'Military Lessons of the Arab Rebellion in Palestine 1936' [‎91v] (187/294)

was not until sufficient troops became available to man a system of
picquets that the saboteur began to run any real risks of having
pay heavily for his actions. ng to
Picquets were introduced with the principal object of pro tec 4 -in
road traffic during daylight, but proved to be a very good deterrent
against night sabotage in their vicinity. Some patrolling was still
required, but could be made more irregular and in less strength where
picquets had been established, while stalking parties on foot and cou f
ambushes by infantry from the picquets did succeed in effecting some
surprises and did at least ensure for the first time that when any fi r '
was opened on the road patrols the infantry attack could start from ^
behind the enemy. In fact one of the chief lessons of road protection
was the necessity of placing protective troops in the vicinity of the *
firing point and not of the butts. In the end therefore the best
solution to the problem was the combination of picquets with irregular
night patrolling by armoured cars; though to provide weak picquets on
the very sparest scale used up to the equivalent of one battalion and
this figure would have risen to two and a half had serious attacks on
picquets ever been started.
In addition to these measures an early morning patrol was required
to detect sabotage committed during the night, and it was found that
aircraft could do this quite effectively with the minimum of delay.
The restriction of traffic to fixed hours of daylight would have been
of great assistance by giving the military greater freedom of action at
night, and oy ensuring that sabotage was detected and repairs effected
Dc-fore traffic was released in the morning. Other civil measures which
can assist in road protection include the declaration of a curfew zone
on the road, the allocation of responsibilities fjmong villages, the
severe p unishment of villages implicated in sabotage, and the provision
of hostages to be carried in military vehicles.
Road Traffic
rioeta trailic was used so often as a bait with which to draw out
armed bands and bring them to action that it is difficult to separate
steps ^uken to protect it from those taken to inflict casualties on the
enemy • ^ ^ Apart from road mines and intermittent sniping the chief threats
to j Oe,.d traffic were deliberately planned daylight ambushes. Anbush
-P ai v/0 ^ld consist of anything from seven to twenty men fairly widely
scattei._al, who often wore black cloaks and when stationary were almost
invisible at anything more than very short range. They always chose
;^ 11 well as being easy to evacuate, while any approach from
uhe road, ^either frontally or from a flank, would involve a‘difficult
C ' La b * The y were seldom prepared to stand and fight, and took care
to otage an ambush at the same place more than once on any one day*
^ ^ ie y re ^i re d in haste as soon as the troops had debussed arid
s° a t e ° attack, so that by the time the attackers gained their
position tne late occupants were several hills away.
y 3-0 Gi:)Sen tial to try to j-^la-cc the orotective troops more
on ground overlooking the road than on the road itself. For this pur-
Laat y rall F the best value and in Palestine could secure
imunity rom daylight ambush for a distance of several miles on either
' hTr j_t_ V . e yy w>r0 no ^ established a similar effect could be obtaine
A ; Uo \" srna ll detachments of infantry, perhaps dropped
qq * 1 * lm a D ^^asiyely during the early morning patrol, who would, either
a ^ r ,r tr01 ^ lllS behind likel y ambush localities. The use of
° v ° u convoys, whicn has been referred to in a previous
chapter, was also most useful in obtaining surprise.
certair "tbnt L '^ e ^' e y tla:Ls in the protection of road traffic were to make
isolated unCl -17 nev '~r gained a cheap victory by overwhelming ^
oo -ted vehicle, and to ensure that he was struck hard, every time he
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