Operation Chariot: The Commando Raid on St Nazaire

Operation Chariot was an audacious Combined Operation raid on the port of St Nazaire in German occupied France. Packed with tons of high explosives a destroyer was rammed into the gates of the only dry dock capable of servicing the German battleship Tirpitz. Such was the damage that the dry dock was rendered unusable for the remainder of the war.

Read More: OPERATION CHARIOT - ST. NAZAIRE

 

Ironically while the raid was in planning, the Germans executed Operation Cerberus, aka Channel Dash, the withdrawal of Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, and Prinz Eugen from Brest to home waters, essentially giving up on operating heavy ships in the open Atlantic. Rather than risking another Bismarck episode in mid-ocean, they were to join Tirpitz and others for operations against the North Russian convoys. Tirpitz had already commenced operations with a sortie against convoys PQ12 and QP8 which included an unsuccessful attack on the battleship by Albacores from Victorious March 9.

Some of us may recall that S and G had both been drydocked at Brest, as had the French battleship Richelieu which was built there. The largest drydock in Brest was 250m long - one meter too short for Tirpitz!

 

Interesting. So if this took place, why the raid? Were they thinking that the German surface ships would return?

 

Well of course things are always clearer in hindsight. Also once planning and preparation were underway, Combined Operations was probably reluctant to halt it. Their brief was to make as much trouble as they could for the Germans, and there's some value in destroying anything the enemy might find useful. The Normandie dock was part of the overall port facilities, and the raiders were to destroy other targets as well. It might also be considered insurance in case the Germans did consider sending Tirpitz out into the Atlantic, even though that was appearing less and less likely.

The Germans had taken considerable risk running the ships home through the Channel, so they were hardly likely to send them back. On the other hand it was much riskier to access the Atlantic from Norway than France. And they had a worthwhile mission in Norwegian waters which they had not had before the Allies started running convoys to North Russia. So the specific imperative to deter Tirpitz may have given way to a general wreck-stuff-and-kill-Germans concept, which the raid achieved.