In 1948, Italian exploding boats were bought in Israel.

On May 18, 1948, the establishment of the State of Israel was proclaimed. Given the difficult relations with neighbors, the Israeli authorities from the very beginning paid special attention to the purchase of weapons – after all, then there was no defense industry in the country. In different countries, they bought old decommissioned warships and auxiliary vessels. But the leadership of the armed forces wanted to equip their fleet with strike weapons.

Then, in 1948, there were no people willing to sell torpedoes and their carriers. The Israelis had to come up with a non-standard way out. In this article, we will talk about the use of Italian exploding boats in the Israeli Navy, which are in service with the X MAS flotilla.

One of the best combat swimmers during the Second World War were the Italians. About them, see the article “Anthology of naval sabotage. “Black Prince”. As part of the X flotilla MAS under the command Valerio Borghese, which was called the “Black Prince”, also included a unit armed with exploding boats. They were created in the late 30s of the twentieth century, and were officially called MT Motoscafo Turismo – a tourist motor boat. The length of such boats was 5.6 meters, the displacement was one ton. Up to 33 knots – a little more than 60 km / h – the boat accelerated the 95-horsepower Alfa Romeo engine. The boat could be transported in an ordinary truck. In the bow compartment of the boat housed 250 kg of explosives. In the stern there was a place for a combat swimmer. The tactics of using such boats was as follows. A group of 1-2 torpedo boats and 5-6 exploding boats advanced to the target – usually these were anchorages. MT was a planing boat, and could overcome a submerged boom. The combat swimmer selects a target, fixes the steering wheel, throws out the back of the seat (it is used as a life-saving device), and leaves the boat at a distance of about 200 meters from the target. Swimmers thrown into the water are picked up by torpedo boats. When hitting a target, special charges were triggered, upon detonation of which the stern of the boat was torn off. The nose part was immersed in water, and at a given depth the main 250 kg charge was detonated, hitting the underwater part of the target. The practice of using such boats was successful and not very good. So, as a result of the attack on March 26, 1941, the English heavy cruiser York and the Pericles tanker, with a displacement of 8,324 tons, were heavily damaged. The cruiser and tanker sank. The Italians used 6 boats to attack. All swimmers survived, but were captured. The attack on Malta failed, only the bridge was blown up. 15 Italians were killed, 18 were captured. The following attacks were unsuccessful, and only on April 16, 1945, the MT boat sank the French destroyer Tromb.

In total, during the years of World War II, the Italians built about a hundred boats of the MT and MTM types – its modernized version. A modernized version of the boat was even built with one 450 mm torpedo. It is important for our story that not all boats built were transferred to the X flotilla MAS.

In the summer of 1948, Israeli intelligence agents led by Zev Khayyam contacted the owners of small shipyards, who during the Second World War built exploding boats for the X flotilla MAS. They offered the shipyard owners to buy the six remaining boats for $3,000 each. Of course, officially, the boats were purchased as racing and sports boats, but everyone, both sellers and buyers, understood who needed these unusual boats and why.

The boats were delivered to Israel in August 1948. They were assigned to a special sabotage unit of the Israeli Navy. Commanded this unit Johan Bin-Nun. Officially, as part of the Navy, these boats were considered rescue boats. The initial crew training was carried out on Lake Tiberias. The first instructor was an Italian Fiorenzo Capriotti. It turned out to be a very valuable acquisition for the Israelis. Fiorenzo Capriotti, as a combat swimmer of the X flotilla MAS, participated in the attack in Souda Bay on Crete and in the attack on Malta. Got captured. When he returned to his homeland, he began to look for work. At this time, the Israeli special services came to him. At first, Capriotti checked the serviceability of the purchased MTM boats, then he moved to Israel to train the Israelis. The secrecy regime was maximum. By the fall of 1948, the boats were relocated to the port of Jaffa. The boats had to be delivered to the area of ​​operations. For this purpose, a patrol vessel was converted – the former Ma’oz K-24 yacht, which was placed at the disposal of Bin-Nun’s saboteurs. Ma’oz had a displacement of 1,050 tons and was armed with one 76 mm gun. Developed a speed of 15 knots. “Ma’oz” K-24 was built in Germany in 1931 as a private yacht “Argosy”. Participated in the Spanish Civil War on the side of the Republicans. Since 1942, she was part of the US Navy as a patrol ship USS “Cythera” PY-31. In 1946, the yacht was acquired by an Israeli organization and it was named “Abril”. In 1948, it was included in the Israeli Navy as Ma’oz K-24. The yacht had two cranes at the stern and a place to accommodate all six MT boats. The launch time for all boats was about 6 minutes. One of the boats was designed to lift combat swimmers from the water. The Israelis believed that their saboteurs should not have been captured.

The attack of the exploding boats on the ships of the Egyptian fleet was planned as part of the overall operation “Joab”. Attempts to organize a naval blockade of the Gaza Strip then failed, and then they decided to resort to attacking MT boats. On October 22, 1948, at 16:00 local time, the flagship of the Egyptian fleet, the frigate El-Amir Farouk, was discovered in the Gaza region. Some sources claim that it was a destroyer. Actually, it is not. “El-Amir Farouk” had a curious history. She was built in 1926 in Tyneside, UK, as a passenger and cargo ship. In 1936, he was drafted into the Royal Navy of Great Britain and armed on the model of the Flower-class sloops. Its displacement was 1,441 tons, speed 17 knots (about 30 km/h). By 1948, when the ship was part of the Egyptian Navy, she was armed with one (some sources say two) 76.2 mm cannon, four 20 mm Oerlikon automatic cannons, machine guns and depth charges. At the time of the attack, El-Amir Farouk was escorted by a BYMS-class minesweeper. Minesweepers of this type were built during World War II in the United States. Some of them (about 150 units) were transferred to the UK. The minesweepers were wooden, with a displacement of 274 tons. After World War II, the UK transferred 9 of these minesweepers to the Egyptian Navy.

Commander of the Israeli Navy Gershon Zach sent to intercept the Egyptian flagship a formation consisting of the Hagan and Wejawood corvettes, the large submarine hunter Nogah and the base of the exploding boats Ma’oz. It must be said that this attack was carried out after a truce agreement was concluded with the mediation of the UN, that is, the Israelis violated it with this attack.

At 1840 local time, the Ma’oz separated from the Israeli ships and headed for the point of attack. This point was calculated so that the attacking boats remained unnoticed from the shore. At 21-00 all four boats were launched. Two of them were intended for attack, the third was a reserve, the fourth, without explosives, with two sailors, was supposed to pick up the crews of the attacking boats from the water. An interesting detail. The sailors were wearing special helmets with night vision devices, and the sailors in the attack boats were wearing special caps with infrared lights to make them easier to detect in night water.

At 22-00 the boats approached the Egyptian ships. The Egyptians believed that the UN truce was already in effect, the Israelis would not attack them, so they carried ordinary navigation lights. Operation Commander Bin-Nun ordered the first boat to attack the El-Amir Farouk, the second – the minesweeper. The idea was that when going on the attack, the boats would pass between the Egyptian ships. This would make it difficult to return fire from them. But, while the boats were maneuvering to carry out their plans, El-Amir Farouk turned north, and the minesweeper turned south. The Egyptian ships dispersed. Observing this, the first boat launched an attack on Farukh, but was immediately discovered by them. Fire was opened from him on the boat. The pilot of the second boat, seeing that the minesweeper had already gone far enough, decided to also switch to an attack on the Egyptian flagship. But at that moment, his motor went haywire, and the boat went into circulation. The commander of the reserve boat decided to still catch up and attack the minesweeper. He belatedly left the boat just 30 meters from the minesweeper.

“El-Amir Farouk” was blown up by the first boat. It sank in 5 minutes. The minesweeper was damaged but kept buoyant, and the Egyptians managed to tow it to Alexandria. The fourth, rescue boat, picked up the pilots of the three attack boats. At 22-25 the rescue boat went to search for the floating base, night vision devices were of great help in this, and at 23-10 all combat swimmers boarded the Ma’oz. The fate of the second boat, which was supposed to initially attack the minesweeper, is not entirely clear. According to some reports, he was nevertheless sent to El-Amir Farouk and exploded, according to others, he returned to the base ship. According to this version, the Israelis lost two exploding boats.

The Israelis were well aware that they attacked Egyptian ships when the truce was in effect under the auspices of the UN, therefore, firstly, they did not publicly report the attack. This was also done in order to keep the presence of exploding boats in their arsenal a secret. Secondly, after the night attack, “Ma’oz” was at sea for three days, so that her return to the base could not be associated with an attack on the Egyptian flagship.

The Egyptian minesweeper received minor damage and was repaired. This is confirmed by the fact that in the 1956 war, the Egyptian Navy had as many minesweepers of the BYMS type as in 1948. Moreover, the name of the minesweeper that was attacked by the exploding boat is not even known.

The boats were used for the second time in January 1949. True, the result was zero. After the end of the truce, the Egyptian fleet fired Tel Aviv from the sea for the first time. “Ma’oz” came out to intercept the Egyptian ships. But the time of attack and weather conditions did not contribute to the successful use of MT boats. Because of the daylight hours, the boats had to be lowered far from the Egyptian ships. In addition, there was a strong wind, and the seaworthiness of small boats was extremely low. One of them was overwhelmed by a wave, and he sank, the rest of the boats, due to the rough sea, could not go on the attack. It all ended in an artillery duel “Ma’oz” with Egyptian ships at a great distance, which did not bring results to either side.

In March 1949, a final ceasefire took place. The only successful military operation that the Israeli fleet conducted after the attack on El-Amir Farouk was the landing on December 26, 1948, from large patrol boats of ten commandos to carry out sabotage on the railway. The second landing was not so successful – the commandos discovered themselves, and they had to urgently return to the boats.

For the successful attack on El-Amir Farouk, Yochai Bin-Nun was awarded the title of Hero of Israel. In 1960, he became commander of the Israeli Navy. Throughout his military career, Bin-Nun was an ardent supporter of sabotage attacks at sea. After the end of the war, the sabotage unit of the Navy was renamed the 13th flotilla – Shayetet-13. This renaming clearly shows the influence of MAS X Flotilla.

After the 1948-1949 war, the Israelis had two MT boats left. It is not known whether they replenished their number or not. It is only known that later, one of the surviving boats was transferred to the Red Sea, and was used to land agents on the coast of Jordan. The last surviving boat of the MT type is today in the Museum of the Navy in the city of Haifa.