"Why Are We Waiting?"

On their rounds of London last week, visiting U.S. Army chiefs sought out a very lean, very tall (6 ft. 4 in.) Englishman with a graceful name, royal blood, and one of the key posts in warring Britain. If, as some people thought, the U.S. officers were in London to sell the Imperial General Staff a second front, they did well to look up Vice Admiral, Lieut. General and Air Vice Marshal Lord Louis Mountbatten.

For, to Britons a-clamor for Continental action, Lord Louis personifies the second front. They know him as the chief of their savage specialists in hit-&-run invasion, the Commandos. Actually, he has a larger and more complex job: he is Chief of Combined Operations, directing not only the Commando troops themselves but the naval and air units which share the labor, glory and death of Commando raids.

Nothing annoys Lord Louis more than this public clatter for immediate, all-out invasion. To him, it smacks of wishful bunk. He knows all about the days and weeks of reconnaissance, the painstaking study of land maps, ocean charts, weather cycles and models of likely invasion points, which it takes to prepare one of his quick stabs at Nazi Europe. So it is only natural that when second-front talk comes up, Lord Louis' long face tightens.

His dark, grey-green eyes turn icy. Show him--they seem to say--the transports to move armies, more transports to replace the certain losses and keep the invaders supplied, warships to protect the transports. Show him the million-&-one items and preparations necessary for invasion.

But, first and above all, show him the ships. Show him the second fleet which must shuttle the Atlantic, between the U.S. and Britain, while the first plies between Britain and the invaded coasts.

Perhaps Lord Louis can be shown. When he is, the Imperial General Staff and the British Government are likely to be convinced. Then, behind the massive air assaults which the R.A.F. reopened and stepped up last week, U.S. and British troops will move into Europe. When that day of wrath comes, Lord Louis' terrible boys in blackface, the men of the Commandos, will be there to help undertake the first daring assault.

Butcher and Bolt. It was Winston Churchill who gave Britain's Commandos their name.-- After Dunkirk, when these special units were first formed, Churchill remembered his Boer War days and the Boer Commandos: irregular, ill-trained, but well-equipped bands of 300 to 400 Boers, with less regard for the niceties of war than for ambushing and killing British soldiers.

There was nothing unduly nice about the British Commandos, their job, or their first leader. Aging Admiral of the Fleet Sir Roger Keyes, famed for his raid on a German submarine base at Zeebrugge in World War I, formed and trained the first Commandos in Scotland. His men were to be simply raiders. Their job was to shake Nazi morale, collect information, do what damage they could, and give Britons something to cheer about. Soon the Commandos had a phrase to describe their task: "butcher and bolt."

Their first officers were largely drawn from the ultra-swank Household Brigade, whose regiments set much store on birth and money. This circumstance made ordinary Britons grumble and suspect that the Commandos were officered by undemocratic pantywaists. The lists of Commando officers did indeed include many a prewar playboy, many an old, famous and sometimes weary name. Among them were Author Evelyn Waugh (Vile Bodies, Scoop, Put Out More Flags), who had transferred from the Royal Marines; Sir Roger's son, Lieut. Colonel Geoffrey Keyes, who last year died leading a Commando raid on Rommel's headquarters in Libya; Winston's son, Captain Randolph Churchill, who is on duty in the Middle East. But the Commandos have a hardening, unsocial leaven. When a Commando unit raided Boulogne last April, one of the officers was a onetime London police inspector who stepped ashore in carpet slippers. Said he: "I intend to invade France in comfort."

In the Scottish Highlands, officers and men get the same, tough training. All are volunteers, with at least 18 months' service in regular units behind them. Most of them are from British regiments, a few are Royal Marines, Canadians, Australians. So far as is known, no U.S. volunteers have been accepted. Commandomen have a friendly, free-&-easy comradeship unique in the British Army. To encourage independence, they are made to buy their own food, find their own lodging.

They must learn to catch, kill, dress, cook their own meat. They must know how to stalk, unseen, in woods, fields, mountains. If a man is spotted on his first stalking practice, he is orally warned. On the second, a blank round is fired at him. On the third, a live bullet spats close by him. Said a onetime Commando officer now on duty in the U.S.: "It certainly teaches people quickly."

Above all, Commandomen must learn to kill. They prefer to kill quietly. A favorite Commando weapon is a long, straight knife, both edges sharpened razor-keen, carried in a trouser sheath. Some have metal kneecaps, fitted with metal spikes, to be driven into enemy crotches and spines. They can devise their own daggers, clubs, knives. They know the uses of spiked brass knuckles. All must know a Commando equivalent of jiujitsu. Fiercely, without quarter, they battle each other in practice combat, often break each other's bones: a few nights before the St. Nazaire raid one officer had his hand cut to the bone in a scuffle. For night attack, they black their faces and shoes, wear black uniforms, partly for camouflage, partly for the effect on enemy morale.

Commando training has had a profound effect on the whole British Army. Now, in effect, every British soldier gets the elements of Commando schooling. Even in the old Guards regiments, parade-ground precision has given way to training for actual battle. The U.S. has also profited. U.S. Marines studied Commando methods, found them akin to what the Marines were already doing. Amphibious troops now being trained in the U.S. Army will have the benefit of Commando experience.

Dear Dickie. Last year, for reasons never publicly told, Churchill abruptly relieved Sir Roger Keyes and installed Lord Louis Mountbatten in Combined Operations. Perhaps age was the sufficient reason: Lord Louis, at 41, was 28 years the younger. Sulfurous Sir Roger fumed that War Office bureaucrats had stymied him, implied that they wanted to get their clutches on the independent Commandos.

Whatever Sir Roger had to put up with, Lord Louis apparently was given full control. So that he can deal effectively with all three services, he was recently promoted from Commodore to Acting Vice Admiral in the Navy, given honorary Army and R.A.F. titles. Today, as Chief of Combined Operations, he has Britain's only unified command. Aside from Lord Louis, only his second cousin George VI and the King's three brothers hold ranks in Army, Navy, R.A.F.

By heritage and training, Lord Louis is a Navy man. By blood and marriage, he is also related to many of Europe's royal families, including dethroned ones. His mother was Queen Victoria's granddaughter, Princess Victoria of Hesse. His father was Prince Louis Alexander of Battenberg, a German who became a naturalized Briton in 1868, served 51 years in the Royal Navy and was First Sea Lord when World War I began. The name of Battenberg was too much for warring Britons: late in 1914, just a year after 14-year-old Lord Louis had become a naval cadet, Prince Louis resigned from the Admiralty. In 1917, he translated his name into English and became Mountbatten.

Young Louis was a cadet on two of Admiral Beatty's flagships (Lion, Queen Elizabeth), If his royal blood did him no harm, it did not noticeably speed his promotion: a midshipman by 1916, he was a lowly sublieutenant when the war ended.

At World War II's start, Lord Louis was a Captain in command of the Fifth Destroyer Flotilla. Three months later his flagship, the new destroyer Kelly, hit a mine in the North Sea. Lord Louis nursed her home, transferred to another flagship until the Kelly was repaired. The next May, a U-boat torpedoed the Kelly. Lord Louis & crew again brought her home. In November 1940, aboard the new destroyer Javelin, Lord Louis led an attack on three German surface raiders. In flight, the Nazi warships fired a torpedo salvo. Two torpedoes holed the Javelin. R.A.F. fighters warded off Nazi bombers which came to finish the Javelin, and Lord Louis again nursed his flagship to port.

Lord Louis then took the twice-repaired, recommissioned Kelly to the Mediterranean. On May 23, 1941, he was with the Kelly in the hell of Crete. This time, he did not bring her home. A dive-bomber found her. Within 70 seconds the Kelly sank, Lord Louis and some of his men escaped. Standing on a life raft, he led his men in a cheer for the dying Kelly. Down with her went two of Lord Louis' prized possessions: a silver cigaret lighter from his cousin, the Duke of Windsor, and a photograph of the reigning King and Queen. Both the lighter and the picture were inscribed: "To Dear Dickie With Love."

Bad Dickie. Between wars, it was possible for properly born officers of the Royal Navy to retain their standings, and still find time for play. Actually, Lord Louis did a lot of good sound Navy work, but he chose to hide the fact from his London friends, who would have disapproved.

He also did a lot of playing, and the Court of George V did not always ap prove of his playmates. One of his boon companions was Edward, Prince of Wales. Another was the late Douglas Fairbanks. Not until Edward briefly took the throne did Lord and Lady Louis Mountbatten have an unclouded welcome at court. Then, in 1937, he became King Edward's naval aide-de-camp.

Before that, the gay Mountbattens were accounted among "the palace gang" of blooded, moneyed youngsters who kept Queen Mary in a continuous state of alarm.

In the mid-1920's, while the Mountbattens were visiting the U.S., beauteous Lady Louis publicly danced the Charleston with Fred Astaire. Soon afterward, London was given to understand that Queen Mary disapproved of dancing with cinema actors, and Lord Louis was blackballed from the sacrosanct Royal Yacht Squadron.

New Dickie. Last year, just before Lord Louis took over Combined Operations, he was sent to the U.S. to command the bombed aircraft carrier Illustrious, then under repair at Norfolk Navy Yard. On that visit, their U.S. friends saw a new Lord and Lady Louis Mountbatten. Lord Louis no longer hid his light under a fashionable bushel. Once one of London's best-dressed women, Lady Louis was often in uniform. As Lady President of Britain's swank St. John's Ambulance Brigade, she toured the U.S. for the Red Cross. Between chores, the Mountbattens visited their daughters, 17-year-old Patricia and 12-year-old Pamela, who since mid-1940 had been living in the U.S. with Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt.

"All Tickety Boo." After Lord Louis got his three different ranks someone suggested that he alternate in Army, Navy, R.A.F. uniforms. Lord Louis stuck to his braided Navy blue. Londoners often see him at about 9:30 each morning, driving himself to work in his four-seater Ford (Priority No. 14). Nowadays, he has almost no club or social life. Often, he lunches on sandwiches in his headquarters office. "All tickety boo," he says when everything is as he likes it, in apple pie order.

Under him is another officer (name secret) who attends to the actual Commando details. Lord Louis has the larger, harder job of coordinating Army, Navy, Air Force action in the precisely planned and timed Commando raids. In fact, exclusive emphasis upon the Commandos exasperates him; they are. he knows, the heart and center of his organization, but he would like to see the Navy and Air Force get more credit.

To date, the Commandos have made countless, unannounced raids on coastal France, Norway, The Netherlands, even on Italy and Africa. Often their bag is no more than a few Nazi soldiers and officers, isolated damage to small Nazi posts--and the incalculable effects upon Nazi morale of swift, unannounced, murderous visits after dark. In their six publicized raids (two on Norway's Lofotens, others on Boulogne, St. Nazaire, Vagsoy), the total damage done could not compare with that achieved by the R.A.F.'s 1,000-plane raid on the Rhineland last week.

But, in terms of British morale alone, the Commandos' value has already been immense. In the terms of damage to Nazi morale and the uplift to civilian morale in occupied countries, it may well have been even greater. They have gathered information about Nazi coastal dispositions which may some day be very helpful to a real invasion. Most important of all, they know the technique of invasion, as no other Allied troops know it.

Constantly, the Commandomen in their home stations champ for more and bigger action. Often they grow impatient while their superiors at Lord Louis' headquarters master the details which must precede a raid. New recruits constantly arrive at the highland camps; replacements must be continuous, because the Commandos' losses are inevitably high. But the veterans of the Lofotens and Boulogne, the few who returned from St. Nazaire, the new men waiting for their first raid--all have a constant refrain between jobs. "Why," they ask, "are we waiting?"

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