Finally, the 2nd Battalion, under Major John H. Dilley, the ‘Go-Devils,’ would land just below the Sebou and immediately attack an old fort, called the Casbah, and its adjacent lighthouse that protected the river approaches to Port Lyautey. To get to it, the troops would have to fight their way past a single 200-yard opening in the ridges that was protected by six 138.6mm guns and sundry other obstacles, including machine guns, 75mm guns mounted on flatcars, and entrenchments.

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In the early morning darkness of November 8, 1942, the Sub-Task Force, carrying 9,000 jittery troops, approached the Moroccan coast and promptly got lost. The flagship, the battleship USS Texas, ordered a change in course, and during the maneuver the other ships became confused and lost formation. In addition, ship-to-ship communications became snarled. Noticing some naval officers’ nervous behavior, Truscott asked Commodore Harold Gray if he knew where they were. ‘Well, General,’ Gray replied, ‘to be perfectly honest, I am not sure exactly where we are.’ This admission and lack of communication with his commanders aboard the other ships led Truscott to the desperate expedient of taking a launch from ship to ship to inform his commanders that no matter what the condition of the fleet, the mission was to proceed as planned, with the exception that they would begin a half hour later than scheduled.

Although the landing should still have taken place in darkness, the confusion in assembling landing craft and sending them to an uncertain shore caused the first waves to hit the beaches a little after 6 a.m.–in full daylight. And Truscott had another headache waiting for him when he returned to his ship. There, his staff informed him that a pre-recorded message from President Franklin D. Roosevelt and General Dwight D. Eisenhower to the French ashore was at that moment being broadcast. The Eastern and Center task forces had landed ahead of schedule, forcing the broadcast. But what was timely for others proved detrimental to Goalpost. Now the enemy knew they were coming for sure.

As dawn began to break and the first ragged waves of landing craft began to churn toward shore, bad luck continued to haunt the mission. McCarley’s 1st Battalion missed both of its designated beaches and landed almost 3,000 yards north of Blue Beach, with its second wave coming ashore before the first. Meeting no opposition, the men sorted themselves out, hiked around the southern end of the lagoon and made their way rapidly inland to the roadway to establish their positions on the flank.

Five minutes after the 1st Battalion landed, at 5:40 a.m., Dilley’s 2nd Battalion came ashore, guided by previously placed signal lights, while enemy searchlights and red flares arced into the sky. The French coastal guns opened up on the fleet, but the guns of the destroyer Eberle extinguished the searchlights while the cruiser Savannah tried to put the shore batteries out of commission. Suddenly the Go-Devils were obliged to throw themselves flat on the beach as two Vichy French Dewoitine fighter planes swept into action.

With the roar of guns, the drone of planes, the shouts of men, amphibious tanks sinking in the surf and other vehicles struggling against the loose sand, Mehedia Beach was a mass of confusion. Truscott himself knew little of what was happening. His only information was coming from two men, Colonel Demas D. Craw and Major Pierpont M. Hamilton, who had landed with the 2nd Battalion to take a personal message to Colonel Charles Petit, commander of Vichy forces in Port Lyautey, asking him to lay down his arms and join the Allies. As soon as they hit Green Beach, the two men were to grab a jeep and race to the town ahead of the advancing troops. As they went in, they radioed Truscott, ‘ At mouth of river. Being shelled by enemy and our own Navy….On Green Beach….Troops landed and moving inland. Proceeding on mission.’

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