In a stay-behind operation, a country places secret operatives or organizations in its own territory, for use in case an enemy occupies that territory. If this occurs, the operatives would then form the basis of a

resistance movement A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objectives ...

or act as spies from behind enemy lines. Small-scale operations may cover discrete areas, but larger stay-behind operations envisage reacting to the conquest of whole countries. Stay-behind also refers to a military tactic whereby specially trained soldiers let themselves be overrun by enemy forces in order to conduct

intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance ISTAR stands for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance. In its macroscopic sense, ISTAR is a practice that links several battlefield functions together to assist a combat force in employing its sensors and manag ...

tasks often from pre-prepared hides.

History

Stay-behind operations of significant size existed during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. The United Kingdom put in place the

Auxiliary Units The Auxiliary Units or GHQ Auxiliary Units were specially-trained, highly-secret quasi military units created by the British government during the Second World War with the aim of using irregular warfare in response to a possible invasion of the Un ...

. Partisans in Axis-occupied Soviet territory in the early 1940s operated with a stay-behind element. During the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...

, the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...

(NATO) coordinated and the

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

(CIA) and the British

Secret Intelligence Service The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intellige ...

(SIS) helped create clandestine stay-behind networks in many

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

an countries, intending to activate them in the event of that country being taken over by the

Warsaw Pact The Warsaw Pact (WP) or Treaty of Warsaw, formally the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, was a collective defense treaty signed in Warsaw, Poland, between the Soviet Union and seven other Eastern Bloc socialist republi ...

. According to Martin Packard they were "financed, armed, and trained in covert resistance activities, including assassination, political provocation and disinformation." These clandestine stay-behind organisations were created and run under the auspices of intelligence services and recruited their agents from amongst the civilian population. These specially selected civilian stay-behind networks or SBOs, were created in many Western countries including Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Germany, Switzerland, Norway, Austria and others, including Iran. They prepared to organize resistance, sabotage and intelligence gathering in occupied (NATO) territory. The most famous of these clandestine stay-behind networks was the Italian

Operation Gladio Operation Gladio is the codename for clandestine " stay-behind" operations of armed resistance that were organized by the Western Union (WU), and subsequently by NATO and the CIA, in collaboration with several European intelligence agencies durin ...

, acknowledged by Italian Prime Minister

Giulio Andreotti Giulio Andreotti ( , ; 14 January 1919 – 6 May 2013) was an Italian politician and statesman who served as the 41st prime minister of Italy in seven governments (1972–1973, 1976–1979, and 1989–1992) and leader of the Christian Democracy ...

on October 24, 1990. Many hidden weapons caches were found in Italy, Austria, Germany, the Netherlands and other countries that had been at the disposition of these "secret armies". As late as 1996, the United Kingdom revealed to the German government the existence of stay-behind weapons and equipment caches in

West Berlin West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...

. The content of these caches offer an insight into the equipment supplied to (German) stay-behind networks. In two of the secret caches, buried in the Grunewald forest, police found boxes with 9 mm pistols and ammunition, knives, navigation equipment, an RS-6 'spy radio', various manuals, tank and aircraft recognition books, a flask of brandy, and chocolate as well as a copy of ' Total Resistance', the guerrilla warfare manual written in 1957 by Swiss Major

Hans von Dach Hans von Dach (1927–2003) was a Swiss military theorist. He was the author of the influential seven-volume 1957 guerrilla warfare manual '' Total Resistance'' (), which made him the internationally best-known Swiss tactical theorist. Von Dach, a ...

. During the

, military stay-behind units were usually long-range reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition units that were specifically earmarked for operations in the early phase of a potential war (D-day to D+1-5). These units would quickly deploy forward, link up with the rear guard or 'aggressive delaying force' and 'stay-behind' as these forces withdrew, letting themselves be bypassed by advancing Warsaw Pact troops. Exploiting pre-reconnoitred hide sites and caches of arms, ammunition, and radios, they would then start to conduct intelligence gathering operations in what is called static covert surveillance as well as target acquisition for high value targets such as enemy headquarters, troop concentrations, and atomic weapons systems. They would also perform demolition tasks, in what was referred to as the 'demolition belt', at places where bottlenecks were likely to occur for enemy formations. Another task would have been escape and evasion (E&E) assistance to downed pilots and others needing repatriation. The United Kingdom's Territorial Army regiments of SAS and Honourable Artillery Company provided such stay-behind parties in the UK's sector of West Germany.

List of military stay-behind trained units

NATO *

Special Boat Service The Special Boat Service (SBS) is the special forces unit of the United Kingdom's Royal Navy. The SBS can trace its origins back to the Second World War when the Army Special Boat Section was formed in 1940. After the Second World War, the Roya ...

(

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

) * 21 Special Air Service Regiment (Artists) (Reserve) (

) *

23 Special Air Service Regiment (Reserve) 23 Special Air Service Regiment (Reserve) (23 SAS(R)) is a British Army Reserve special forces unit that forms part of United Kingdom Special Forces. Together with 21 Special Air Service Regiment (Artists) (Reserve) (21 SAS(R)), it forms the S ...

(

) * Honourable Artillery Company (

) * Special Reconnaissance Squadron RAC (

) *

4/73 (Sphinx) Special Observation Post Battery RA 4/73 (Sphinx) Special Observation Post Battery Royal Artillery is a surveillance and target acquisition unit of the British Army. It is part of 5th Regiment Royal Artillery and is based at Catterick Garrison in North Yorkshire. Organisation 4/ ...

(

) *

10th Special Forces Group The 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) (10th SFG (A), or 10th Group) is an active duty United States Army Special Forces (SF) Group. 10th Group is designed to deploy and execute nine doctrinal missions: unconventional warfare (UW), foreign in ...

(

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

) * Escadron Spécial de Recherche (SOE/ESR) (

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to ...

) * Fernspäher Companies (

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...

) *

Korps Commandotroepen The (KCT) ( en, Commando Corps) is the elite special forces unit of the Royal Netherlands Army. The KCT traces its origins to the Second World War with the founding of No. 2 (Dutch) Troop, and the founding of the during the Indonesian War of I ...

(

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

) * 7e Compagnie de Commandos (France) * 1st Paratroopers Brigade, Lochoi Oreinon Katadromon or LOK (

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders wi ...

) * Özel Harp Dairesi (

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...

) Training was conducted at the International Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol School in Weingarten Germany. Warsaw Pact * MfS-Abteilung IV Spezialkampfführung (

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In t ...

) * Patriotic Guards (

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

) World *

Fedayeen Saddam Fedayeen Saddam () was a paramilitary Fedayeen organization loyal to the Ba'athist Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein. The name was chosen to mean "Saddam's Men of Sacrifice". At its height, the group had 30,000–40,000 members. Irregular force ...

(

Ba'athist Iraq Ba'athist Iraq, formally the Iraqi Republic until 6 January 1992 and the Republic of Iraq thereafter, covers the History of Iraq, national history of Iraq between 1968 and 2003 under the rule of the Ba'ath Party (Iraqi-dominated faction), Arab S ...

) * Regional Force Surveillance Units (

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

), non-secret units of the

Australian Army Reserve The Australian Army Reserve is a collective name given to the reserve units of the Australian Army. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, the reserve military force has been known by many names, including the Citizens Forces, the Citizen ...

that would operate in a stay-behind capacity in the event of an invasion of northern Australia * Territorial Defense (

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label= Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavij ...

), non-secret branch of the

Yugoslav People's Army The Yugoslav People's Army (abbreviated as JNA/; Macedonian and sr-Cyrl-Latn, Југословенска народна армија, Jugoslovenska narodna armija; Croatian and bs, Jugoslavenska narodna armija; sl, Jugoslovanska ljudska ar ...

with an official doctrine to wage

guerrilla warfare Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare in which small groups of combatants, such as paramilitary personnel, armed civilians, or irregulars, use military tactics including ambushes, sabotage, raids, petty warfare, hit-and-run ta ...

against a potential occupier.

List of known clandestine stay-behind plans

World War II *

(

) *

Werwolf ''Werwolf'' (, German for " werewolf") was a Nazi plan which began development in 1944, to create a resistance force which would operate behind enemy lines as the Allies advanced through Germany, in parallel with the '' Wehrmacht'' fighting ...

(

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

) * Operation Tracer (

Gibraltar ) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song = "Gibraltar Anthem" , image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg , map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe , map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green , mapsize = , image_map2 = Gibr ...

) *Palestine Post-Occupational Scheme (

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine ( ar, فلسطين الانتدابية '; he, פָּלֶשְׂתִּינָה (א״י) ', where "E.Y." indicates ''’Eretz Yiśrā’ēl'', the Land of Israel) was a geopolitical entity established between 1920 and 1948 ...

): joint plan between the British SOE and the

Palmach The Palmach (Hebrew: , acronym for , ''Plugot Maḥatz'', "Strike Companies") was the elite fighting force of the Haganah, the underground army of the Yishuv (Jewish community) during the period of the British Mandate for Palestine. The Palmach ...

to resist a potential Axis occupation before and during the

200 days of dread The 200 days of dread ( he, מאתיים ימי חרדה; ) was a period of 200 days (almost 7 months) in the history of the Yishuv in British Palestine, from the spring of 1942 to November 1942, when the German Afrika Korps under the command of ...

. SOE Palestine, with assistance from the

Jewish Agency The Jewish Agency for Israel ( he, הסוכנות היהודית לארץ ישראל, translit=HaSochnut HaYehudit L'Eretz Yisra'el) formerly known as The Jewish Agency for Palestine, is the largest Jewish non-profit organization in the world. ...

, created a secret stay-behind network of cells to resist a potential occupation of Palestine by the Axis.

Moshe Dayan Moshe Dayan ( he, משה דיין; 20 May 1915 – 16 October 1981) was an Israeli military leader and politician. As commander of the Jerusalem front in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (1953–1958) dur ...

set up this clandestine structure. Training for Palmach operatives was conducted at the Special Training Center (STC102) at

Mount Carmel Mount Carmel ( he, הַר הַכַּרְמֶל, Har haKarmel; ar, جبل الكرمل, Jabal al-Karmil), also known in Arabic as Mount Mar Elias ( ar, link=no, جبل مار إلياس, Jabal Mār Ilyās, lit=Mount Saint Elias/ Elijah), is a ...

near

Haifa Haifa ( he, חֵיפָה ' ; ar, حَيْفَا ') is the third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropol ...

. Cold War * (

) Operatiën en Inlichtingen (Operations and Intelligence) was unique among its counterparts in other NATO countries in that it operated autonomously from NATO control. *

GLADIO Operation Gladio is the codename for clandestine "stay-behind" operations of armed resistance that were organized by the Western Union (WU), and subsequently by NATO and the CIA, in collaboration with several European intelligence agencies during ...

(

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

) *

Aginter Press Aginter Press, also known under the name Central Order and Tradition ( pt, Ordem Central e Tradição), was an international anti-communist mercenary organization disguised as a pseudo-press agency and active between 1966 and 1974. Founded in Lisbon ...

(

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of th ...

) *Operation (Red) Sheepskin (

) * Austrian Association of Hiking, Sports and Society (OeWSGV, also: ÖWSGV) (

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

) *Plan Bleu, La Rose des Vents, and Arc-en-ciel (

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

) * ROC (

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of ...

) * SDRA8 and STC/Mob (

) * Bund Deutscher Jugend – Technischer Dienst, or TD BJD (

-West) * Kampfgruppe gegen Unmenschlichkeit (A secret stay-behind organisation of West Berlin against the GDR 1948–1959 with strong support of CIA) *

Counter-Guerrilla Counter-Guerrilla ( tr, Kontrgerilla) is the Turkish branch of Operation Gladio, a clandestine stay-behind anti-communist initiative backed by the United States as an expression of the Truman Doctrine. The founding goal of the operation was to ere ...

, Turkish branch of

(

) * Nihtilä-Haahti plan (

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bot ...

) *

Projekt-26 Projekt-26, best known as P-26, was a stay-behind army in Switzerland charged with countering a possible invasion of the country. The existence of P-26 (along with P-27) as secret intelligence agencies dissimulated in the military intelligence agen ...

(P-26,

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

) * and Informationsbyrån ('IB') in

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic countries, Nordic c ...

. * Operation Washtub (

Alaska Territory The Territory of Alaska or Alaska Territory was an organized incorporated territory of the United States from August 24, 1912, until Alaska was granted statehood on January 3, 1959. The territory was previously Russian America, 1784–1867; th ...

) * Study and Training Group for Military Reconnaissance (

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 ...

). * Qashqai 1948-1953 (

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

)Mark Gasiorowski (2019) The US stay-behind operation in Iran, 1948-1953, Intelligence and National Security, 34:2, 170-188, DOI: 10.1080/02684527.2018.1534639

References

* . {{DEFAULTSORT:Stay-Behind Intelligence operations Psychological warfare techniques Spies by role Urban guerrilla warfare tactics

History

List of military stay-behind trained units

List of known clandestine stay-behind plans

See also

References