From: spencer@panix.com (David Spencer)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: Re: Dieppe (Montgomery and others quoted)
Date: 26 Aug 92 13:28:52 GMT
Organization: PANIX Public Access Unix, NYC

tedrick@whistle.Berkeley.EDU (Tom Tedrick) writes:

>sachs@lhasa.berkeley.edu (Rainer Sachs) writes:
>fr@compu.com writes:

><<Yet, I'm still bewildered by the rationale for this raid. 

><For centuries one result of British control of the seas
><was to keep the over-all initiative, by being able to
><start a fight at almost any location world-wide.

This was an important, and successful, strategy in WW2. the Germans
tied up almost as many divisions protecting the French coast as they
did on the Eastern front. Of course, many of these were second- or
third- rate troops, or divisions refitting or organizing, but it was
successful.

The Dieppe raid reinforced this trend. It also had several other
important effects:

1. It convinced the Allied high command that the eventual invasion
should not be aimed at a port. The port area at Dieppe was heavily and
easily defended, and could easily be destroyed if it were about to be
lost. If it was impossible to take Dieppe, even for a few hours, even
with surprise, and even before its defenses were improved, how much
more difficult would it be to take and hold a major port after the
Germans had time to improve it and develop counterattacks?

2. It convinced the Germans that the eventual invasion _would_ be
aimed at a port. Or, rather, it reinforced their belief that it was
impossible to mount an amphibious invasion unless a port were taken in
the first few days. And it reinforced their belief that the Allies
believed this, too.

These caused the Germans to shift troops and effort from Normandy
(where there were no major ports between Cherbourg and Le Havre) to
the Pas-de-Calais. Of course, Allied counterintelligence helped them
to this conclusion...

It also caused the Allies to develop the means of supplying a full
army -- not just a raiding party -- over a beach. These means proved
successful in the Normandy invasion.

3. It convinced the Allies that no sustained amphibious attack could
be successful without absolute air superiority. The invasion forces --
naval units and ground units -- are sitting ducks.

By D-Day, the Allies had attained absolute air superiority over France.

4. It reminded the Allied high command that amphibious invasion is the
most difficult of all military operations. It's a frontal assault
against prepared positions, with no maneuver room and no means of
logistical support. In Europe, there was an further problem not found
in the Pacific assaults: The enemy could (relatively) freely reinforce
and maneuver many times more troops.

In short, it was suicidal. 

This encouraged Churchill's great reluctance to assault NW Europe, and
encouraged him to press his goofy strategic concepts. It was a major
influence on the decision to season US troops in North Africa, rather
than build up in Britain for a direct assault across the Channel. It
led the Allies to continue operations in North Africa and the
Mediterranean long after they had ceased to have any strategic merit.

It also convinced the planners that they were going to need a hell of
a lot more landing craft and support craft than they had available.

5. At the time of the Dieppe raid, the Allies had no experience in
large scale amphibious assault. There was a lot of theory, but no
direct knowledge. The North African invasion (which was not against a
well-defended coast) was months off; Guadalcanal was just underway and
did not present the sort of problems that a large-sacale assault on
Europe presented. The only marginally relevant experience was the
Dardanelles fiasco (with which Churchill was acutely familiar) in WW1.

Without some experience, planning would have been impossible. Indeed,
considering what little experience the Allies had before D-Day (all of
it -- Dieppe, Sicily, Salerno, Anzio -- frightfully bad), it's amazing
that the Normandy assault worked at all, or that it was even tried.
The planners did a magnificent job.

Dieppe provided a _lot_ of information. Most of it was negative, and
it was dearly bought, but it was essential. The Normandy invasion
could not have been mounted without it, or something like it.


The only useful reference on the operations at Dieppe is the Canadian
Official History, by Col CP Stacey. I don't recall which volume; I
think it's _Six Years of War_.

On Dieppe's effects on both side's planning for the Normandy invasion,
the US Official History, _Cross Channel Attack_, is incisive. (Oddly,
the British Official History is useless, both on operations at Dieppe
and on their effects on the Normandy invasion.)

I believe that Williamson's _Strategy for Defeat_ has a discussion of
the need for air superiority, though I may be thinking of the USAAF's
Official History.

The memoirs of the chief planner, Lt-Gen Frederick Morgan, _Overture
to Overlord_, are a magnificent description of the planning for the
Normandy invasion -- with particular insight on the lessons of Dieppe.


>Finally, here is what Bernard Montgomery has to say (pages 65-67 of
>"The Memoirs of Field-Marshall Montgomery"):

Take BLM's _Memoirs_ with a bushel of salt. Even BLM's (generally
hagiographic) official biographer warns that they are highly
unreliable (especially on things, like Dieppe, that reflect badly on
him). He had a lot more to do with Dieppe -- and its failures -- than
he let on. Poor security had little to do with the problems at Dieppe.


David Spencer     spencer@panix.com
* It is better to be lucky than to be smart. -Napolean
* But it's easier to be smart twice than to be lucky twice. -CG Solsvig