Page "Orde Wingate" Paragraph 21

At the outbreak of World War II, Wingate was the commander of an anti-aircraft unit in Britain.

He repeatedly made proposals to the army and government for the creation of a Jewish army in Palestine which would rule over the area and its Arab population in the name of the British.

Eventually his friend Wavell, by this time commander-in-chief of Middle East Command which was based in Cairo, invited him to Sudan to begin operations against Italian occupation forces in Ethiopia.

Under William Platt, the British commander in Sudan, he created the Gideon Force, a guerrilla force composed of British, Sudanese and Ethiopian soldiers.

The force was named after the biblical judge Gideon, who defeated a large force with a tiny band.

Wingate invited a number of veterans of the Haganah SNS to join him.

With the blessing of the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, the group began to operate in February 1941.

Wingate was temporarily promoted to lieutenant colonel and put in command.

He again insisted on leading from the front and accompanied his troops.

The Gideon Force, with the aid of local resistance fighters, harassed Italian forts and their supply lines while the regular army took on the main forces of the Italian army.

The small Gideon Force of no more than 1, 700 men took the surrender of about 20, 000 Italians toward the end of the campaign.

At the end of the fighting, Wingate and the men of the Gideon Force linked with the force of Lt. Gen. Alan Cunningham which had advanced from Kenya to the south and accompanied the emperor in his triumphant return to Addis Ababa in May.

Wingate was mentioned in dispatches in April 1941 and was awarded a second DSO in December.