CHAPTER IEarly HistoryAt the New York Conference of Foreign Ministers in
September 1950 it was decided to increase the number of troops in But Sylt was primarily a Royal Air
Force range and it was soon apparent that by the end of 1952 there would no
longer be room for the Army as well. The first alternative site suggested was at Hohwacht
on the Baltic, because of its proximity to Putlos
which was already in use as an anti-tank and anti-aircraft range. Fortunately
there was much local opposition to the loss of this very popular little
seaside resort, and Todendorf was selected instead
as the final site. The original project at Todendorf was
purely British – room for 60 officers and 1,500 soldiers in a summer camp.
All accommodation was to be in tents save for such things as cookhouse,
NAAFI, cinema and workshops, which were to be semi-permanent buildings. The
technical requirement for the ranges was stated to be “like a good grass
field – not so hard that the guns bounce nor so soft
that they sink in”. This first project was completed early in 1953 and firing began
in the spring of the same year. But the plan was expanding fast. The
Americans had already put in a bid to build a range and camp of their own and
they even began shooting in 1953 although their camp was still under
construction. At the same time, it was decided that further enlargement was
necessary to meet NATO requirements and a fourth range and camp should be
added. It was also decided that all tents should be replaced by hutted
accommodation, and that the ranges themselves should be better than a “good
grass field”. Thus the final plan began to take shape – four ranges, each
designed to take twenty or more of the largest guns in line and consisting of
hard standings and concrete connecting roads for guns, radar, predictors and
generators. Each range was to have its own camp – a completely self-contained
barracks capable of accommodating the strongest NATO regiment or battalion. The most westerly range and camp (“A”) was to be exclusively
American, while the remaining three (“B”, “C” and “D”) would all be NATO,
suitable for Heavy or Light AA of any Allied nation. The engineer problems involved were very considerable. First and
foremost, vast quantities of materials had to be transported to the site
along roads which were quite inadequate to cope with the traffic. They were
neither wide enough nor robust enough with the results that the Royal
Engineers had to institute their own traffic control and used vast quantities
of material and man-hours keeping the roads “navigable”. Patching-up alone in
these early stages used some 4200 tons of gravel and 2000 tons of concrete
rubble, and it was eventually decided that the 12 kms
long approach road from Seekrug to Todendorf must be widened, straightened and generally
improved. This involved building whole new sections of road, and the project
was eventually completed in August 1954. Similarly there were headaches “seawards”. The required danger
area of 22,000 yards was found to overlap the main shipping lane from the There was still the problem of patrolling the danger area in
order to keep out small vessels not restricted to “Way I”. At first these
duties were carried out by the German Water police but in 1954 the Budesseegrenzschutz took over and continued until the
newly-formed German Navy replaced them in July 1956. Thus, by the time the author arrived in May 1955, all tents had
disappeared; the four ranges and camps taking on their final form but the
whole area was a sea of mud with scores of contractors milling around trying
to complete a hundred and one projects without interfering with the shooting
which was constantly in progress. Bad weather merely brought everything to a
glutinous halt – both shooting and building. THE GLOBE CINEMA
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