The 1st Ranger Battalion: The Devil's Division
The 1st Ranger Battalion: The Devil's Division
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1942, the 1st Ranger Battalion was created after Major General Lucien Truscott convicted General George C. Marshall, the Army Chief of Staff, of the need for large, all- volunteer and highly-trained commando units that could be used for special operations.
The Devilâs Brigade
The Devilâs Brigade, also known as the 1st Special Service Force, was a Canadian-American unit trained in mountaineering, airborne, and close-combat skills that operated mostly in Italy and France. They excelled at close-quarters combat with numerically superior forces.
At Monte la Difensa, Italy, they wiped out a strategic enemy defensive position high atop a mountain surrounded by steep cliffs. They got their nickname from a captured diary of a German officer who wrote about the American commandos whose faces were camouflaged in black paint for the nighttime raid, âThe black Devils are all around us every time we come into line and we never hear them.â