 The film dramatizes the Brigade's first mission in the Italian Campaign, the task of capturing what is considered an impregnable German mountain stronghold, Monte la Difensa.In the summer of 1942, American Lieutenant Colonel Robert T. Frederick, a War Department staff officer with no prior combat or command experience, is summoned to Britain where he is selected by Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten to raise a commando force composed of both American and Canadian personnel for operations in German-occupied Norway.Back in the U.S., Frederick arrives at the derelict Fort William Henry Harrison in Montana where he receives his American troops — all of whom are jailbirds, ne'er-do-wells, and misfits.