The Siege of Jadotville (155 Irish soldiers VS 4,000 Katangese troops)

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programs are available in 4k simple history viewers get a one-month free membership trial just go to tribal Gellin tv.com slash simple history or click the link in the description below head over there now the siege of chad oval september 13th through the 17th 1961 the siege of jade oval from september 13 to the 17th 1961 was a forgotten military action of the irish un peacekeeping forces during the congo crisis it's the story of 155 soldiers of the a company 35th battalion of the Irish Army who fought against an enemy that outnumbered them for five days while kept under siege in the hostile region because they surrendered only when they were left without water food and ammunition the document of their heroism was kept under the carpet for more than 50 years the Congo crisis began in 1960 the same year when the country declared independence after almost a century long Belgian rule after only a few months the central government lost control over the country as Katanga led by Prime Minister Moysey Dushanbe declared its independence later followed by Kasai oriental province and léopoldville Katanga was of greater importance to the future of the Congo as it was the wealthiest portion of the country due to its huge mining resources without the capacity to deal with secessionists in the belgian army that still had not left the country the government of the Republic of the Congo led by President Kosovo Bou and Prime Minister Lumumba called the United Nations for help in July 1960 the United Nations operation in the Congo or onu C was formed UN peacekeeping forces from Africa Asia and Europe were deployed across the entire country with a task to monitor the withdrawal of Belgian troops and protect the civilian population the Irish contingent along with the Swedish and Indian soldiers were sent to the disputed region of Catania the UN headquarters was established at the provinces capital Elizabeth Ville HQ deployed a detached unit to the 80-mile away distant town of Jett Oval with the task of protecting the local Belgian population Jett Oval was a town of great strategic importance because of the nearby sinkhole of Waymire it was a mine with the largest uranium deposits in the world and it was this mine that provided the uranium needed to make the Hiroshima and Nagasaki a bombs even though the UN forces were responsible for protecting the local population it was obvious they were not welcome neither natives nor Belgians who supported Katanga secessionists looked with favor on the UN base in the town the commander of a company 35th battalion of the Irish Army stationed in Jan Oval command dog pack Quinlan was very well aware of the situation as a measure of precaution he ordered his men to build a defensive perimeter around the entire base they were told to dig deep trenches stockpile water and carry their guns at all times the following days would show how good this preparation was on September 13th 1961 but when you see launched an offensive named Operation Moore Thor against the forces of the state of Catania this action meant that the UN directly sided with the central Congo government the Catania's response was immediate as if they knew about the UN offensive before it happened what was to be a quick offensive lasting two hours to resolve the Secession once and for all in fact lasted from September 13th to the 21st and was the moment in which a peacekeeping mission turned into a war between the UN and the Katanga on the same day at 7:40 a.m. while almost all Irish soldiers were attending mass coton de gendarmerie attacked the Jet oval base luckily for the Irish soldiers they were noticed by private Billy Reddy who was on guard duty that morning private ready fired a warning shot and alerted the whole unit as the Irish soldiers in the base were ordered to always carry their weapons they manned their positions instantly the katana and gendarmeries attacked the UN base with a force between 3,000 and 4,000 men the majority of them were inexperienced soldiers from the local Luba tribe but there were also a lot of Belgian settlers and battle-hardened mercenaries from France Belgium and Rhodesia they were on with a wide spectrum of various light weapons and supported with 81 millimeter mortars and French 75 millimeter ml e 1897 field guns they even had air support from a modified fuga Magister training jet the jet had machine guns added as well as under wing bombs which proved crucial and the assault on the Irish peacekeepers Patong DS forces were financed by the Anglo Belgian mining cartel Union manera de Hawk Katanga a covert international company that was responsible for supplying most of the world's copper cobalt and uranium the base was defended by almost 160 Irish soldiers armed only with light weapons the majority of soldiers were armed with FN FAL self-loading rifles and British Li and field number four rifles they were also armed with a few like machine guns Swedish called Gustav light machine guns and Vickers machine guns the support butcher's was armed with 60 millimeter motors the Irish however had the advantage of the supreme commanding ability of Maj Quinlan the way he led his men from five days of the siege was nothing less than ingenious when the assault began the Irish soldiers alertness and defensive perimeter enabled them to repel the first attacking waves with ease the first attack was followed by a few hours of silence after which a new wave followed along with bombardment those mortars and field guns once again the well entrenched Irishman managed to withstand the attack with only a few soldiers wounded what major Quinlan realized on the first day was that his perimeter was too wide under the cover of night he withdrew his men inwards to a new position where they dubbed new trenches the new position allowed the Irish to hold a better defense especially because it was elevated and allowed him a complete overview of their surroundings the following morning started with a new garage but on the previously abandoned trenches that same day the attackers called in the air support on the enemy Fugen Magister flew over the base if Irish soldiers thought it was a un plane woman's later the jet started bombing the iris positions destroying their vehicles and preventing them from making or treatment attack after attack in waves followed even though the Khatami's gen das managed to get closer to the perimeter the Irish managed to repel every single attack inflicting heavy casualties on their enemy the Irish borders also managed to silence the Catania artillery as their strength severely diminished the coton guns asked for a ceasefire Maj Quinlan agreed as he too wanted to buy some time and allow UN reinforcements to arrive the headquarters and Elisabeth bill sent a reinforcement of 500 irish swedish and indian Gurkha soldiers to relieve soldiers at genival but these were fought off on their way to Gen oval by mercenaries in Katanga service the besieged soldiers didn't receive help in Watterson a helicopter carrying the Warner landed into the base under intense fire however the water was undrinkable because it was stored in petrol containers as time passed the situation for the Irish soldiers worsened the kotani's forces broke the ceasefire and continued their attacks the Irish soldiers were slowly coming to the end of their ammunition and even worse food and water since major Quinlan had not been receiving messages from his HQ about reinforcements or orders on what to do next he decided to surrender but before the surrender his men had killed fifty mercenaries more than 300 contagion arms and wounded one thousand more Irish casualties were totaled at only five wounded soldiers after five days of combat they simply had no more capacity to continue the fight on September 17th major Quinlan made an agreement with the katanas to cease fire in genival the agreement however ended with the disarmament of Irish soldiers who were then sent to captivity during the first three and a half weeks of captivity the Irish soldiers were treated well the coton guns did not want any bad publicity their intention was to exchange the prisoners for a UN promise of a ceasefire when the gendarmerie took over supervision of the Irish POWs their treatment worsened significantly but the captured Irish were eventually exchanged for kotani's soldiers held by the United Nations upon release the soldiers of the a Company 35th Irish battalion returned to Elizabeth Ville where they stayed until the end of their rotation in December 1961 they returned home to Ireland after being relieved by the 36th Irish battalion instead of being welcomed with laurels soldiers from general were met with condemnation despite the fact that a company managed to fight off the much more powerful enemy army officials disfavored the fact that major Quinlin eventually laid down his arms the fact that the unit was left without ammunition food and water and that the command structure was the one that failed was ignored only after more than 40 years been of a company of the 35th battalion were given credit for their bravery during the siege of general ville major Quinlan was posthumously relieved of all allegations of socially misconduct November 2005 a monument was unveiled to the brave soldiers of a company of the 35th battalion in costume barracks Ethel on

Channel: Simple History

Views: 2,709,021

Rating: 4.9397984 out of 5

Keywords: simple history, animated history, educational, education, un, united nations, Siege of Jadotville, ireland, irish, Congo Crisis, A Company, Katangese, gendarmeries, French, Belgian, mercenaries, Katanga, Kasai, Orientale province, Léopoldville, Moïse Tshombe, ONUC, Lumumba, Kasa-Vubu, Elisabethville, uranium, mine, ‘Pat’ Quinlan, Union Minière, FN FAL, peace, keeping

Id: l9yquVGZrQU

Length: 11min 0sec (660 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 25 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/GanGreenSkittle]

Under supplied, outnumbered, and cut off from retreat the Irish soldiers of A co. 35th Battalion fought an overwhelming force. I am writing a paper about this siege and found this video in the process.

[u/dethroan]

The movie is pretty good too, The Siege at Jadotville

[u/4feicsake]

My favourite story is afterwards while in prison, they were allowed to keep their hurls and used to play hurling during their exercise time. The guards were so impressed with their skills at the sport they allegedly said if we had seen you play this we would have never attacked.

[u/Cian-Rowan]

This was good, always nice to see A company get recognition

[u/CDfm]

I was browsing on line years ago and came across an interview with a former US diplomat from the era and I recall two things . One was that the Irish contingent believed they were on a peacekeeping mission whereas the politicians at the UN had other ideas and the other was that America would have funded and supplied whatever was needed but the UN or anyone else connected with it never mentioned a lack of resources.

So the UN was being run a bit like NATO.

[u/WedSkriwohh]

A real shame the reaction the soldiers received for eventually surrendering

[u/Potato_Lord587]

There’s a film adaptation on Netflix which is really good, anyone who’s interested should watch it

[u/BananaBork]

Was this the last combat that the Irish Army saw?