Bonsoir

The life of blondie Asler is a novel. I would recommand his biography:

https://www.worldcat.org/fr/title/Blondie-:-a-biography-of-Lieutenant-Colonel-H.G.-Hasler-DSO-OBE-Croix-de-Guerre-Royal-Marines/oclc/39837007

written by Ewen Southby-Tailyour at the origin of the Jester Challenge.

Eric

Hi,

I am an Autrian who lost 6 of my 8 uncles in WW2 and was named Karl after one of them and being told that he was stationed in Bordeau although he died later during the war in Russia.

Therefore I watched this UK TV Cockleshell Heroes Programme with great interest and sadness how many lives were lost in those days. I wish all of us born after WW2 would have learned from history that war should never happen again. Putin and Hamas skipped the history lessons in school and we see the result now. I have 10 grandchildren and I hope to live long enough too pass my peace gen onto them in words and deeds.

There is one thing that I would like to know, was this commander Blondie Hasler the author of the Practical Junk Rig which was like a bible for me when I built my sailboat ?

Available for the next 27 days only on iPlayer (for UK residents only)

Timewatch - The Most Courageous Raid of World War II

Lord Ashdown, a former special forces commando, tells the story of the Cockleshell Heroes, who led one of the most daring and audacious commando raids of World War II. 

In 1942, Britain was struggling to fight back against Nazi Germany. Lacking the resources for a second front, Churchill encouraged innovative and daring new methods of combat. Enter stage left, Blondie Hasler. 

With a unit of 12 Royal Marine commandos, Major Blondie Hasler believed his 'cockleshell' canoe could be effectively used in clandestine attacks on the enemy. Their brief was to navigate the most heavily defended estuary in Europe, to dodge searchlights, machine-gun posts and armed river-patrol craft 70 miles downriver, and then to blow up enemy shipping in Bordeaux harbour. 

Lord Ashdown recreates parts of the raid and explains how this experience was used in preparing for one of the greatest land invasions in history, D-Day.