Operation Jubilee

The raid of the French port of Dieppe, code-named Operation Jubilee, witnessed a huge Canadian involvements as the attack was lead by the Canadian 2nd Division. The division consisted of 4,693 men from eight different regiments:

• the Calgary Regiment
• the Essex Scottish Regiment
• Les Fussiliers Mont-Royal
• the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada
• the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry
• the Royal Regiment of Canada
• the Toronto Scottish Regiment
• the South Saskatchewan Regiment.

Britain sent 1,000 commandos forth with the Canadian division, along with a handful of American troopers. On August 19th 1942, the raid set forth with specific goals:

• to seize and hold a major Channel port
• to test new amphibious equipment
• to gather intelligence from German prisoners - possibly enigma-coded German radio traffic
• to learn how the Germans respond to enemy attack

The Invasion

On the night o the 18th, almost 240 ships left British ports in four amphibious forces. The plan was to land on the beaches of Dieppe under the cover of night, and surprise German defenses with an intimidating invasion fleet.

Unfortunately, the ships carry No.3 Commando ran into a convoy of German ships, alerting the German coastal defenses along the whole shoreline. This left the assault with little to no chance of success, as they no longer had the element of surprise.

At dawn, the well entrenched Germans were ready. The landing crafts were only 10 meters away when they began bombarding every landing craft in sight with waves of machine gun and mortar fire.  Canadian men fell in waves as the landing crafts lowered their ramps. Less than 20 commandos got within 180m of the battery, while others were slaughtered by artillery fire. This failure to clear the shoreline of German troops had doomed the main frontal attack. After two and a half brutal hours, all allied troops were evacuated from the beaches of Dieppe.

Lesson Learned


After reconciling their humiliating defeat and slaughter of Canadian troops in Dieppe, the allied forces were able to extract crucial information that would eventually win them the whole war and free Europe from the Nazi aggression

• It was imperative to improve communications at all levels: on the battlefield, between the HQ's of    each unit, between air, naval and ground forces
• It was crucial to use prior air bombings to destroy enemy defences as much as possible
• It was important to support assault troops with artillery fire from ships and landing crafts
• It was obvious that they needed to improve techniques and equipment in removing obstacles for  troops and tanks