II Corps (United Kingdom)

Infobox Military Unit
unit_name=II Corps


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country=United Kingdom
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branch=British Army
type=Field corps
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notable_commanders= Alan Brooke
Bernard Montgomery (acting)
Kenneth Anderson
Gerald Templer
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The British II Corps was formed in both World War I and World War II.

During the Great War it was part of the original British Expeditionary Force, under the command of Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien, and remained on the Western Front throughout the war.

During WWII its first assignment was to the British Expeditionary Force where it was commanded by Alan Brooke (from whose name it took its insignia of a red leaping salmon upon three wavy blue bands against a white background, all in an oblong red border). It took part in the advance into Belgium, and was then pushed back with the rest of the force. It was evacuated from Dunkirk in June 1940. After commanding forces in the United Kingdom, it was being disbanded in early 1944 when selected to be one of the two corps comprising the notional British Fourth Army, which under the deception plan Fortitude North was supposed to attack Norway.

For Fortitude North, with its headquarters supposedly at Stirling in Scotland, it notionally consisted of the genuine British 3rd Infantry Division (shortly replaced by the notional British 58th Infantry Division), the genuine British 55th Division in Northern Ireland, and the genuine 113th Independent Infantry Brigade in the Orkneys. Under Fortitude North II Corps was supposedly to attack Stavanger, with the 3rd (later the 58th) Division and supporting commandos and paratroops seizing the airfields, the 55th Division joining as followup; the genuine U.S. XV Corps from Northern Ireland would augment the force, which would advance on Oslo.

The corps was transferred to First U.S. Army Group ("FUSAG") in early June 1944 and moved to Lincolnshire; restored to Fourth Army when that formation joined FUSAG for Fortitude South II, headquarters now at Tunbridge Wells in Kent, with under command the British 55th and 58th Divisions and the British 35th Armoured Brigade. It was notionally transferred to France in late September, consisting of the essentially notional 55th Division, the genuine 79th Armoured Division, and the essentially notional 76th Division; also apparently at times the genuine 59th Division, disbanded but notionally kept alive. It was notionally part of Canadian First Army in the deception Operation Trolleycar II (threatening an attack on the Germans in Holland) in November 1944.

After WWII, as a genuine corps it was based in the Middle East, controlling British forces around the Suez Canal. Following the British withdrawal from Egypt, II Corps was also the controlling force for the invasion of the country during the Suez Crisis.