the Allied forces during World War II. They specialised in night raiding operations, and fought against the forces of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany during 1942-45. Goumier units were also used to man the front line in mountainous and other rough terrain areas, freeing regular infantry units to operate along more profitable axes of advance.
]North Africa 1940-42
In May 1940, 12 Moroccan Goums were organized as the 1st Group of Moroccan Auxiliaries (French: 1er groupe de supplétifs marocains - G.S.M.) and used in combat against Italian troops operating out of Libya. After the armistice of 1940, the goums were returned to Morocco. In order to evade strict German limits on how many troops that France was allowed to maintain in North Africa, the Goumiers were described as having Gendarmerie-type functions such as the maintenance of public order and the surveillance of frontiers, while maintaining military armament, organization, and discipline.[2]
[Tunisia, 1942-43
The 1st GSM fought on the Tunisian front as part of the Moroccan March Division from December 1942, and was joined by the 2nd GSM in January 1943. After the Tunisia Campaign, the French organized two additional groups and retitled the groups as groupe de tabors marocains (G.T.M.) Each group contained a command goum (company) and three tabors (battalions) of three goums. A tabor contained four 81-mm mortars and totaled 891 men. Each infantry goum was authorized 210 men, one 60-mm mortar, two light machineguns, and seven automatic rifles.[3]
An anonymous junior officer from the U.S. 26th Infantry Regiment, which fought alongside the Goumiers in Tunisia, wrote that:
Two companies of Goums...were stationed next to our CP, and these had sent out two raiding parties the same night... Mostly mountain men from Morocco, these silent, quick-moving raiders were excellent at night raids, and in surprise attacks. How successful they had been was attested by the two [French] officers who had command of the companies of the Goumiers. The companies lacked most of the clothing, equipment and weapons necessary for warfare. Several raids had remedied that. Inspection of their clothing revealed a good many German articles of clothing under their conventional brown and white vertical striped robes. Their rifles were mixed German and Italian, with a few old French rifles firing clips of four. Mess equipment, and a good deal of the food was also of enemy origin, as were the knives, pistols, blankets and toilet articles. From questioning of the Italian prisoners, it was evident that they had either heard or experienced the merciless raids of the Goums, and they wanted no part of them. Part of the Goums' success lay in their silence as they moved forward, and in their highly perfected art of camouflage. One anecdote ran that one warrior had so successfully camouflaged himself all day in full sight of the Germans that a German officer had wandered over to what he thought was a bush, and had urinated on the motionless head of the Moroccan soldier who bore the trial well, but who marked that particular officer down for special attention that night. Goums did not take any prisoners, and it was well-known to the Germans and Italians what befell anyone who ran afoul of those Moroccans. There was certainly no desire to have our battalion tangle with either of the two raiding parties sent out the same night.[1]
Separate from the groups, the 14th Tabor did not participate in the fighting in Europe and remained in Morocco to keep public order for the remainder of the war.[4]
[]Italy, 1943-45
The 4th Tabor of Moroccan Goums fought in the Sicilian Campaign, landing at Licata on July 14, 1943, and was attached to the U.S. Seventh Army.[5][6] The Goumiers of the 4th Tabor were attached to the U.S. 1st Infantry Division on July 27, 1943 and were recorded in the U.S. 26th Infantry Regiment's log files for their courage. Upon their arrival many Italian soldiers surrendered en masse, while the Germans began staging major retreats away from known goumiers presence.[7]
The Italian campaign of World War II is perhaps the most famous and most controversial in the history of the Goumiers. The 4th Group of Moroccan Tabors shipped out for Italy in November 1943, and was followed in January 1944 by the 3rd Group, and reinforced by the 1st Group in April 1944.[8]
In Italy, the Allies suffered a long stalemate at the German Gustav Line. In May 1944, three Goumier groupes, under the name Corps de Montagne, were the vanguard of the Corps Expéditionaire Français (CEF or FEC) attack through the Aurunci Mountains during Operation Diadem, the fourth Battle of Monte Cassino. "Here the Goums more than proved their value as light, highly mobile, mountain troops who could penetrate the most vertical terrain in fighting order and with a minimum of logistical requirements. Most military analysts consider the Goumiers' maneuver as the critical victory that finally opened the way to Rome."[2]
The Allied commander, U.S. General Mark Clark also paid tribute to the Goumiers and the Moroccan regulars of the Tirailleur units:
In spite of the stiffening enemy resistance, the 2nd Moroccan Division penetrated the Gustave [sic] Line in less than two day’s fighting. The next 48 hours on the French front were decisive. The knife-wielding Goumiers swarmed over the hills, particularly at night, and General Juin’s entire force showed an aggressiveness hour after hour that the Germans could not withstand. Cerasola, San Giorgio, Mt. D’Oro, Ausonia and Esperia were seized in one of the most brilliant and daring advances of the war in Italy... For this performance, which was to be a key to the success of the entire drive on Rome, I shall always be a grateful admirer of General Juin and his magnificent FEC.
However, the military achievements of the Goumiers in Italy were accompanied by widespread allegation of war crimes: "...exceptional numbers of Moroccans were executed—many without trial—for allegedly murdering, raping, and pillaging their way across the Italian countryside. The French authorities sought to defuse the problem by importing numbers of Berber women to serve as "camp followers" in rear areas set aside exclusively for the Goumiers."[3] According to Italian sources, more than 7,000 people were raped by Goumiers.[4] [5] The victims, later known in Italy as Marocchinate, included women, children and men, including some priests. The mayor of Esperia (a comune in the Province of Frosinone), reported that in his town, 700 women out of 2,500 inhabitants were raped and that some had died as a result. In northern Latium and southern Tuscany, it is alleged that the Goumiers raped and occasionally killed women and young men after the Germans retreated, including members of partisan formations.[6]
The C.E.F. executed 15 soldiers by firing squad and sentenced 54 others to hard labor in military prisons for acts of rape or murder.[9]
During their fighting in the Italian Campaign, the Goumiers took 3,000 casualties, of which 600 were deaths.[10]
Corsica, 1943
In September 1943 the 2nd Group of Moroccan Tabors participated in the liberation of Corsica, and fought the Germans in the mountains near Bastia, by Cape Corse.[7]
Elba, 1944
The 2nd Group of Moroccan Tabors was part of the French Forces that took Elba from the Germans in June 1944. The operation was called Operation Brassard. The island was more heavily defended than expected, and there were many casualties on both sides as a result of the severe fighting.
]Mainland France, 1944
The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Groups of Moroccan Tabors fought in the campaigns in southern France, Vosges Mountains, and Alsace during late 1944 and early 1945. The Goumiers started landing in southern France on August 18, 1944. Attached to the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division, all three groups took part in the combat to liberate Marseille from August 20 - 28, 1944. The 1st Group was subsequently used to secure France's Alpine frontier with Italy until late October 1944, and then took part in the forcing of the Belfort Gap in November. During late September and early October 1944, the 2nd and 3rd Groups fought in the areas of Remiremont and Gérardmer. All three groups fought in the Vosges Mountains during November and December 1944, facing extremely cold weather and bitter German resistance. After hard fighting in the Vosges Mountains and the Colmar Pocket, the 3rd Group was repatriated to Morocco in April 1945. It was replaced in Europe by the 4th Group, which had returned to North Africa after French forces left Italy.[11] [8]
Germany, 1945
The 1st, 2nd, and 4th Groups of Moroccan Tabors fought in the final operations to overrun southwestern Germany in 1945.[12] The 1st Group fought through the Siegfried Line in the Bienwald from March 20 - 25, 1945. In April 1945, the 1st and 4th Groups took part in the combat to seize Pforzheim. In the last weeks of the war, the 2nd Group fought in the Black Forest and pushed southeast to Germany's Austrian border. During the same period, the 1st and 4th Groups advanced with other French forces on Stuttgart and Tübingen. By mid-1946, all three groups had been repatriated to Morocco.
The total of Goumier casualties in World War II from 1942 to 1945 was 8,018 of which 1,625 were killed in action.[9]
