Operation Vigorous

On the evening of 14 June 1942 a British reconnaissance aircraft from Malta spotted the Italian fleet in the Ionian Sea, heading south from Taranto. Admiral Angelo Iachino was leading two modern battleships, four cruisers and twelve destroyers. His course led straight towards the Vigorous convoy, which for three days had been sailing from Egypt and Palestine to Malta under air attack from the very start. Over the next twenty-four hours Admiral Henry Harwood, directing the operation from ashore, several times ordered the convoy to turn back and then to head west again. On the evening of 15 June he called off the operation. The warships and merchant ships returned to Alexandria, losing a cruiser, three destroyers and two merchant ships on the way. Not a single ship of this convoy reached Malta.

The operation appears in war chronologies under two dates: under 14 June, with the information that the convoy “sighted” an Italian squadron and had been under air attack almost from the moment it left port, and under 16 June, with the news that the operation was called off late in the evening. Both entries need some refinement. The British ships never saw the Italian fleet, because no action took place: they learned that it had put to sea from air reports, and at their closest they were about 100 nautical miles from it. Harwood issued the final order to return on the evening of 15 June. By 16 June the convoy was already on its way back to Alexandria, and that evening it began to enter harbour. The last ships arrived on 17 June.

A convoy from the east

Vigorous was the eastern half of Operation Julius, the double attempt to supply Malta in mid-June. At the same time the Harpoon convoy was sailing from the west, from Gibraltar. The eastern convoy was much larger. Eleven ships were loaded at Alexandria, Port Said, Suez, Haifa and Beirut and divided into three groups (MW 11A, B and C), which were to rendezvous at sea. The convoy was so big because since March, when all the ships of convoy MW 10 had been bombed in harbour after the Second Battle of Sirte, the island had received almost nothing.

Command of the escort (Force A) was taken by Rear Admiral Philip Vian, the victor of Sirte, in the cruiser Cleopatra. He had seven light cruisers – four Dido-class anti-aircraft cruisers (Cleopatra, Dido, Euryalus and Hermione) and three larger cruisers, Newcastle, Birmingham and Arethusa – as well as the old anti-aircraft cruiser Coventry. To these were added 26 destroyers, four of them Australian, corvettes, minesweepers and two rescue ships. Some of the warships were borrowed from the Eastern Fleet in the Indian Ocean. The Mediterranean Fleet, however, did not have a single serviceable battleship: Queen Elizabeth and Valiant had been under repair since the December Italian human-torpedo attack at Alexandria. The British therefore attached to the convoy the old battleship Centurion of 1911, for years a target ship, armed only with light anti-aircraft guns and disguised as a modern battleship. She was meant to deceive Italian reconnaissance, and she carried part of the cargo.

The plan assumed that it would be aircraft and submarines, not Vian’s warships, that would stop the Italian fleet if it put to sea. Bristol Beaufort and Wellington torpedo bombers were assembled at airfields in Egypt and on Malta, along with American B-24 Liberator heavy bombers from Colonel Harry Halverson’s group, which a few days earlier had bombed Romania for the first time. A line of nine submarines was placed across the Italian fleet’s path. The operation was directed from ashore, from a joint headquarters in Alexandria, by Harwood, acting commander of the Mediterranean Fleet since April, and by the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Middle East, Air Marshal Arthur Tedder. Vian was to screen the merchant ships with smoke and attack with torpedoes, as in March, but everyone understood that in the long days of June a repeat of Sirte would be much harder.

“Bomb Alley”

The most difficult stretch of the route ran between Crete and Cyrenaica. British sailors called it Bomb Alley. After Rommel’s January offensive the airfields of western Cyrenaica were in Axis hands, and German Ju 87s and Ju 88s were operating from Crete. British fighters could cover the convoy only at the start of its voyage; after that it was left with a handful of long-range Kittyhawks and Beaufighters.

First, in the afternoon of 11 June, the four ships of group MW 11C left Port Said. They were to sail west as far as Tobruk and turn back, so as to provoke the Italian fleet into putting to sea prematurely. On the evening of 12 June they were attacked by Ju 88s from Crete, and the damaged ship City of Calcutta was sent to Tobruk. That same day the slow Elizabeth Bakke, which could not keep up the convoy’s speed, was also sent back. On 13 June the groups met off Mersa Matruh, and the convoy, covered by Vian’s main force, headed west.

On 14 June the convoy passed through Bomb Alley under incessant air attack. The Dutch ship Aagtekerk, which had been sent to Tobruk because of engine trouble, was bombed by several dozen Ju 87s and Ju 88s a dozen or so miles from the port, ran aground and burned out. In the afternoon, once the convoy was beyond the reach of short-range fighters, several dozen bombers from Crete and Libya made a series of attacks over a few hours. Bombs sank the ship Bhutan, with the loss of 16 men, and Potaro was damaged. On land, meanwhile, the Eighth Army’s retreat from the Gazala Line was under way, after the British had lost the tank battle on 11–13 June. The fighters that were to have covered the convoy from airfields in Cyrenaica were needed over the retreating troops, and the airfields had to be abandoned. That day the escorts used up a large part of their anti-aircraft ammunition.

The Italian fleet puts to sea

The Italian command knew about the preparations for the convoys, among other things from the intercepted telegrams of the American military attaché in Cairo, Colonel Bonner Fellers. Once it was clear which route Vigorous was taking, Iachino’s squadron left Taranto in the afternoon of 14 June: the battleships Littorio (flagship) and Vittorio Veneto, the heavy cruisers Gorizia and Trento, the light cruisers Giuseppe Garibaldi and Duca d’Aosta, and twelve destroyers. Iachino was to intercept the convoy on the morning of 15 June.

The report from a Martin Baltimore reconnaissance aircraft from Malta, made on the evening of 14 June, reached Harwood only late that evening. The admiral informed Vian that the Italians would reach the convoy at about 7 a.m. Vian pointed out that his ships could not defend the merchantmen through another long summer day and asked for permission to turn back. Harwood ordered him to hold on westwards until 2 a.m. and then reverse course. He hoped that by morning aircraft and submarines would have weakened the Italian fleet.

The night and morning of 15 June

The turn was made shortly before 2 a.m. For several dozen warships and merchant ships sailing in night formation it was a risky manoeuvre, and German torpedo boats (PL) (Schnellboote) were lurking nearby. S 56 hit the cruiser Newcastle with a torpedo; despite the damage she carried on. S 55 torpedoed the destroyer Hasty. Twelve sailors were killed, and the wreck, which could not be saved, was finished off by the destroyer Hotspur.

At dawn Beaufort torpedo bombers from Malta attacked the Italian fleet. One torpedo hit the cruiser Trento, which burst into flames and dropped astern, guarded by a destroyer. A few hours later she was sighted by the British submarine Umbra under Lieutenant S. L. C. Maydon. His torpedo struck her magazine, and Trento sank within minutes. According to Italian figures, more than half of the roughly 1,150 men on board were killed, among them her captain, Stanislao Esposito. At about 9 a.m. American B-24s attacked the battleships from high altitude. One bomb hit Littorio’s forward turret but did no serious damage. Immediately afterwards several Beauforts from Egypt dropped torpedoes, which missed. On their return the airmen claimed hits on battleships and cruisers.

Orders and counter-orders

Ashore in Alexandria, reports were arriving many hours late. Harwood, fearing that the convoy was heading back into the zone of the heaviest air attacks, at about 7 a.m. again ordered it to steer for Malta. He added that Vian was to avoid meeting the Italians until aircraft had attacked them. When scouts reported that the Italian fleet was still heading south, at about 9.40 a.m. he ordered another reversal. Before noon he received the airmen’s exaggerated reports of hits on the battleships. Harwood once again sent the convoy towards Malta, and if the Italians intercepted it the warships were to abandon the merchantmen and save themselves. Finally, after 12.45 p.m., he left the decision to Vian. The orders took so long to arrive that Vian received them as much as two hours late, when the situation had already changed. The British historian Richard Woodman later judged this exchange of orders to be evidence of indecision and a lack of strategic sense. Harwood had gambled with valuable ships in the hope that aircraft and submarines would hold the enemy off.

Air attacks continued all day. Ju 87 dive bombers hit the destroyer Airedale, whose wreck was then sunk by Aldenham. Near misses damaged the cruisers Birmingham and Arethusa. Many attacks were aimed at Centurion, which the Germans took for a real battleship. She took a hit but sailed on. In the evening bombs badly damaged the Australian destroyer Nestor, which was taken in tow.

Meanwhile the Italian naval command, convinced that the convoy had turned back for good, ordered Iachino to give up the pursuit if he had not made contact by the afternoon. The squadron turned north-west towards Navarino on the west coast of Greece, ready to come back if the British tried again. At about 4.30 p.m. Harwood, on learning of this turn, ordered Vian to make for Malta after dark. Vian replied that his ships had less than a third of their anti-aircraft ammunition left and that the destroyers were short of fuel. At 8.53 p.m. Harwood called off the operation and ordered a return to Alexandria.

The voyage back

The night brought no respite. British Wellingtons from Malta attacked the Italian fleet, which was returning to Taranto, by the light of flares, and one torpedo hit Littorio in the bow. The battleship reached base with minor damage. The convoy sailed east, but before dawn on 16 June the German submarine U-205 got through the screen and torpedoed the cruiser Hermione, which capsized and sank. Eighty-seven or 88 of her crew were killed, and about 400 were rescued. Nestor, under tow, was falling further and further behind. In the morning her captain concluded that in daylight he would not be able to escape the aircraft; he transferred his crew to Javelin and had his ship scuttled with depth charges.

On the evening of 16 June the first ships entered Alexandria. The last warships arrived the following day. The merchant ships brought back almost all of the cargo that was to have saved Malta.

The toll

The operation cost the British the cruiser Hermione, the destroyers Hasty, Airedale and Nestor, the merchant ships Bhutan and Aagtekerk, and a motor torpedo boat that foundered in bad weather. The cruisers Newcastle, Birmingham and Arethusa were damaged. The Italians lost the heavy cruiser Trento, and Littorio was lightly damaged. According to British tallies, the fire of the warships and merchant ships brought down 21 of the roughly 220 aircraft that attacked the convoy. The German air force in Libya flew 193 sorties against the convoy in two days. The only benefit was that during this time the Eighth Army, retreating from Gazala, had a brief respite from air attack.

The Royal Navy’s official historian, Stephen Roskill, called the Axis success “undeniable”. Woodman wrote bluntly of a fiasco. Harwood himself reported on 16 June that the British faced superiority both at sea and in the air, and that “the gallant efforts of all concerned” could not make up for this deficiency. He later blamed the RAF for failing to provide enough aircraft capable of stopping the Italian fleet. Playfair pointed out that the air attacks on the battleships had not done the damage that had been hoped for, and that Vian’s escort stood no chance in a fight with battleships. Without the airfields of western Cyrenaica, even faster and more accurate reports would have changed little.

In Italy Vian’s withdrawal was presented as flight from Iachino’s fleet. Although the Italian squadron did not fire a single shot at the British warships, propaganda exploited it as revenge for earlier defeats, including that off Cape Matapan. Yet the fleet’s mere putting to sea was enough to make the convoy turn back. Therein lay the strength of the Italian fleet in 1942, even though the shortage of fuel rarely allowed it to sail.

Its place in the war

Of the seventeen ships of the two June convoys, only two reached Malta, both from Harpoon. The island was left with stocks for a few weeks. From then on the British did not try to send convoys from Alexandria until the Eighth Army had regained the airfields in Libya. A few days after the convoy’s return Tobruk fell, and at the end of June the Eighth Army fell back to El Alamein. The Mediterranean Fleet soon had to leave Alexandria, threatened by Rommel, and move to Haifa, Port Said and Beirut.

The next attempt was the August convoy from Gibraltar in Operation Pedestal, for which only a dummy convoy sailed from Alexandria. A convoy from the east reached Malta only on 20 November 1942 – that of Operation Stoneage, covered from the airfields regained after the victory at El Alamein. Its arrival is regarded as the end of the siege of the island. Harwood commanded in the eastern part of the Mediterranean until the spring of 1943. When General Montgomery criticised the pace at which the port of Tripoli was being brought into use, he gave up his command, officially on grounds of ill health. The failure of Vigorous showed the same as the fate of the March convoy: in the central Mediterranean, whether convoys got through was decided by command of the air, not by the number of cruisers and destroyers.