UNITED STATES ARMr IN WORLD WAR II 

The European Theater of Operations 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

by 

Gordon A. Harrison 

CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY 

UNITED STATES ARMY 

WASHINGTON, D.C., 1993 
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 51-61669 

First Printed 1951-CMH Pub 7-4-1 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office 

Washington, D.C. 20402 
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II 

Kent Roberts Greenfield, General Editor 

Advisory Committee 

James P. Baxter 

President, Williams College 

Henry S. Commager 

Columbia University 

Douglas S. Freeman 

Richmond News Leader 

Pendleton Herring 

Social Science Research Council 

John D. Hicks 

University of California 

William T. Hutchinson 

University of Chicago 

S. L. A. Marshall 

Detroit News 

E. Dwight Salmon 

Amherst College 

Col. Thomas D. Stamps 

United States Military Academy 

Charles H. Taylor 

Harvard University 

Historical Division) SSUSA "" 

Maj. Gen. Orlando Ward, Chief 

Chief Historian 

Chief, World War II Group 

Editor-in-Chief 

Chief Cartographer 

Kent Roberts Greenfield 

Col. Allison R. Hartman"" 

Hugh Corbett 

W sevolod Aglaimoff 

·Redesignated Office of the Chief of Military History. 28 March 1950. 

··Succeeded by Col. Thomas J. Sands. 3 March ,1950. 

iii 

· . . to Those Who Served 

Foreword 

Cross-Channel A ttack is one of approximately a hundred volumes which 

the Department of the Army intends to publish regarding its part in World 

War II. This particular volume deals with the planning and the difficulties encountered incident to the mounting of the largest amphibious assault ever 

undertaken in military history. Much of the information it contains has not 

heretofore been a matter of public knowledge. For example, light is for the 

first time thrown upon the enemy's conflicting theories of defense against 

Allied air superiority and upon his pauCity of first-class troops. This information is derived from the official records of the Wehrmacht and from signed 

statements of German participants. Many of the difficulties encountered in the 

planning, as well as in the execution stage of the operation, are here described 

to the public for the first time. 

Where this history deals with the struggle ashore, it clearly illustrates the 

necessity for commanders to adjust their thinking to the means at hand, the 

terrain, and the influence of new weapons. It reiterates the indispensability of 

constant training in how to get order out of the confusion which is forever 

present upon the battlefield. It brings to mind in this connection the means 

used by a football team for meeting the problems of overcoming opposition on 

the playing field. The plays devised and the techniques used to attain its ends 

must be practiced again and again. Frequently it is the loss of effective direction of small units, incident to the battle's toll, which makes for failure rather 

than success. 

Whether the reader approaches the book with the justified pride that he 

was a member or supporter of the winning team, or whether he reads to learn, 

is a matter for him to decide. The victor tends to prepare to win the next war 

with the same means and methods with which he won the last. He forgets the 

difficulty of reaching decisions, the planning problems, his faltering, his unpreparedness. The vanquished is wont to search far afield for new and improved methods, means, and equipment. The accomplishments of those who 

fought in this period were indeed great, as were the sacrifices. But from the 

national viewpoint it would seem desirable to read this volume with the selfcritical eye of the vanquished as well as with the pride of the victor, an approach which the thoughtful reader will not find difficult. 

Washington, D.C. 

1 October 1950 

vii 

ORLANDO WARD 

Maj. Gen., U.S.A. 

Chief of Military History 
Introductory Note on the History of 

the European Theater of Operations 

Chronologically this volume is first in the series narrating the events of 

'","orId War II in the European Theater of Operations. It has been preceded 

in publication by The Lorraine Campaign) which covers the operations of the 

Third Army during the autumn of 1944 and which begins some two months 

after the close of the present volume. A co-operative history of the type represented in this series has distinct advantages but does not lend itself readily to 

the production and publication of volumes in proper chronological order. 

For this reason each volume will be designated only by title and will remain 

unnumbered. 

Cross-Channel Attack has been planned and written as. the introduction to 

the history of those campaigns in 1944 and 1945 which led to the destruction 

of the German armies in the west. It provides necessary background for the 

study of all the campaigns in the European Theater of Operations. The narrative of operations ends on I July 1944, with the Allies firmly established in 

Normandy. The concluding chapters show the successful fruition of plans and 

preparations reaching back as far as January 1942; but the seizure. of the Norman beaches and the establishment of a lodgment area are only a beginning, a 

point of departure for the drive to the Elbe and the Baltic. Although CrossChannel Attack includes discussion of certain problems of high command and 

logistics, a more complete treatment is accorded these subjects in two volumes 

now under preparation in this series: The Supreme Command and Logistical 

Support of the Armies. 

The author of Cross-Channel Attack) Gordon A. Harrison, a former newspaper reporter and instructor at Harvard University, holds the Doctor of Philosophy degree from that institution. During the war he served as a historical 

officer with the Third Army, taking part in five campaigns. He joined the Historical Division, Department of the Army, in 1946. 

Washington, D.C. 

1 October 1950 

viii 

HUGH M. COLE 

Chief, European Section 
Preface 

This volume, introductory to a series on the European Theater of Operations, deals with the development of strategy and planning for the attack on 

northwest Europe in 1944 and with the first month of operations establishing 

Allied armies in France. The first seven chapters (about two-thirds) of the 

book are concerned with the prelude to the 6 June assault: the preparations 

and discussions of strategy on both the Allied and German sides from 1941 to 

1944. The remaining three chapters describe the combat operations of the 

First U. S. Army in Normandy from 6 June to 1 July 1944. This apportionment of space was deliberately made with reference to the whole European 

Theater Series, and much of the material on plans, the state of German defense, preparatory operations, has strict relevance only when viewed from the 

larger perspective. 

While attempting to set operations in northwest Europe in the framework 

of world-wide strategy, Cross-Channel A ttack makes no pretense of telling the 

full story of that strategy. Other volumes under preparation by the Historical 

Division will focus on the Mediterranean and Pacific and discuss various aspects of the higher direction of the war. 

It should be pointed out further that this is an American story of an Allied 

operation. It is based largely on Department of the Army records, and although these include a large number of British and Combined document~ it 

has not been possible, nor was it intended, to develop in full the narrative of 

British participation. Every effort has been made to avoid a partisan viewpoint 

and to present fairly some of the critical problems of the Anglo-American 

alliance as they came into and were revealed by the cross-Channel project. 

Beyond that there is no attempt to achieve an "Allied" perspective or to 

weigh and balance American and British contributions. In the operational 

chapters British action has been summarized only when it occurred on the 

flank of First U. S. Army and materially affected American operations. 

In the narrative of American operations in Chapters VIII-X, the basic 

unit treated is the division, although in recording the fragmented battles typical of fighting in the European theater it often becomes necessary to follow 

battalions and even companies and platoons on quasi-independent missions 

in order to describe fully what the division as a unit did. The actions are described in somewhat less detail than in other volumes of the series chiefly because the Department of the Army has already published monographs covering the period. The reader interested in greater detail will find it in [Charles 

H. Taylor] Omaha Beachhead (Washington, 1945) and [R. G. Ruppenthal] 

Utah Beach to Cherbourg (Washington, 1947). Cross-Channel Attack summarizes these two accounts with occasional corrections, additions, and reinterpretations, and with entirely new German material. 

ix 
In a work based o.n thousands of cables, memoranda, plans, journal entries, 

etc., to have cited the source for every fact would have unduly burdened every 

page with redundant footnotes. Documentation is therefore selective, aimed 

first at citing authorities for all important or disputed facts and opinions, and 

second at providing those curious to know more with an adequate guide to 

the primary and secondary source material. 

As is the uniform practice throughout this series, German units and headquarters are italicized. Exception is made for OKW and OKH which, though 

military headquarters, were also constitutional organs of the German state. 

German units are translated whenever exact English equivalents exist. The 

terms panzer, panzer grenadier, Luftwaffe, and Kampfgruppe, however, have 

been retained because they are of such common occurrence that they have 

been virtually assimilated at least into military English. 

Cross-Channel Attack is in a real sense the product of co-operative enterprise. It depends heavily on information collected by army historians in the 

field during combat, on preliminary draft narratives by other historians after 

combat, on specific assistance given me during the writing and research, and 

perhaps most important of all on the privilege (which I have always enjoyed) 

of tapping the collective knowledge of colleagues working in related fields. 

When the first draft was completed I had to leave the Division temporarily 

and the whole burden of editing devolved for some time upon others. I am 

particularly grateful to Associate Editor Joseph R. Friedman and to Capt. 

Frank Mahin, Capt. James Scoggin, and Mr. Detmar Finke of the Foreign 

Studies Section for undertaking much of the onerous burden of checking facts 

and footnotes in my absence, and for performing an editing task that often 

amounted to collaboration. 

It is a pleasure to acknowledge indebtedness to Col. S. L. A. Marshall for 

his indispensable series of interviews and manuscript studies of the airborne 

operations in Normandy and for his interviews with officers and men of th(" 

1st and 29th Divisions. Other combat interviews to which I am indebted were 

conducted by Lt. Col. W. T. Gayle and Capt. R. G. Ruppenthal. Special 

thanks are due Captain Ruppenthal and Colonel Taylor for the excellent preliminary studies on UTAH and OMAHA beach mentioned above which I have 

used freely. Interviews conducted by Dr. Forrest C. Pogue with some forty 

British planners and commanders in the summer of 1946 immeasurably enriched the record available to me. 

In exploring German sources, besides assistance by the Foreign Studies 

Section I received special help from Capt. Benjamin Schwartz. The bulk of 

the research in air force records on which the section on the Combined 

Bomber Offensive is based was very ably performed by Lt. Col. Charles A. 

Warner. The task of locating relevant documents and running down some of 

the more elusive facts was made easier and more pleasant by the willing efforts 

of many special research assistants and archivists who cannot all be named 

here. I appreciate the co-operation of members of the JCS Historical Section, 

the Air Forces Historical Section, and the Office of Naval History. I am spex 
cially grateful to Mr. Israel Wice and his assistants, to Mr. Royce L. Thomp· 

son, and to Miss Alice Miller. 

The problems of dealing with an Allied operation largely from American 

records were greatly reduced by the generous help of the British Cabinet Historical Section under Brigadier H. B. Latham. I must particularly acknowledge the contributions of Lt. Col. H. A. Pollock and Lt. Col. A. E. Warhurst. 

Colonel Warhurst, author of the British Historical Section's preliminary narrative of operations in northwest Europe, has sent me copies of important 

documents missing from the files here and has supplied careful briefs of 

British action. Useful information was also supplied by the British Admiralty 

and the Air Ministry. Col. C. P. Stacey of the Canadian Historical Section 

gave me the benefit of his special knowledge. It should be pointed out, however, that the British and Canadian historians do not concur in many of the 

judgments in this book and that they are in no way responsible for the handling of the material, or for errors of fact or presentation. 

For making available personal papers and other data I am indebted to the 

kindness of Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Maj. Gen. Ray W. Barker, and Lt. 

Gen. Sir Frederick E. Morgan. Other commanders have helped clarify obscure 

points and have criticized portions of the manuscript. Footnotes acknowledge 

their contributions only in part. The warning must be repeated that their help 

in no way implies an endorsement of the use that has been made of it. 

Mr. Wsevolod Aglaimoff in the course of planning and laying out the maps 

provided me with new fruitful perspectives out of his knowledge and experience as a military cartographer. Pictures were selected and prepared by Lt. 

Col. John Hatlem; aerial photogTaphs were made by him specially for this 

volume through the co-operation of the 45th Reconnaissance Squadron, 

USAF. Miss Michael Burdett edited the footnotes and, with Mrs. Frances T. 

Fritz, copy-edited the entire manuscript. The tremendous job of preparing 

the index was carried out by Mr. David Jaffe. Miss Mildred Bucan typed the 

manuscript for the printer. 

Cross-Channel Attack has been prepared under the general direction of 

Dr. Hugh M. Cole, Chief of the European Section, Historical Division. It has 

been a happy and rewarding experience to have had Dr. Cole's discerning 

counsel throughout the period of research and writing. 

Washington, D.C. 

1 October 1950 

xi 

GORDON A. HARRISON 

Contents 

Chapter 

I. THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY. 

Page 

1 

1 

13 

21 

32 

38 

The Common Ground 

General Marshall's Project . 

"Action in 1942-Not 1943" .. 

The Period of Indecision (July-December 1942) 

The Casablanca Conference. 

II. OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 

Organization for Planning . 

Size and Shape of the Attack. 

Landing Craft Requirements 

Allotment of Resources) May 1943 

The COSSAC Plans . 

46 

46 

54 

59 

63 

70 

III. OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 83 

Strategy Reviewed: The Quebec Conference 83 

Landing Craft Again. 100 

Questions of Command . 105 

The Cairo-Tehran Conferences. 117 

IV. THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 . 128 

Organization of the West 128 

Impact of the Russian and Mediterranean Fronts. 140 

Rebuilding the Western Defenses 148 

V. OVERLORD REVISED . 158 

U.S. Organization and Training tor the Assault, January 1944 158 

The ANVIL-OVERLORD Debate. 164 

The NEPTUNE Plans . 173 

VI. PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 198 

The French Resistance 198 

The Combined Bomber Offensive 207 

The Bombing of French Railroads. 217 

VII. GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 231 

OKW Policy in 1944 . 231 

Organization for Combat 236 

Command and Tactics 242 

The Defense on the Eve of Invasion 258 

xiii 
Chapter 

VIII. THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

The Invasion is Launched 

The Airborne Assault 

Hitting the Beaches . 

The D-Day Beachhead 

IX. THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 

Securing the Beachheads . 

Junction Between V and VII Corps 

The Caumont Gap 

Toward St. La . 

X. THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 

Securing the North Flank . 

Appendix 

Attack to Cut the Peninsula. 

Hitler Intervenes . 

A dvance to the C herbourg Landfront 

The Fall of Cherbourg 

End of a Phase 

Page 

269 

269 

278 

300 

321 

336 

336 

351 

366 

376 

386 

386 

396 

408 

416 

422 

438 

A. DIGEST OF OPERATION OVERLORD 450 

B. DIRECTIVE TO SUPREME COMMANDER, ALLIED EXPE· 

DITIONARY FORCE 457 

C. HITLER DIRECTIVE NO. 40 459 

D. HITLER DIRECTIVE NO. 51 464 

E. CHRONOLOGY OF MAIN PLANNING PAPERS FROM 

JANUARY 1944 468 

F. COMPARATIVE FIRE POWER OF THE U.S. AND GERMAN 

1944-TYPE INFANTRY DIVISIONS. 470 

G. DIVISIONS AVAILABLE TO GERMANY ON 6 JUNE 1944 471 

H. TABLE OF EQUIVALENT RANKS 472 

1. RECIPIENTS OF THE DISTINGUISHED SERVICE CROSS 473 

J. BASIC MILITARY MAP SYMBOLS 477 

GLOSSAR Y 479 

CODE NAMES 485 

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 487 

INDEX . 495 

xiv 
Charts 

}io. Page 

1. Simplified Command and Planning Organization for European Operations as of May 1942 . S 

2. German Chain of Command in the West, May 1944 . 244 

3. Luftwaffe Command in the West 245 

4. German Naval Command in the West . 245 

Maps 

1. Situation in Europe, 6 june 1944 . 

2. German Counterattack in the Cotentin . 

S. 4th Infantry Division, 6 june 1944 . 

4. German Counterattack on Carentan, 13 june 1944 

5. Caumont Gap, Morning 10 june 1944 

6. The la Fiere Bridgehead, 9 june 1944 . 

Maps I-XXIV are in accompanying map envelope 

I. Overlord Area. 

II. The Final Overlord Plan. 

III. Development of the Lodgment. 

IV. Sealing Off the Battlefield. 

V. Order of Battle OB WEST, 6 june 1944. 

VI. Allied Assault Routes, 6 june 1944. 

VII. The Airborne Assault, 6 june 1944. 

VIII. lOlst Airborne Division Drop Pattern, 6 June 1944. 

IX. 82d Airborne Division Drop Pattern, 6 June 1944. 

X. V Corps D-Day Objectives. 

XI. Omaha Beach Assault. 

XII. The Second British Army on D Day. 

XIII. German Countermeasures, 6 June 1944. 

XIV. V Corps, 7-8 June 1944. 

XV. VII Corps on D + 1. 

268 

296 

305 

S66 

370 

397 

XVI. Battle for Carentan and Junction of the Beachheads, 8-12 June 1944. 

XVII. V Corps Advance, 9-13 June 1944. 

XVIII. Kampfgruppe Heintz, 6-11 June 1944. 

XIX_ Toward St. L6, 14-18 June 1944. 

XX. Securing the North Flank, 8-14 June 1944. 

XXI. Attack to Cut the Peninsula, 10-18 June 1944. 

XXII. The Advance North, 19-21 June 1944. 

XXIII. The Attack on Cherbourg, 22-26 June 1944. 

XXIV. The Advance Inland, 6 June-l July 1944. 

xv 
Illustrations 

President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill 

General Marshall . 

U.S. Soldiers in Ireland 

Casablanca Conference 

General Morgan 

British Landing Craft on Beach at Dieppe 

German Submarine Under Aerial Attack 

Quebec Conference 

General Montgomery . 

Tehran Conference 

Field Marshal von Rundstedt and General JodI 

German High Command 

Enemy Coast Artillery . 

Field Marshal Rommel 

General Eisenhower 

Invasion Training in England 

Assault Training 

Vauville Beach, Spring 1944 . 

Preinvasion Bombing . 

Hitler Leaving Railway Carriage at Compiegne 

V-Bomb Over London, June 1944 

Bombardment of Marshaling Yards 

Results of Air Attacks . 

Antilanding Obstacles. 

German Mobile Infantry 

Captured German Armor 

Preinvasion Scenes . 

Allied Invasion Chiefs. 

German Field Commanders 

Parachute Troops . 

Hedgerow Country. 

Merderet River Crossing 

Crossing the Channel . 

Troops on Utah Beach 

Aerial View of Utah Beach on D-Day Morning. 

Aerial View of Omaha Beach on D Plus 1 

Terrain on Omaha Beach 

Assault Landings, Omaha Beach . 

First Aid on the Beach 

Rangers Scaling the Cliffs at Pointe du Hoe 

Ninth Air Force B-26 Over British Beachhead. 

Troops on Utah Beach Under Artillery Fire 

Planes and Gliders Circling Les Forges . 

xvi 

Page 

7 

14 

20 

39 

50 

55 

85 

89 

118 

124 

132 

134 

139 

150 

159 

161 

163 

178 

195 

199 

216 

226 

229 

251 

255 

256 

271 

273 

277 

279 

285 

294 

299 

303 

306 

310 

312 

314 

316 

323 

331 

343 

346 
U.S. Commanders . 

St. Come-du-Mont Area 

Carentan Causeway ... 

Carentan and Hill 30 Area 

Tank Equipped with Hedgerow Cutter . 

Crisbecq Fortification 

Azeville Forts 

Quineville 

La Fiere Causeway. 

Tank Entering St. Sauveur-le Vicomte 

Ste. Colombe-Nehou Area. 

Seine River Bridge at Mantes-Gassicourt Under Bombardment 

Utah Beach During the Build-up. 

Omaha Beach During the Build-up . 

Artificial Port at Omaha Beach . 

American Artillery in Action Against Cherbourg 

Fort du Roule 

House-to-House Search in Cherbourg 

American Infantry Captain with Cherbourg Prisoners. 

Illustrations are from the following sources: 

Page 

352 

354 

358 

362 

385 

389 

391 

394 

399 

405 

407 

409 

424 

425 

427 

433 

435 

437 

439 

u.s. Army Photos, pages: 7,14,20,39,50,89, ll8, 124,132,159,163,178,216,251,256,271,273,277, 

.285,303,310,316,343,352,385,405,424,425,427,433, 437, 439 

U.S. Air Force Photos, pages: 85, 195,226,229, 279, 285, 294, 306. 312, 331, 346, 354, 358, 362, 389, 

391, 394, 399, 407, 409, 424, 427, 435 

U.S. Navy Photos, pages: 161,323 

U.S. Coast Guard Photos, pages: 161,299,303,314,425 

Captured German Photos, pages: 55, 134, 139, 150,255 

National Archives Photo, page: 199 

xvii 
The U.S. Army Center of Military History 

The Center of Military History prepares and publishes histories as required by 

the U.S. Army. It coordinates Army historical matters, including historical properties, and supervises the Army museum system. It also maintains liaison with public 

and private agencies and individuals to stimulate interest and study in the field 

of military history. The Center is located at 1099 14th Street, N.W., Washington, 

D.G 20005-3402. 

xviii 
CHAPTER I 

The Roots of Strategy 

The Common Ground 

OVERLORD, the cross-Channel attack 

which hit the German-occupied coast of 

Normandy on 6 June 1944, was one of the 

last and by far the biggest of the series of 

amphibious operations by which the 

United States and the British Empire 

came to grips with the German-ItalianJapanese Axis in the course of World War 

II. But it was more than just another attack. It was the supreme effort of the 

Western Allies in Europe-the consummation of the grand design to defeat Germany by striking directly at the heart of 

Hitler’s Reich. One of the last attacks, it 

was the fruition of some of the first strategic ideas. 

The principles that eventually shaped 

OVERLORD were developed early but their 

application was discontinuous, interrupted by diffuse experimentation and 

improvisation. Neither ideas nor planning can be traced along a single line 

from a clear beginning to the ultimate action. OVERLORD was an Allied project. 

British and American planners worked 

together, but they also worked separately, 

particularly in the early years of the war. 

Sometimes their efforts paralleled each 

other; sometimes they were at cross-purposes. Within both the American and the 

British military establishments, furthermore, divergent opinions struggled for acceptance. The whole story of planning 

and preparing the cross-Channel attack is 

thus many stories which can be told only 

in terms of the planners and directors 

concerned, and the pragmatic organizations within which they worked. 

At least a year and a half before the 

United States was drawn into the war, the 

groundwork for possible Anglo-American 

military collaboration against the Axis 

was being laid. The Navy Department 

took the lead in the summer of 1940 in establishing a permanent observer in London (Rear Adm. Robert L. Ghormley) 

whose job was specifically to discuss arrangements for naval co-operation in case 

the United States came into the war, and 

generally to provide a channel for the 

interchange of naval information between the two countries.1 Army observers 

also traveled to London during 1940 on 

special missions, but the War Department did not set up a permanent liaison 

body until the spring of 1941. At that 

time Maj. Gen. James E. Chaney, a veteran of twenty-four years’ experience in 

the Air Corps, was sent to London as a 

Special Army Observer directly responsible to Gen. George C. Marshall, the 

U. S. Army Chief of Staff. General 

Chaney’s headquarters became known as 

SPOBS (Special Observers) . Admiral 

Ghormley’s group at the same time was 

reconstituted and he was designated Special Naval Observer, reporting directly 

1 Administrative History of U.S. Naval Forces in 

Europe, 1940-1946, MS, pp. 2ff. Hist Div files. See 

Bibliographical Note. 
2 

to Admiral Harold R. Stark, the U. S. 

Chief of Naval Operations.2 

The establishment of Chaney's and 

Ghormley's groups stemmed from agreements with the British in early 1941 to exchange military missions in order to insure continuous co-ordination of ideas 

and techniques. The British, as a result 

of these agreements, set up in Washington the Joint Staff Mission, representing 

the British Chiefs of Staff. Heads of the 

J oint Staff Mission were co-ordinate representatives of each of the three service 

chiefs. Jointly the mission was responsible 

to the British Chiefs of Staff Committee 

as a whole. Originally the United States 

intended to establish a similar joint mission. But in the first place the United 

States had at that time no system of joint 

direction comparable to the British 

Chiefs of Staff. In the second place it was 

considered that a formally constituted 

military mission might lead to political 

commitments which, in view of U. S. 

neutrality, the government could not accept.a 

The co-ordination provided by the Interchange of information through U. S. 

observers and the British mission was supplemented during 1941 by two formal 

Anglo-American military conferences. 

The first was held in Washington between January and March; the second 

took place in August on shipboard in the 

Atlantic. At both conferences principles 

of combined strategy in Europe were discussed and tentative agreements reached 

on the policy that would govern combined conduct of the war when and if the 

2 Ibid.; [Henry G. Elliott], The Predecessor Com· 

mands: SPOBS and USAFBI (The Administrative 

and Logistical History of the ETO: Part I) , MS, pp. 

23-24. Hist Div files. 

3 Elliott, The Predecessor Commands, pp. 2, 25. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

United States became Great Britain's ally. 

The agreement known as ABC-I, which 

was arrived at in the course of the first of 

these meetings, was especially important. 

Although its decisions were not binding 

on either nation and were not officially 

recognized by President Roosevelt, they 

were nevertheless accepted by the War 

and Navy Departments as a basis for planning in the event of U. S. participation in 

the war.4 

The observer and military mission 

period came to an abrupt end in December 1941 after the Japanese attacked Pearl 

Harbor and Germany declared war on the 

United States. In January 1942 AngloAmerican alliance became a fact and the 

British Chiefs of Staff came to Washington to reaffirm earlier informal agreements on combined strategy and to plan 

the combined conduct of the war. Their 

most important achievement was the establishment of permanent machinery for 

collaboration: the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff. (Chart 1) The Combined Chiefs of 

Staff were defined as consisting of the 

British Chiefs of Staff or their representatives in Washington (the Joint Staff Mission) and the United States opposite 

numbers.5 Their duties as finally approved were to formulate and execute, 

under the direction of the heads of the 

United Nations, policies and plans concerning the strategic conduct of the war, 

the broad program of war requirements, 

the allocation of munitions, and the re" 

quirements for transportation. 6 

4 Brief of ABc-I Conversations. Pre-Inv file 308. 

See Bibliographical Note. 

5 U.S. ABC-4/CS-4, 14 Jan 42. OPD files, ARCADIA 

Conf Bk. 

6 CCS 9/1, War Collaboration Between United Nations. Approved at CCS 4th Mtg, 10 Feb 42. See Bibliographical Note for location and nature of CCS docu· 

ments. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 3 

I PRESIDENT n n PRIME I 

MINISTER 

COMBINED 

CHIEFS OF 

STAFF' 

CHIEFS OF · · 

ARMY NAVY AIR 

JOINT · · BRITISH 

CHIEFS OF · · ____ J L ____ CHIEFS OF 

STAFF STAFFt 

CHIEFS OF 

ARMY 1 NAVY I AIR 

I I I I I I I I 

OPDt NAVY AIR 

PLANS PLANS 

JOINT JOINT PLANNING ----, r---- PLANNERS STAFF · · · · 

COMBINED 

COMMANDERS 

ARMY I NAVY I AIR 

COMBINED 

STAFF Command channels ___ _ PLANNERS 

Composition line~ ................ .. -----------

*Admiral Leahy (beginning in July 1942) represented Commander in Chief Roose\elt. and Field Marshal Dill represented 

Minister of Defence Churchill in the Comhined Chiefs of Staff. 

tThe Joint Staff Mission met in Washington with (he Joint Chiefs of Staff as representatj1,es of [he British Chiefs of Staff. 

In major conferences. such as Cairo. Tehran. Yalta. etc.. (he British Chiefs of Staff attended themselves. 

tThe Operations Oi"lsion was (he agency most concerned with planning for European operations. 

CHART I.-SIMPLIFIED COMMAND AND PLANNING ORGANIZATION 

FOR EUROPEAN OPERATIONS AS OF MAY 1942 

The curious definition of the Combined Chiefs was compelled by the fact 

that there was no organization of United 

States Chiefs of Staff at that time equivalent to the British Chiefs of Staff Committee. It was primarily to provide "opposite numbers" to the British for membership in the combined organization 

that the U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff came 

into being.7 Initially they consisted of 

Gen. George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff 

7 The only interservice directorate previously existing was the Joint Board founded 17 July 1903. The 

Joint Board, charged with co-ordinating all matters 

of joint interest to the services, consisted in 1942 of 

four Navy and four Army members: for the Army, 

the Chief of Staff, the Deputy Chief of Staff, the 

Deputy Chief of Staff for Air, and the Director of the 

War Plans Division; for the Navy, the Chief of Naval 

Operations, the Assistant Chief of Naval Operations, 

the Chief of the Bureau of Naval Aeronautics, and 

the Director of the War Plans Division of the Office 

of the Army, Lt. Gen. Henry H. Arnold, 

Commanding General of the Army Air 

Forces and Deputy Chief of Staff for Air, 

Admiral Harold R. Stark, Chief of Naval 

Operations, and Admiral Ernest J. King, 

Commander in Chief of the U. S. Fleet. 

In March 1942, the offices held by Stark 

and King were combined under King;8 

Stark was sent to London as Commander 

of U. S. Naval Forces in Europe. The 

three Joint Chiefs then corresponded to 

of Naval Operations. The Joint Board was primarily 

concerned with administrative matters and doctrine. 

It continued to exist after the establishment of the 

Joint Chiefs although its duties and importance 

dwindled. It was finally abolished by executive order in August 1947. 

8 Admiral King, Annapolis graduate of 1901, served 

during World War I as Assistant Chief of Staff to the 

Commander in Chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, winning 

the Navy Cross. In 1937 he moved into the group 

controlling broad naval operations and was, suc-
4 

the British organization, which in 1942 

included Gen. Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of 

the Imperial General Staff, Admiral Sir 

Dudley Pound, First Sea Lord, and Air 

Chief Marshal Sir Charles Portal, Chief 

of the Air Staff. The British Chiefs, however, met with the Americans only at 

periodic military-political conferences. In 

the interim they were represented on the 

permanent combined body in Washington by the Joint Staff Mission, the original 

members of which were Lt. Gen. Sir Colville Wemyss, Admiral Sir Charles Little, 

and Air Marshal A. T. Harris. 9 In addition to the three service members of the 

mission, Field Marshal Sir John Di11 l0 sat 

as a member of the Combined Chiefs of 

cessively, a member of the General Board of the 

Navy, Commander of the U.S. Fleet Patrol Force, 

and, with the rank of admiral, Commander in Chief 

of the Atlantic Fleet. He assumed command of the 

U.S. Fleet in December 1941. Admiral Stark, An· 

napolis graduate of 1903, had commanded a destroyer 

squadron in active service against submarines in the 

Mediterranean and the Atlantic in World War I, 

later serving on the staff of the Commander, U.S. 

Naval Forces Operating in European Waters. He 

was made Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance in 1934 

and four years later became Commander, Cruisers, 

Battle Force. The following year, 1939, he was promoted to full admiral and assumed his post of Chief 

of Naval Operations. 

9 The Joint Staff Mission superseded the earlier 

British Military Mission in May 1941. Changes in 

personnel up to 1944 were: Chief of the British Army 

Staff-Lt. Gen. Sir Colville Wemyss (to March 1942) , 

Maj. Gen. R. H. Dewing (March-June I 94Z) , Lt. 

Gen. G. N. Macready; Chief of the British Admiralty 

Delegation-Admiral Sir Charles Little (to June 

1942), Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham (JuneDecember 1942), Admiral Sir Percy Noble; Chief of 

the British Air Staff-Air Marshal A. T. Harris (to 

February 1942), Air Marshal D. C. S. Evill (February 1942-June 1943), Air Marshal Sir William Walsh. 

10 Field Marshal Dill, Sandhurst graduate and Boer 

War veteran, was Field Marshal Haig's Brigadier 

General, Operations, during the last Hundred Days 

before the 1918 Armistice. He served on the General 

Staff in India, was Director of Military Operations 

and Intelligence in the War Office, commanded two 

divisions in Palestine during the Arab rebellion, and 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Staff representing the Prime Minister, 

Winston S. Churchill, in his capacity as 

Minister of Defence. In July 1942, the 

J oint Chiefs of Staff also acquired a fourth 

member in Admiral William D. Leahy, 

appointed Chief of Staff to President 

Roosevelt in his capacity as Commander 

in Chief of the Army and NavyY 

The mechanics of joint and combined 

direction of the Allied war effort developed very slowly although most of the 

machinery was established in early 1942. 

Just as the Joint Chiefs of Staff themselves 

were formed to parallel the existing British organization, so they established their 

principal subordinate agency, the Joint 

Planning Staff, along the lines developed 

was Commander·in-Chief at Aldershot. As Chief of 

the Imperial General Staff from May 1940 through 

1941, he was responsible for the reinforcement of the 

British armies in Egypt and the Middle East and for 

the decision to send British troops to G r,eece. Promoted to field marshal in December 1941, he was 

sent to Washington as Head of the British Joint 

Staff Mission and senior British member of the Com· 

bined Chiefs of Staff. 

11 Long after the Joint Chiefs of Staff had become 

an accepted functioning organization an attempt was 

made to give them a written charter. But it was discovered that definitions of authority at such high 

levels tended to confuse rather than clarify the positions of responsibility and trust established by intimate personal relationships. The attempted definition 

was rejected by President Roosevelt, and the corporate existence of the Joint Chiefs of Staff continued 

to stem from the Combined Chiefs of Staff charter. 

Admiral Leahy, Annapolis graduate in the class of 

1897, saw active war service against the Spanish Fleet 

in Santiago Harbor, in the Philippine Insurrection, 

and in tbe Boxer Uprising. During World War I, he 

served aboard ships of the line and also commanded 

a troop transport, winning the Navy Cross. He assumed command of the New Mexico in 1926 and in 

1933 was made Chief of the Bureau of Navigation. 

Four years later (then an admiral) , he became Chief 

of Naval Operations. In 1939, retired from the service, he was appointed governor of Puerto Rico. The 

following year he went to France as U.S. Ambassador. 

It was from this post that he was recalled to active 

duty by the President in 1942. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

by the British. The U. S. Joint Planning 

Staff together with the British Joint 

Planners constituted the Combined Staff 

Planners, responsible to the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff.12 In theory, plans and 

studies of U. S. policy and strategy were 

to come up through joint committees to 

be co-ordinated by the Joint Planners and 

then submitted for approval to the Joint 

Chiefs. If approved, they became the official U. S. view to be placed before the 

Combined Chiefs for acceptance as Allied 

policy. British studies would develop 

along parallel lines. In case of important 

discrepancies between American and 

British views, the problem might be referred by the Combined Chiefs to their 

planning staff for adjustment. The Combined Planners, being more of a co-ordinating than a working body, seldom 

initiated planning papers. 

By 1943 the practice of joint and combined planning closely approximated the 

theory. But in early 1942 most actual 

planning on the U. S. side was done in the 

War and Navy Departments and co-ordination between the services was effected 

largely outside the formally established 

joint channels.13 As far as the European 

war was concerned, the War Department 

and particularly the Operations Division 

took the initiative in planning and General Marshall assumed personal res pons i12 Combined Planners named in the original Combined Chiefs' charter were: for the U.S., Rear Adm. 

R. K. Turner (USN), Brig. Gen. Leonard T. Gerow 

(USA), Capt. R. E. Davison (USN), Col. E. L. 

Naiden (AC); for the British, Capt. C. E. Lambe 

(RN) , Lt. Col. G. K. Bourne, Group Capt. S. C. 

Strafford (RAF). 

13 U.S. planning organization and techniques are 

considered at length in Ray S. Cline, Washington 

Command Post: The Operations Division, a volume 

now under preparation in this series. 

5 

bility for establishing and defending the 

U. S. view. 

On the British side, the joint system 

had been worked out and was fully operative in 1942. The British Joint Planners 

directly responsible to the British Chiefs 

of Staff were throughout the war the chief 

planning body concerned with developing British strategy. Much of the opera~ 

tional planning, however, was done by 

various field commands. Especially important was the Combined Operations 

Headquarters, which was headed after 

September 1941 by Commodore Lord 

Louis Mountbatten.14 At the time that 

Mountbatten became chief, Combined 

Operations was charged with responsibility for planning and executing raids 

against the Continent. It was also primarily concerned with all the technical 

problems of amphibious operations, and 

in particular with the development of 

landing craft.I5 In January 1942 Gen. Sir 

Bernard Paget, commander of the British 

Home Forces (the highest army field command in England), was brought into the 

planning picture by a directive from the 

Chiefs of Staff to study a cross-Channel attack plan written by the British Joint 

Planners.16 Paget was asked to study this 

14 Mountbatten, who entered the Royal Navy in 

1913, served at sea during World War I, for the last 

two years as a midshipman. After specializing in communications, he was assigned as Mediterranean Fleet 

Wireless Officer in 1931. Then followed assignments 

as commander of the Daring, the JVishart, and, in 

1939, the Kelly and the 5th Destroyer Flotilla in 

Mediterranean operations. He came to Combined 

Operations Headquarters after commanding the Illustrious. 

15 Paper by Lt. Col. Paddy Corbett, The Evolution 

and Development of Amphibious Technique and Material, read before British Staff College, Camberly, 

England, May 45. Hist Div files. 

16 General Paget, winner of the Distinguished Service Order and Military Cross in World War I, entered the British Army in 1907. As commander of the 
6 

plan in consultation with the designate 

Naval and Air Force Commanders-inChief (Admiral Sir Bertram H. Ramsay 

and Air Marshal Sholto Douglas respectively). Beginning their association informally these three became in the course 

of the first six months of 1942 the nucleus 

of a formal planning body, the Combined 

Commanders. Later Mountbatten was of· 

ficially added to their number and the 

Commanding General of U. S. Forces in 

the European Theater was informally included among them. The Combined 

Commanders held their first meeting in 

May 1942 and thereafter until early 1943 

acted as the chief British planning agency 

concerned with the development of plans 

for a cross-Channel attack.17 

To sum up, the informal military rapprochement between the United States 

and Great Britain which began in 1940 

culminated in January 1942 with the formation of the Combined Chiefs of Staff. 

The Combined Chiefs were a co-ordinating agency at a very high level. The detailed work, not only of drawing up tactical plans but of outlining strategy, 

studying requirements, and testing principles against resources, was done very 

largely by separate U. S. and British 

bodies. At the strategy level, the most important in 1942 were the Joint Planning 

Staff and the Joint Planners for the Americans and the British respectively. On the 

18th Division in 1939 in operations in Norway, he 

successfully engineered its evacuation. He was promoted to lieutenant general and in 1940 was appointed Chief of General Staff, Home Forces. holding this position until he assumed command of the 

Home Forces in 1942. 

1721 A Gp. Note on the History of Planning for Oper;ttions in Northwest Europe. 30 Dec 43. Hist Div 

files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

other hand, the agencies most directly 

concerned with drawing up plans for European operations in 1942 were, in the 

United States, the Operations Division of 

the War Department, and, in England, 

the Combined Commanders. Finally, over 

and above all these formally constituted 

planning and directing bodies stood 

President Franklin D. Roosevelt and 

Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill, the 

ultimately responsible persons for all 

military decisions, who exerted a direct 

and vital influence on planning that cut 

athwart all the formal channels of co-operation. 

In the period before the United States 

entered the war, the planning of offensive 

operations against Germany was naturally 

desultory and inconclusive. In view of 

British weakness and aloneness on the 

edge of Hitler's Europe, and in view of 

America's jealously preserved isolation, 

the interesting thing is that planning took 

place at all. The notion of a British attack 

across the Channel could have had little 

reality and no urgency during the days 

when the German armies were in the 

flood tide of their initial victories on the 

Continent. Yet the British] oint Planners 

before the end of 1941 had drawn up an 

invasion plan. They called it ROUNDUP} a 

name suitably reflecting the concept of an 

operation in the final phase of the war 

against only token resistance. ROUNDUP 

was a plan for an operation with very 

small resources and bore little relation to 

the attack against Normandy in 1944. 

Nevertheless it was a beginning and some 

of its ideas persisted far into the OVERLORD 

planning period. 

ROUNDUP was planned to exploit German deterioration. As a condition for the 
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND PRIME MINISTER CHURCHILL 
8 

invasion, it was assumed that the Germans 

had abandoned hope for victory, and were 

withdrawing their occupation forces to 

concentrate on the defense of the Reich. 

The purpose of ROUNDUP was to disrupt 

that orderly withdrawal. British forces 

would assault west and east of Le Havre 

on beaches from Deauville to Dieppe. 

The object would be initially to 

dominate an area beiween Calais and 

the Seine 75 to 100 miles deep. The invasion forces would then push north, take 

Antwerp and proceed into Germany 

across the Meuse River north of Liege. 

Total forces to be used were 6Ya infantry 

divisions, 6 armored divisions, 6 army 

tank brigades, and supporting troops. 

Preliminary bombardment to soften the 

coast defenses would require three naval 

vessels, including one capital ship. The 

diffuse, small-scale landings and the tiny 

dimensions of the total force at once 

underlined the basic condition of enemy 

weakness set for the operations, and reflected the military poverty of the British 

at the time.IS 

The 1941 ROUNDUP was not taken very 

seriously and was never intr.oduced officially into combined discussions. The immediate concern of both Americans and 

British was necessarily with basic strategic 

principles in the light of which longrange planning and production could be 

undertaken. The first Allied discussions 

of strategy took place when the war was 

still confined to Europe. It was clear, 

however, that Japan might at any time 

18 JP (41) 1028, 24 Dec 4l. CCS files, CCS 381 (3-

23-42) , par. I. This was the final version of the plan. 

An earlier version, JP (41) 823 (0) Draft, was dated 

9 Oct 41; no copy has been located among Dept. of 

the Army records. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

enter the conflict. In that event, if the 

United States was drawn into war with 

all three Axis members Allied military 

resources would be scattered and Allied 

strategy immensely complicated. A decision was urgently required as to where 

U. S. and Bri tish forces should first be concentrated. That decision was taken at the 

conference in early 1941 when the U. S. 

War and Navy Departments agreed with 

the British to defeat Germany first while 

remaining on the strategic defensive in 

the Pacific.19 For Great Britain geography 

made the choice obligatory. American 

concurrence was dictated by reasons less 

obvious but scarcely less compelling. Germany was considered the dominant Axis 

member whose defeat would greatly 

weaken the war-making power of Japan. 

Only against Germany could the offensive 

power of both the United States and Great 

Britain be concentrated without uncovering the British Isles. Finally, the United 

States, desperately short of shipping, 

could not at first afford long lines of communication. "Time and space factors," 

wrote General Marshall in reviewing the 

early years of the war, "dictated our 

strategy to a considerable degree. To land 

and maintain American forces in Australia required more than twice the ship 

tonnage for similar American forces in 

Europe or North Africa." 20 The decision 

to take the offensive first against Germany 

was reaffirmed at the ARCADIA Conference 

in Washington on 31 December 1941 

after the United States entered the war. It 

was reaffirmed without question despite 

the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. 

19 Brief of ABC-I Conv. See n. 4. 

20 George C. Marshall, Biennial Report of the Chief 

of Staff of the United States Army, July 1,1941, to 

June 30, 1943 (Washington, 1943) ,p. 10. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

In the very broadest sense, the groundwork for OVERLORD was thus laid. The 

early combined discussions tried further 

to explore ways and means of getting at 

Germany. But offensive plans necessarily 

remained vague so long as the needs for 

defense of the United Kingdom and, after 

Pearl Harbor, of American bases in the 

Pacific absorbed not only all resources on 

hand but the bulk of those immediately in 

prospect. 

The conclusion was that direct offensive action against Germany was unlikely 

at least until 1943. At the ARCADIA Conference, the following agreement was 

reached: 

In 1942, the methods of wearing down 

Germany's resistance will be ... ever increasing air bombardment by British and 

American forces ... assistance to Russia's 

offensive by all available means . . . [and 

operations] the main object [of which] will 

be gaining possession of the whole North 

African coast. . . . It does not seem likely 

that in 1942 any large scale land offensive 

against Germany, except on the Russian 

front, will be possible . . . [but] in 1943, 

the way may be clear for a return to the 

continent across the Mediterranean, from 

Turkey into the Balkans, or by landings in 

Western Europe. Such operations will be the 

prelude to the final assault on Germany itself.21 

The program thus outlined was to a remarkable degree carried out. But it was 

not carried out without prolonged and 

searching re-examination of each step of 

the prelude. In the course of that re-examination the American and British 

Chiefs of Staff discovered an important 

difference of bpinion in their approach to 

the problem of defeating Germany. The 

difference was adumbrated in an ex21 U.S. ABC-4jCS-l, 31 Dec 41. ARCADIA Conf Bk. 

9 

change of views in the fall of 1941 called 

forth by a Review of Strategy submitted 

by the British Chiefs of Staff for American consideration. In reply, American 

joint planners criticized the indirection 

of the British approach to offensive action. They noted "only minor attention" 

in the Review to possible land operations 

and expressed the opinion that although 

naval and air power "may prevent wars 

from being lost, and by weakening enemy 

strength, may greatly contribute to victory, ... dependence cannot be placed on 

winning important wars by naval and air 

forces alone. It should be recognized as 

an almost invariable rule," they added, 

"that wars cannot be finally won without 

the use of land armies." 22 

That point, of course, had not escaped 

the British. The first British ROUNDUP 

plan was in itself a recognition of the need 

for ground action on the Continent and 

specifically admitted that "operations on 

the Continent will in some form be inevitable." 23 Further, in reply to American objections to their Review, the British Chiefs of Staff explained that the indirect offensive methods which they had 

listed, including blockade, bombing, and 

the encouragement of subversive activities in German-occupied countries, did 

not preclude an eventual large-scale landing on the Continent when the time was 

ripe. 24 

If there was, at this time, any real disagreement, it was over a question of emphasis. Neither operations, nor plans, nor 

22 Joint Planning Committee Rpt, General Strategy 

-Review by the British Chiefs of Staff, 25 Sep 41, 

JB 325, ser 729. OPD files. 

23 ROUNDUP Plan cited n. 18. 

24 American Liaison (41) 8th Mtg, 21 Nov 41. Navy 

Dept files, Ghormley Papers. 
10 

even strategic principles were immediately at issue. The ARCADIA formula, cited 

above, outlined a program to which both 

British and American military leaders 

could subscribe without reservation, and 

it did not contradict anything in either 

the British Review or the American reply 

to it. The American protest was nevertheless significant for the future. It foreshadowed an American impatience to get 

on with direct offensive action as well as a 

belief, held quite generally in the U. S. 

War Department, that the war could most 

efficiently be won by husbanding resources for an all-out attack deliberately 

planned for a fixed future date. American 

impatience was opposed by a British note 

of caution; American faith in an offensive 

of fixed date was in contrast to British 

willingness to proceed one step at a time 

molding a course of action to the turns of 

military fortune. This opposition was by 

no means clear in 1941. It is sketched here 

in order to provide a vantage point for 

the understanding of Anglo-American 

strategy, and as a guide through a necessarily condensed and selective account of 

the debate on how to fight the war against 

Germany. 

The complex bases for American and 

British strategic views will appear in the 

course of the narrative. At the risk of oversimplification, however, it may be useful 

here to generalize that the prime difference between those views derived from 

the fact that the British, close to the scene 

of the war, tended to focus on the difficulties of assault, and the tactical and 

logistical problems involved, while the 

Americans, some 3,000 miles away, found 

it easier to start with the large view of the 

strategic problem. British planners were 

deeply and continuously conscious that 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

to attack northwest Europe armies had 

to get across an ugly piece of water called 

the Channel, that this crossing took boats 

and special equipment, that when the 

troops landed they had to storm fortifications and fight a German Army that had 

ali Europe by the throat. Americans were 

aware of these problems only at second 

hand and at a distance. They worked from 

maps. Each perspective, it should be 

noted, had a distinct contribution to 

make. If the British saw the tactical problems more clearly, the Americans were 

enabled to give freer rein to their imagination and to arrive at bolder offensive 

concepts. 

These views need not necessarily have 

been opposed. They were opposed largely 

because the strategic problem as it developed in early combined discussion was 

not one of developing and carrying out 

the ideally best plan for defeating Germany. It was rather a problem of tailoring an ideal strategy to the changing political and military shape of a war in which 

the enemy at first had the initiative. The 

difference of opinion as to how the tailoring should be done was called forth primarily by the cry for immediate action. 

That cry was taken up by many voices 

for a number of different reasons. In the 

first place, it was recognized that the 

sooner the Allies could wrest the initiative 

from the Axis the sooner they could stop 

dissipating resources to plug holes in the 

defense and start concentrating them for 

the defeat of the enemy. The combined 

Chiefs of Staff discussed at the ARCADIA 

Conference one plan for immediate action, called GYMNAST> which looked as 

though it might have a chance of success 

even when carried out by the relatively 

tiny forces then available to the United 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

States and Great Britain.25 GYMNAST, a 

plan for the invasion of North Africa, was 

a highly speculative operation. For success 

it gambled on the nonresistance of the colonial French, and even if successful it was 

doubtful whether it would materially 

contribute to the offensive against Germany except in strategically tightening 

the ring around her. What it clearly 

would do, however, would be to put U. S. 

ground troops in action against the Germans. This consideration was particularly important to President Roosevelt, 

who thought that immediate action 

would stiffen American morale and have 

the reverse effect on the Germans.26 

Strongly championed by both the President and the Prime Minister, GYMNAST 

was accepted by the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff in January 1942. But the more 

pressing need to send immediate reinforcements to the Southwest Pacific to 

check Japanese expansion toward Australia forced postponement and at last 

in March drew from the Combined Planners a declaration that the project had 

become academic.27 

In the meantime, both U. S. and British 

planners were independently investigating the possibility of being forced into 

action in 1942 in order to assist the Soviet 

Union. When Hitler attacked the USSR 

in June 1941, many observers felt that the 

Russians would fall before the German 

blitz as quickly as had most of the rest of 

25 Full treatment of the GYMNAST-TORCH project 

will be found in George F. Howe, Operations in 

Northwest Africa, a volume now under preparation 

in this series. 

26 (Marshall) Notes of Meeting at the White House 

with the President and the British Prime Minister 

Presiding-5:00 P.M. (Dictated from rough notes), 

23 Dec 41. CIS file 384 (Mtgs and Confs) . See Bibli· 

ographical Note. 

27 CCS 11th Mtg, 10 Mar 42. 

II 

Europe. Then the Red Army tightened 

and held in front of Moscow and, when 

the snows came, struck back. Despite this 

success, however, neither American nor 

British military leaders were sanguine 

about the ability of the Russians to withstand a new German offensive in 1942. 

U. S. planners wrote: "Although Russia's 

strength was greatly underestimated by 

military authorities, including the Germans, a true test of Russia's capacity to 

resist the enemy will come this summer. "28 The outcome of that test, they 

believed, was the key to the European 

and possibly to the world situation. Defeat of the USSR would enable the Germans to dominate the whole of Europe, 

complete the blockade of England, and 

probably force England to capitulate. If 

so, then it followed that every possible 

effort should be made by the Western 

Powers to insure that Russia was not defeated. 

At the end of February 1942, Brig. Gen. 

Dwight D. Eisenhower, Assistant Chief 

of Staff, War Plans Division, wrote: "The 

task of keeping Russia in the war ininvolves ... immediate and definite action. It is not sufficient to urge upon the 

Russians the indirect advantages that will 

accrue to them from Allied operations in 

distant parts of the world .... Russia's 

problem is to sustain he1'self during the 

coming summer, and she must not be permitted to reach such a precarious position 

that she will accept a negotiated peace, 

no matter how unfavorable to herself, in 

preference to continuation of the fight." 

The two ways of assisting Russia, General 

28 JCS 23, Annex C, 14 Mar 42. This paper is actu· 

ally a composite of directives and deployment studies 

dating back to 30 January 1942. See Bibliographical 

Note for location and nature of JCS documents. 
12 

Eisenhower noted, were Lend-Lease aid 

and early operations in the west to draw 

off from the Russian front large portions 

of the German Army and Air Force. He 

was dubious whether a sizable ground 

attack from England could be mounted 

soon, but at least, he thought, air operations could be initiated.29 

The U. S. Joint Planning Staff, studying the whole question of U. S. troop deployment, went much further. They believed that a considerable land attack 

could be launched across the English 

Channel in 1942. Although it would 

have to be done at first largely by British 

forces, American participation would 

build up rapidly, and the prospect of such 

reinforcement should enable the British 

to mount the attack on a slimmer margin 

than would otherwise be possible. On 

this basis, the planners outlined what they 

thought would be a possible operation to 

take place in the summer of 1942 with a 

D Day between 15 July and I August. The 

operation was to open with a fifteen-day 

air attack, the strategic purpose of which 

would be to divert the German Air Force 

from the east. The immediate tactical 

objectives were to establish control of the 

air over the Channel and at least a hundred kilometers inland between Dunkerque ~nd Abbeville, and to inflict the 

maximum damage on German military 

installations and lines of communication. 

During the air offensive, commandos were 

to raid the coasts of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Normandy. In phase two, beginning about D plus 30, major land 

forces were to cross the Channel with the 

mission of securing the high ground north 

29 Memo for CofS, 28 Feb 42. (Italics in the original.) OPD files, exec 4 .. env 35. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of the Seine and Oise Rivers, and of destroying enemy ground and air forces in 

the general area Calais-Arras-St. Quentin-Soissons-Paris-Deauville. The plan 

did not go into operational detail. The 

critical problem of landing craft received 

little attention beyond a listing of the 

barge requirements and a notation that 

both Americans and British would have 

to construct special craft.30 

The British Joint Planners had come to 

the same conclusion as the U. S. War Department-that the approaching summer 

campaign of 1942 in Russia was likely to 

be critical and might require support by 

diversions in the west if Russia was to be 

kept in the war. On the other hand, the 

British were much more pessimistic about 

what could be done. The maximum feasible operation, they thought, would be a 

limited-objective attack-something like 

a large-scale raid-the main purpose of 

which would be to tempt the German Air 

Force into a battle of destruction with the 

Royal Air Force under conditions favorable to the latter.3! For that concept, 

Prime Minister Churchill coined the code 

name SLEDGEHAMMER, and the Combined 

Commanders were directed to study and 

report on it. They found at once that the 

name was far more aggressive than the 

plan could be. They faced a tactical paradox. They were asked ·to strike where 

RAF fighters could engage the Luftwaffe 

on favorable terms. There was only one 

such area, since effective fighter cover 

from British bases extended at that time 

only over the beaches between Dunkerque and the Somme. This area, called 

80 JCS 23, App. II, JPS 2/6, 5 Mar 42 . 

. 81 Capt M. McLaren, secy to Combined Commanders, Notes on the History of SLEDGEHAMMER, Sep 42. 

Hist Div files. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

the Pas-de-Calais,32 had the strongest 

German defenses of any portion of the 

French coast. It also had flat beaches unsuitable for British landing craft. The 

beaches furthermore had too few exits to 

pass the required number of vehicles inland to maintain the forces landed. Finally the ports in the area were too small 

to supply a force large enough to hold a 

bridgehead against the probable scale of 

German counterattack. In short, the one 

area where the RAF could supply fighter 

support and achieve the main purpose of 

defeating the Luftwaffe was precisely the 

one area which, from every other point of 

view, was unsuitable for assault.33 

The problem seemed insoluble and the 

planners first concluded that no crossChannel operation was possible in 1942 

unless the Germans showed signs of collapse. This conclusion, however, was 

modified by a second report submitted 

by the Combined Commanders early in 

April. Assuming then that they might 

disregard requirements for the security 

of the British Isles and that "the maintenance problem"34 could be "successfully 

overcome," they calculated that an invasion of the Pas-de-Calais could be carried 

out. But, they added, if the Germans 

countered in force, the beachhead probably could not be held and, if lost, it was 

doubtful whether the bulk of the men 

and equipment could be evacuated. The 

82 The Pas-de-Calais actually was the name of a department in the center of the coast considered for invasion. But the name was used by the planners, and 

will here be used, in the looser sense of the coast line 

washed by the Strait of Dover between Dunkerque 

and the Somme. 

ss Memo, Brig C. V. McNabb, SLEDGEHAMMER, 17 

Jul 42. SHAEF G-3 files, Ref Lib Gp D. See Bibliographical Note. 

84 The British term "maintenance" is generally 

equivalent to U.S. "supply." 

13 

British Chiefs of Staff did not wholly endorse this analysis, but they did tacitly 

accept the conclusion that establishment 

of a permament bridgehead on the Continent would probably be impossible in 

1942.35 

General Marshall's Project 

The first look at the cross-Channel 

project discovered only a host of difficulties that seemed all but insuperable. 

So long as attention' was focused on an 

attack in 1942 all plans were pervaded 

with the sense that to do anything at all 

would be to act in desperation, to accept 

abnormal military risks for the sake of 

avoiding ultimate disaster. If the view 

in London was more pessimistic than in 

Washington, that was in large part because the major risks of action in 1942 

would have to be borne by the British.36 

In addition the British, whose mobilization was already far advanced, were inclined to see operations through the glass 

of current resources which, in general, 

could be increased in one category only by 

reduction in another. The United States, 

on the other hand, even while struggling 

desperately to build up the stocks needed 

for defense in the Pacific, was still continuously aware of its huge potential 

resources. Although it was recognized 

that in 1942 American military power 

would only begin to make itself felt, 

plans even for that year reflected the 

Americans' basic optimism and recommended risks far greater than the British 

considered accepting. 

S5 McLaren, Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER, cited n. 31. 

86 This was freely admitted by General Marshall. 

Draft Memo, Marshall for Roosevelt, The Pacific 

Theater versus BOLERO, undtd (sent to the President 

6 May) . OPD file 381 gen sec. 2, case 62. See Bibliographical Note. Cf. below, p. 30. 
GENERAL MARSHALL, Chief of Staff, United States Army. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

It was in looking further ahead, however, that the American optimistic view 

made its chief contribution to strategy. 

Until mid-March, plans for 1942 had been 

considered without specific reference to 

long-range objectives. Except for the determination to attack in Europe, there 

were no specific long-range objectives. 

The general principles agreed to at 

ARCADIA did not form a concerted plan 

of action. 

In March 1942, the Operations Division of the War Department (OPD) began work on an outline plan for a fullscale invasion of the European continent 

in 1943. It was to be projected as the basis 

for the deployment of forces and as a 

guide for strategy. The need for such a 

guide had become increasingly urgent as, 

despite the shelving of GYMNAST, President Roosevelt continued to press for immediate action.37 On 25 March, the President called the Joint Chiefs of Staff and 

Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson to 

the White House to ask advice on future 

offensive operations. Specifically he 

wanted to know whether U. S. troops 

might profitably be used in Syria, Libya, 

and northwest Africa, as well as in northwest Europe. On 2 April, General Marshall gave the President the War Department's answer embodying OPD's outline 

plan for a cross-Channel attack in 1943.38 

37 Cbl, Roosevelt to Churchill, 9 Mar 42. OPD 

file ABC 311.5 (1-30-42). 

88 The first memorandum was submitted by OPD 

on 27 March. The last draft bearing a date was prepared on 2 April. This was revised by General Eisenhower and the revision constituted the memorandum 

as finally presented to the British. This final version 

is undated and titled simply "Operations in Western 

Europe." Additional studies were made after 2 April, 

an analysis of U.S. troop build·up being dated as late 

as 6 April. For the final version and various drafts 

and appendixes see Pre-Invasion file 308. Copy of the 

15 

The War Department and General 

Marshall were convinced that the main 

U. S.-British ground offensive should be 

undertaken against northwest Europe. 

They rejected the Mediterranean areas 

suggested by Roosevelt because commitment of U. S. troops there would be 

strategically defensive. Although the conquest of North Africa would break Axis 

control of the Mediterranean and prevent 

an Axis move through West Africa, the 

victory would not in itself be decisive and 

could not be exploited for further decisive action against Germany. 

The body of General Marshall's memorandum therefore, was concerned with 

exploring the concept of a cross-Channel 

invasion of France. The operation was 

conceived in three phases: a preparatory 

phase, the cross-Channel movement and 

seizure of bridgeheads between Le Havre 

and Boulogne, and, finally, consolidation 

and expansion of the bridgehead. Logistics set the earliest possible date for the 

beginning of phase two at 1 April 1943, 

except under emergency conditions.39 

The preparatory phase would begin at 

once with the organization, arming, and 

overseas movement of the necessary 

forces. During the summer of 1942 small 

task forces would raid along the entire 

accessible enemy coast line. General 

Marshall attached great value to these 

preparatory raiding operations which he 

defined as the "establishment of a preoriginal OPD memo is in AAF file 381, War Plans 

Sec. G. See Bibliographical Note. Discussion following is based on the memorandum plan and its appendixes. 

39 Actually it was noted that, if only_ U.S. shipping 

was available for U.S. troop and supply build-up, the 

invasion date would be delayed until late summer. 

By 1 April, it was estimated, U.S. shipping could 

transport only 40 percent of the forces required. 
16 

liminary active front." He thought they 

might serve to draw German troops from 

the east and so "be of some help to 

Russia." They might also be useful for 

deception either in persuading the Germans that no all-out offensive would be 

attempted or else in keeping them on tenterhooks for fear that anyone of the raids 

might develop into a full-scale invasion. 

Thinking of national morale, a consideration always important to both the President and the Prime Minister, he noted 

that raiding together with air operations 

would be "of immediate satisfaction to 

the public." But, he added, "what is most 

important" is that the raids would "make 

experienced veterans of the air and 

ground units, and ... offset the tendency 

toward deterioration in morale which 

threatens the latter dUe to prolonged inactivity."40 

The main attack in the spring of 1943 

was planned to employ 48 divisions supported by 5,800 combat aircraft. Landings would take place between Etretat 

north of Le Havre and Cap Gris Nez with 

the object of seizing the lower valley of 

the Somme and the high ground forming 

the watersheds of the Seine-Somme river 

system. Two main assaults were planned, 

on either side of the mouth of the Somme. 

The bridgeheads would be expanded to 

the southwest in order to seize Le Havre 

and the line of the Seine River. Although 

U. S. planners made use of some detailed 

data on terrain and estimates of the 

enemy, they did not attempt to examine 

tactical problems even to the extent that 

British planners had studied them in 

working on SLEDGEHAMMER. The main 

purpose of the Marshall Memorandum 

40 Memo, Operations in Western Europe, cited n. 

38. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

was to pin down a strategic idea sufficiently so that production, training, and 

troop allocations and movement could be 

"coordinated to a single end." There was 

time for planning, but none for delaying 

the basic decision. For example, it was 

pointed out that under current production schedules only 10 percent of the tank 

landing craft required to carry U. S. 

troops in the assault would be available. 

Only a decision now could insure the required resources in time. 

The Ma:rshall Memorandum shifted 

emphasis from 1942 to 1943 while retaining for 1942 some activity which might 

satisfy political requirements. In the 

event that an operation should be required in 1942 to save the Russians or 

take advantage of sudden German deterioration, preparations were to be made 

to permit a cross-Channel assault on 

greatly reduced scale in ~ne fall of the 

year. The maximum U. S. forces which 

could be on hand for such an assault were 

three and a half divisions, and the operation would be justified only by prospects 

of marked deterioration of the German 

army in the west. 

In the second week in April General 

Marshall and Mr. Harry Hopkins, special 

emissary of President Roosevelt, went to 

London to seek a firm decision from the 

British Chiefs of Staff on the form, location, and timing of the British-American 

main effort. As it turned out, that decision was quickly reached with general 

agreement on the project outlined in the 

Marshall MemorandumY Discussion 

then shifted to what could be done in 

1942. General Marshall reported that by 

41 British Chiefs of Staff, Comments on General 

Marshall's Memorandum, 13 Apr 42, COS (42) 97 

(0) . CIS file 381. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

the end of August U. S. reinforcement 

of the Pacific, Iceland, and Northern Ireland garrisons should be complete and the 

United States could concentrate on pouring troops and supplies into England for 

offensive action. He thought two and a 

half infantry divisions, one armored division, and 900 U. S. aircraft could be in 

the United Kingdom by 15 September.42 

General Brooke, Chief of the Imperial 

General Staff, said his planners counted 

on landing seven infantry and two armored divisions if forced to attack the 

Continent in 1942, but he frankly did not 

like the prospect. Such a small forCe could 

not hold against German counterattacks 

and its loss would seriously weaken England's defenses. Also, he was worried 

about India and the Middle East, where 

the Japanese and Germans might join 

forces and capture the oil fields in Iran 

and Iraq on which, he thought, "the 

whole of our effort in both theaters depended." 43 

Brooke and Air Marshal Portal, Chief 

of Air Staff, also raised objections to the 

September date.44 Brooke believed that 

42 COS (42) 23d Mtg (0), 9 Apr 42. OPD file ABC 

381 BOLERO (3-16-42) sec. 5. 

43 Ibid. General Brooke, a graduate of the Royal 

Military Academy, Woolwich, had by 1941 acquired 

the reputation of being Britain's greatest expert on 

mechanization. For his service in France during 

World War. I, he received the Distinguished Service 

Order with Bar, the Belgian Croix de Guerre, and 

six mentions in dispatches. In the early part of World 

War II, he commanded the British Second Army 

Corps, his defensive action making possible the 

evacuation of Dunkerque. He then organized "and 

trained the British Home Forces in preparation for 

the expected Nazi invasion. He was made Chief of 

the Imperial General Staff in 1941, succeeding Field 

Marshal Dill. 

44 Portal, an observer and fighter pilot in World 

War I, entered the RAF College in 1922. In the 1930's 

he commanded the British forces in Aden and was 

Director of Organization, Air Ministry. Early in 

17 

the operation would have to take place in 

August at the latest in order to capture a 

port before the third week in September, 

when bad weather was likely to prevail 

over the Channel. Portal thought that 

during the summer the German Air Force 

might win a complete victory over the 

Russians and so by autumn become a 

formidable enemy for the RAF. General 

Marshall agreed that an earlier target 

date would be advisable but felt he could 

not urge it since U. S. troops would not 

then be available. He dearly indicated 

that his main interest in a 1942 operation 

was to provide battle experience for the 

Americans in preparation for 1943. He 

was also concerned that, if something 

were attempted in 1942, it be an operation across the Channel in order to avoid 

dispersion of forces. He did not want the 

main project-operations on the Continent- reduced to the position of a "residuary legatee" for whom nothing was left.45 

Against this view, Brooke continued to 

stress the danger in the Middle East. He 

then reversed the American concept that 

SLEDGEHAMMER was a device to save the 

Russians. Operations in 1942, he said, 

depended on what success the Germans 

had against the Russians. "If they [the 

Germans] were successful," he believed, 

"we could dearly act less boldly. If, however, the Russians held the Germans or 

had an even greater measure of success, 

our object should be to detach air forces 

from the Russian front."46 In short, he reWorld War II, he served on the Air Council and was 

Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Bomber 

Command. He became Chief of Air Staff in October 

1940. 

45 COS (42) 118th Mtg, 14 Apr 42. OPD file ABC 

381 BOLERO (3-16-42) sec. 5. 

46 War Cabinet Defence Com, DC (42) 10th Mtg, 

14 Apr 42. CIS file 381. On quotation of indirect discourse, see n. 138. 
18 

jected the emergency operation and accepted only the operation of opportunity.47 The opinion was in notable contrast to the U. S. Army view that a 1942 

operation would be justified by the need 

for helping Russia in the war so that "an 

opportunity would be presented to us of 

defeating Germany next spring."48 The 

point, however, was not argued, and the 

whole problem of a 1942 operation was 

returned to the planners for further 

study. 

General Marshall's scheme for invasion 

in 1943, on the other hand, was received 

with enthusiasm, qualified only by a note 

of caution from British planners. The 

planners observed again the two deficiencies which had already crippled plans for 

a return to the Continent: the lack of 

landing craft (particularly craft capable 

of landing on the flat-gradient French 

beaches) and the lack of long-range 

fighter aircraft. They did not imply, however, that these deficiencies could not be 

made up during the coming year.49 

For the rest, the British Chiefs of Staff 

and the Prime Minister found nothing 

in the plan to quarrel with. The U. S. 

commitment to deliver one million troops 

47 Churchill also made this reversal more explicitly 

a little later when he wrote: "The launching of 

SLEDGEHAMMER should be dependent not on a Russian 

failure but on Russian success and consequent 

proved German demoralization in the West." PM, 

Minute for Gen Ismay for CofS Com, 10 Jun 42, Annex to COS (42) 175th Mtg. Copy in Hist Div files. 

48 Remark by Col 1- E. Hull, U.S. (P) 4th Mtg, 12 

Apr 42. Pre-Inv file 287 (Combined Operations Conferences). A series of meetings was held between 

U.S. and British planners in the course of the April 

conferences in London. 

49 Memo, British Staff Planners, Main Considerations Affecting The Employment on the Continent 

in 1943 of the AnglO-American Forces envisaged in 

General Marshall's Paper, undtd. OPD file ABC 381 

BOLERO (3-16-42) sec. 5. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

to the United Kingdom during the next 

year altered, in the opinion of Lord 

Mountbatten, "the whole picture of combined operations against the Continent. 

The plans, which we had been at present 

evolving, all fell short in one way or 

another for lack of essential resources. 

This would be all changed when the great 

flow of American forces began, and we 

should be enabled to plan that real return 

to the Continent, without which we could 

not hope to bring the war to a successful 

conclusion." 50 

The meeting at which Mountbatten 

so expressed himself was the concluding 

session of the conference with General 

Marshall. The tone of optimism was 

echoed by all those present and the whole 

meeting was informed with an extraordinary enthusiasm. Mr. Hopkins said 

that although American public opinion 

would have preferred an offensive against 

Japan, "the American nation was eager 

to join in the fight alongside the British." 

Mr. Anthony Eden, British Foreign Secretary, replied in kind. "The plan," he 

considered, "had much more than a 

purely military significance. It was, in 

fact, the great picture of tWQ Englishspeaking countries setting out for the redemption of Europe." Forgotten for the. 

moment was the opinion expressed a 

month before that the Allies in 1942 were 

on the verge of defeat.51 Instead of anticipating the need for a "sacrifice" operation in order to save a chance to strike in 

1943, the conferees looked forward to 

sharing in a victory not far off. Churchill 

closed the meeting by summing up the 

complete unanimity of opinion and adding a prediction that now "the two 

50 War Cabinet Mtg, 14 Apr 42, cited n. 46. 

51 JCS 23, cited n. 28. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

nations would march ahead together in a 

noble brotherhood of arms." 

The morrow brought soberer second 

thoughts, but the strategic decision, destined to last less than two months, at least 

laid some groundwork for the future. 

One immediate outcome was the establishment of machinery to concentrate 

U. S. troops in England. The build-up 

operation, called BOLERO> 52 was to provide 

a force of about one million men specifically equipped to carry out an air 

offensive in 1942, a major invasion of the 

Continent in 1943, and if agreed on, 

a continental operation in conjunction 

with the British in 1942. Special planning 

staffs, BOLERO Combined Committees, 

were set up in Washington and London 

to function under the direction of the 

Combined Planning Staff. The committees were not responsible for tactical planning but were to proceed on the assumption that the invasion would conform to 

the outlines drawn in General Marshall's 

memorandum.53 

The establishment of BOLERO planning 

formalized and intensified the process of 

preparing United Kingdom bases for 

52 There was considerable confusion in the early 

use of this code name, especially in the 'War Depart· 

ment where it was taken at first to indicate not only 

the build-up but the cross-Channel operation for 

which the build-up prepared. In the early days the 

confusion was symptomatic of a real conceptual 

identity between the operations. Decisions on the 

BOLERO build-up reflected attitudes toward the 

ROUNDUP attack. Cf. Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt 

and Hopkins: An Intimate History (New York, 

1948) , p. 569. 

53 In general the Washington Committee dealt 

with basic problems of policy; the London Committee, made up of representatives of various British 

supply ministries and representatiyes of the U.S. 

Army, handled the more technical details of the plan. 

See [Herbert French] Supply and Troop Buildup in 

the UK (The Administrative and Logistical History 

of the ETO: Part III) , MS. Hist Div files. 

19 

American troops, but the process had begun long before. As a result of the ABC-l 

decisions of early 1941 the War Department had drawn up deployment plans to 

be put into effect if and when America 

came into the war. One of the provisions 

was the MAGNET plan to move U. S. 

troops into Iceland in order to relieve 

British garrisons there and to send troops 

to Northern Ireland to establish and defend air and naval bases for the use of 

U. S. forces. In January 1942 the first 

contingent of troops under the MAGNET 

plan was shipped to Northern Ireland, 

although, as a result of the emergency reinforcement of the Southwest Pacific area, 

the shipment. had to be cut from a 

planned 17,300 to 4,000. Three more 

shipments arrived in Ireland before the 

end of May, bringing U. S. ground 

strength there to more than 32,000, including the 34th Division, the 1st 

Armored Division, and V Corps headquarters.54 

At the same time the U. S. Air Force 

was beginning to set up house in the 

British Isles. On 26 January 1942, General Arnold submitted to General Marshall a plan to base 4,648 American 

planes in the United Kingdom, including 

54 groups of heavy bombers, 10 groiJps 

of medium bombers, and 10 groups of 

pursuit planes.55 The build-up was begun at once. Brig. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, with 

a portion of his staff, was ordered to England in January and by the end of Feb54 Elliott, The Predecessor Commands, pp. 15, 85-

95. See n. 2. 

55 General Arnold, who had become Chief of the 

Air Corps in 1938, was directly responsible ,for the 

expansion of the American aircraft industry and the 

inception of the program for civilian training of flying cadets. In 1940 he was made Deputy Chief of 

Staff for Air and the following 'year was given the 

additional duty of Chief, Army Air Forces. 
20 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

u.s. SOLDIERS IN IRELAND 

ruary he had established the VIII Bomber 

Command. In June his command was 

subordinated to the newly arrived Eighth 

Air Force under Brig. Gen. Carl Spaatz.~6 

56 General Spaatz, a graduate of West Point in 1914 

and of Aviation School in 1916, served'with the First 

Aero Squadron of the Punitive Expedition into Mexico. During World War I, he flew in combat over St. 

Mihie1 and Meuse-Argonne, receiving the DSC. In 

1940 he was an official observer of the Battle of Britain and returned to the United States to take command, first of the Air Corps Materiel Division and, 

later, of the AAF Combat Command. 

Before General Eaker undertook the assignment 

of establishing VIII Bomber Command, he had been 

The air build-up schedule in the meantime was altered in a series of conferences 

in London in April between General 

Arnold and Air Chief Marshal Portal. 

The new basic plan, approved in June, 

drastically reduced the heavy bomber 

commitment: instead of 54 groups there 

would be 17. The force would include 

10 groups of medium bombers and 6 of 

light, 12 groups of pursuit planes, and 8 

on special duty with the RAF in England in 1941, 

observing and flying new types of fighters and observing British fighter control methods. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

groups of transports, a total of 3,262 aircraft.57 

On 4 July American air crews in six 

bombers borrowed from the RAF participated in a daylight attack on German 

airfields in the Netherlands. It was not 

until 17 August, however, that the Eighth 

Air Force carried out its first bombing in 

its own aircraft. By that time the whole 

European strategy had been profoundly 

altered and the build-up of air and 

ground forces in the United Kingdom 

abruptly ceased to be a first-priority task.58 

"Action in 1942-Not 1943" 

The events between 15 April and the 

end of 1 uly 1942 produced, from the 

point of view of the U. S. War Department, a disturbing shift in AIIied strategy. 

The April decision to concentrate on a 

build-up in the United Kingdom for a 

cross-Channel invasion in 1943 was supplanted in July by the agreement to ship 

U. S. and British forces into the Mediterranean to invade North Africa. The 

1943 ROUNDUP) approved by acclamation 

in April as the first object of combined 

strategy in Europe, in July was laid aside 

in favor of extended preparatory and 

peripheral operations designed as prelude 

to a cross-Channel invasion of uncertain 

date. In General Marshall's view, this 

meant the dissolution of the strategy 

which had seemed so firmly established 

when he and Harry Hopkins left London 

in April. 59 

51 Elliott, The Predecessor Commands, pp. Il10ft. 

See n. 2. 

58 See Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, eds., 

The Army Air Forces in World War II: I, Plans and 

Early Operations January 1939 to August 1942 (Chicago, 1948) , pp. 654, 655ff. 

59 See, for instance, his letter to Dill, 17 Aug 42, 

stating his belief that the July decisions had altered 

21 

Of the many circumstances that combined to overturn the April agreements, 

one of the weightiest was the continued 

inability of planners to see any way out 

of the difficulties posed by SLEDGEHAMMER. A draft plan for the operation was 

submitted at the end of April to newly 

appointed British force commanders, Admiral Ramsay, Air Marshal Sir Trafford 

Leigh-Mallory, and Lt. Gen. Edmond 

Schreiber. Their report on 4 May was 

that with current resources of landing 

craft SLEDGEHAMMER was not a sound 

operation of war. The British Chiefs of 

Staff accepted the conclusion but directed 

that the plan be kept in readiness in case 

German collapse should make it feasible. 60 

In view of the new principle that 

SLEDGEHAMMER would take place only 

under conditions of marked German deterioration, planners now turned away 

from the uninviting prospect of a Pas-deCalais assault. Air cover, they argued, 

would be less essential if the Germans 

were on the point of collapse and it therefore might pay to look farther afield for 

an assault area containing a major port. 

They selected the Cherbourg and Le 

Havre areas, preferring the latter because 

it contained more airfields. 

But problems multiplied faster than 

solutions. It was discovered that it would 

take twenty-one days to land the six divisions with available shipping. When 

not only the strategy agreed upon in April but also 

the fundamental strategic agreements made at 

ARCADIA. CIS file TORCH I; d. Cbl to Eisenhower, 6 

Aug 42, draft in Memo, Handy for Classified MC. 

OPD file 381, ETO, sec. 2. Marshall wrote: "Torch 

operation is of necessity a substi~ution for Roundup 

and not a postponement of the same except for un· 

expected developments." See below, pp. 29--30. 

60 McLaren, Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER, cited n. lIi. 
22 

Churchill was informed of this obstacle 

he replied, as one planner observed, in 

the manner of King Canute: he did not 

accept it.61 Investigation should be made, 

he continued, into the use of floating 

piers and other devices to speed the landings. This observation, important for the 

future, had no immediate issue, for the 

Prime Minister had also put forward and 

secured War Cabinet approval of a principle that, in effect, threw out the whole 

SLEDGEHAMMER idea. The principle was 

that "there should be no substantial landing in France unless we intended to remain."62 All planning to date had concluded that, whatever might be done in 

1942, the establishment of a permanent 

bridgehead on the Continent was beyond 

British resources. 

While planning for 1942 struggled 

vainly to solve the unbalanced equation 

between ends and means, simultaneous 

study of a 1943 cross-Channel assault was 

turning up its share of discouraging difficulties, and drawing conclusions that 

drastically modified the aggressiveness of 

the Marshall Memorandum. Planning 

for ROUNDUP was renewed for the first 

time on an organized combined basis even 

though arrangements remained informal. 

Col. Ray W. Barker, who had arrived in 

London about 1 April, was assigned 

shortly afterward to head the planning 

division of General Chaney's headquarters, which had been converted from 

SPOBS to United States Army Forces in 

the British Isles (USAFBI). Barker set 

up shop in Grosvenor Square. British 

planners under Brig. Colin McNabb 

61 Ibid. 

62 COS (42), 51st Mtg, 8 Jun 42 (0). SHAEF SGS 

files; d. McLaren, Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER. The War 

Cabinet approved the new principle on II Jun 1942. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

worked near by. Colonel Barker's group 

received copies of all the planning papers 

which had been developed up to that time 

by the British. Almost daily conferences 

were held between Americans and British 

and, about once a week, agreed-on papers 

were submitted to the Combined Commanders.63 

By the middle of June 1942 the planners had developed a new appreciation 

and outline plan for ROUNDUP to be 

mounted in the spring of 1943. The plan 

was accepted by the Combined Commanders and submitted to the British 

Chiefs of Staff. It did not go into tactical 

details and was limited in scope to the 

establishment of bridgeheads including 

necessary airfields and port areas. The 

approach was cautious and the tactical 

idea quite different from that which produced OVERLORD. "If our invasion is to 

succeed," the planners wrote, "we must 

endeavor to disperse the enemy's mobile 

reserves on land and in the air. At the 

same time we must avoid such action as 

will allow the enemy to destroy isolated 

parts of our land forces in detail. It follows, therefore, that while we must endeavor to launch assaults on as wide a 

front as possible, the size of each assault 

and the rate of subsequent development 

must, if possible, be sufficient to meet the 

anticipated rate of enemy reinforcement 

in each area .... " How to dissipate the 

enemy's defense by a diffuse attack and 

at the same time be strong at each widely 

separated point was not fully explained.64 

The plan to make three "almost" simultaneous assaults in the Pas-de-Calais and 

63 Interv with Gen ~arker, WD, 4 Oct 46. See Bibliographical Note. t 

64 Joint Memo, Combined Commanders for Br 

COS, 17 Jun 42_ Pre-Inv file 281, Combined Commanders J;'apers. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

on both sides of the Seine would leave a 

gap of some 150 miles between the northern and southern bridgeheads. In addition, subsidiary assaults were to be devised to lead to the early capture of Cherbourg and the Channel Islands. The planners did not go into this problem but 

merely noted that it was subject to further investigation. The first landings 

would require at least six divisions. "After 

the initial assaults the forces in each area 

are built up ... as a preliminary to further offensive operations." No attempt 

was made at the time to foresee these. The 

Combined Commanders, in forwarding 

the plan, told the British Chiefs of Staff 

that they believed it was the only possible 

way of effecting a re-entry into France, 

but even that would not be feasible "unless the German morale was deteriorated 

by the spring of 1943 owing to another 

failure to defeat the Russians." 65 

Churchill was dissatisfied with the 

planners' caution. He retorted with a 

memorandum of his own sketching an 

operation with "qualities of magnitude, 

simultaneity and violence," and involving 

six landings by at least ten armored 

brigades in the first wave, and the debarkation of 400,000 men in the first 

week. If in fourteen days, he wrote, 

"700,000 men are ashore, if air supremacy 

has been gained, if the enemy is in considerable confusion, and if we held at least 

four workable ports, we shall have got 

our claws well into the job."66 Churchill's 

object in sketching his impression of 

ROUNDUP in such terms was to give an idea 

of the "scale and spirit" which he felt 

6~ Ibid. 

86 Memo, Churchill for Marshall, Operation ROUNDUP, 15 Jun 42. Hist Div files. 

23 

necessary if the undertaking was to have 

"good prospects of success." In reality, 

however, his concept required resources 

which seemed so far beyond reach that 

planners could not regard it seriously. 

They did not alter their view that ROUNDUP could go in only against a weakened 

enemy. 

Furthermore, even Churchill's concept, 

for all its vigor, remained academic in the 

absence of broad, formative decisions. 

Planners, without allotted resources, 

without a target date, and without a command organization, worked in a schoolroom, trapped in circular arguments and 

unable to make real progress toward preparing a definite operation of war. Recommendations by the Joint Planning 

Staff that commanders be selected at once 

to carry out the operation and that steps 

be taken to secure the appointment of a 

Supreme Allied Commander produced 

no results.67 

The truth was that the general approval 

of the ROUNDUP idea which General Marshall had won in April 1942 did not reflect any general conviction that the 1943 

cross-Channel attack was really the best 

way of carrying out Allied strategy in 

Europe. Skepticism remained on both 

sides of the Atlantic. In Washington 

President Roosevelt was wavering, and 

the U. S. Navy was lukewarm. Roosevelt, 

early in May, wondered whether more 

troops should not be sent out to the 

Pacific to reinforce Australia. Admiral 

King thought they should, and wrote that 

the mounting of BOLERO should not be 

allowed to interfere with Pacific plans. 

He called holding the Japanese "our 

basic strategic plan in the Pacific Thea67 McLaren. Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER. 
24 

ter."68 It was perhaps only a turn of phrase 

but General Marshall felt it necessary to 

remind the President that sustaining 

Russia, not holding the Japanese, was the 

basic strategy. The proposals to reinforce 

Australia would mean cutting in half the 

number of divisions that could be shipped 

to England for a SLEDGEHAMMER opera· 

tion. Operations in 1942 from England, 

he pointed out, already depended primarily on the British, who would be 

accepting risks far graver than any run by 

the Americans. The British had agreed 

to BOLERO on the understanding that it 

was the prime U. S. project. If it was not, 

BOLERO should be abandoned and the 

British notified. 69 President Roosevelt 

retreated. He told General Marshall that 

he had only asked if the Australian reinforcement could be done and he now 

agreed with him "and Admiral King" 

that it could not. He added: "I do not 

want 'BOLERO' slowed down."7o On the 

same day, however, he expressed his impatience with continued inaction. The 

Atlantic theater, he believed, called for 

"very great speed in developing actual 

operations. I have been disturbed," he 

wrote, "by American and British naval 

objections to operations in the European 

Theater prior to 1943. I regard it as 

essential that active operations be conducted in 1942." He realized the difficulties, but ideal conditions could hardly 

be expected. Expedients must be impro68 Memo, The Pacific Theater versus BOLERO, cited 

n. 36. Proposals to reinforce Australia would have in· 

creased ground forces by 25,000 troops, air forces by 

100 planes. Another 215 planes were to be sent to the 

Sou th Pacific. 

69 Ibid. 

10 Memo, Roosevelt for Marshall, 6 May 42, OPD 

file 381, gen sec. 2, case 62. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

vised. "The necessities of the case call for 

action in 1942-not 1943."71 

The President's impatience may have 

been reinforced by a visit of the Soviet 

Foreign Minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, to 

Washington at the end of May. Molotov 

came at the President's request primarily 

to discuss the M urmansk convoys of 

Lend-Lease war materials, but it was clear 

that he was still more vitally interested in 

the opening of a "second front." On his 

way he had stopped off at London to see 

Churchill, from whom he received only 

deliberately vague promises concerning 

the possibility of SLEDGEHAMMER.72 In 

Washington he tried to pin the Americans down to a more definite commitment. What the Soviets wanted was an 

operation in 1942 on a large enough scale 

to force the Germans to withdraw forty 

divisions from the Russian front. Such an 

operation evidently could not be promised. The most that General Marshall 

would say was that a second front was in 

preparation, that the Western Allies were 

trying to create a situation in which a 

second front would be possible. The 

President, however, significantly extended Marshall's answer and sent word 

through Molotov to Stalin to expect a 

second front in 1942. Roosevelt did not 

say where or on what scale.73 Precisely 

what weight this promise carried in subsequent discussion is difficult to assess. 

Probably the promise was of more significance as a symptom than as a contributing cause of Roosevelt's eagerness 

71 Memo, Roosevelt for Secy of War, CofS, Gen 

Arnold, Secy of Navy, Adm King. and Hopkins, 6 

May 42. CIS file 38l. 

12 McLaren. Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER. 

73 Notes on White House Mtg, cited in Sherwood, 

Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 563. The Molotov visit is 

treated at length by Sherwood, pp. 544-68. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

for immediate action. In any case, other 

pressures built up after Molotov left 

Washington. 

June 1942 marked the low ebb of 

British military fortunes. On the 13th, 

Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel at 

Knightsbridge in Libya defeated British 

armored forces in the last of a series of 

battles which had started 27 May. The 

British army retreated across the Egyptian 

border to El 'Alamein. On Sunday, 21 

June, British and Dominion troops, isolated in Tobruk by the withdrawal, were 

forced to surrender. The rest of the army 

dug in at El 'Alamein for the defense of 

Alexandria. 

That month also marked the opening 

of the expected new German offensive on 

the Russian front. Expected or not, the 

event was disheartening. The prevailing 

opinion among military leaders in America and Britain was still that they would 

be lucky if Russia managed to stay in the 

war through 1942. In London the official 

estimates of the Russian situation included only two hypotheses: that Russia 

had been defeated by October 1942 (hypothesis "A"), or that Russia was still in 

the, war in 1943 "but had suffered heavily 

in manpower and materiel. ... "74 

The pressure was very great on Allied 

leaders to act at once wherever such action 

promised any fair chance of.success. The 

pressure to act, moreover, coincided with 

an improved opportunity. Two decisive 

naval victories over the Japanese in May 

and June (Coral Sea and Midway) had 

relieved the immediate threat to Australia, and defensive requirements in the 

Pacific were thus no longer a sword of 

74 JIC (92) 193 (Final), Gennan Strength and Dispositions in 1943 under Certain Hypotheses, 21 May 

42_ SHAEF SGS files, Combined Commanders Papers. 

25 

Damocles hanging over plans for European operations. 

Between the two North African disasters, on 18 June, the Prime Minister and 

the British Chiefs of Staff came to Washington to discuss the desirability of reorienting strategy. Churchill came because he had been greatly alarmed by reports from Admiral Mountbatten that the 

President was pressing for a 1942 operation. 75 It was clear to the War Department that Churchill's visit foreboded an 

eloquent attack on the April commitment 

to BOLERO. Secretary Stimson prepared 

for the President a strong defense of the 

BOLERO idea. He pointed out that all the 

reasons for adopting BOLERO were still 

valid and that no other operation could 

achieve the same end. No other operation, furthermore, should be allowed to 

interfere with it. It was of prime importance, he believed, to press unremittingly 

forward with BOLERO) not only because it 

was the best plan but because any deviation from it would be taken as "evidence 

of doubt and vacillation. "76 

At the same time General Marshall 

was again defending the idea before the 

Combined Chiefs. At an informal meeting with General Brooke and Field Marshal Dill the reasons for having made 

BOLERO the main effort were discussed and 

reaffirmed. Marshall's defense was at the 

moment completely successful and General Brooke agreed that BOLERO should 

be pushed and that the North African invasion should not be undertaken. The 

generals further accepted the principle 

75 See CCS 27th Mtg, 19 Jun 42. Mountbatten had 

come to Washington earlier in the month, primarily 

to discuss the problems of landing craft. 

76 Ltr, 19 Jun 42, cited in Henry L. Stimson and 

McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and 

War (New York, 1948), pp. 420-23. 
26 

that any operations in 1942 would adversely affect operations in 1943, and 

should therefore be contemplated only in 

case of necessity.77 

On Sunday, 21 June 1942, at the White 

House this decision was significantly 

modified. Churchill vigorously attacked 

the BOLERO idea and urged GYMNAST, with 

the knowledge (Stimson believed) that 

"it was the President's great secret 

baby."78 In the midst of the discussions 

at the White House came the dramatic 

news of the surrender of Tobruk. The 

news greatly strengthened Churchill's 

arguments for diverting the Allied effort 

from BOLERO to North Africa and correspondingly weakened General Marshall's efforts to save what he regarded as 

sound strategy from being upset by political considerations.79 While arguing 

for BOLERO, however, General Marshall 

was deeply conscious of the gravity of the 

situation both in Egypt and in southern 

Russia, where German successes "threatened a complete collapse in the Middle 

East." 80 To meet that threat, Roosevelt 

and Marshall agreed to rush reinforcements of planes to the Middle East and 

tanks to the British armies in Egypt. Marshall hoped that these reinforcements 

would ease the pressure of the immediate 

emergency without disrupting basic 

77 Memo, CCS for information, Minutes of an In· 

formal Meeting ... held in General Marshall's Office, 

June 19, 1942. OPD file ABC 381 (3-16-42) sec. 2. 

78 Stimson and Bundy, On Active Seroice, p. 425. 

79 Notes on War Council Mtg, 22 Jun 42. CIS file, 

Secy of War Confs, Vol. II. The War Council meeting 

at which General Marshall reported on the White 

House meeting was attended by the Secretary of War 

and Under and Assistant Secretaries as well as by 

Generals Arnold, McNair, Somervell, Knudsen, McNarney, Surles, and Eisenhower. 

80 Quoted in Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 

592. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

strategy.S1 The final upshot of the 'White 

House meeting was a compromise which 

left BOLERO the priority task but noted 

that it was "essential that the U. S. and 

Great Britain should be prepared to act 

offensively in 1942." The President and 

Prime Minister agreed that "operations 

in France or the Low Countries in 1942 

would, if successful, yield greater political 

and strategic gains than operations in any 

other theater." Such operations would 

therefore be planned and prepared with 

all vigor, but if they proved unlikely 

to succeed, "we must be ready with an 

alternative." The best alternative was 

GYMNAST, which should be "explored 

carefully and conscientiously" and plans 

completed in detail as soon as possible.82 

Although in form these conclusions reaffirmed the priority of BOLERO in Allied 

European strategy, against the background of the pessimistic reports of planners in England they actually yielded precedence to GYMNAST. This fact became 

increasingly clear as planners engaged in 

the last futile struggle with SLEDGEHAMMER. On 24 June General Eisenhower 

arrived in London to take command of 

all American forces in Europe, as Commanding General ETOUSA (European 

Theater of Operations, U. S. Army). He 

spent a week looking around and then 

wrote General Marshall that although a 

lot of planning had been done at low 

levels most of the basic decisions such as, 

for instance, the exact frontage of the 

assault had still not been made. He reported General Paget's complaint of the 

81 Notes on War Council Mtg, 29 Jun 42. CIS file, 

Secy of War Confs, Vol. II. 

82 CCS 83/1, Offensive Operations in 1942 and 1943, 

24 Jan 42, Encloses memorandum by Maj. Gen. Sir 

Hastings Ismay reporting conclusions of a meeting 

held at the White House on 21 June. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 27 

lack of effective organization. Paget told 

him: “If we could only have the organization you have here, we could settle these 

matters in a morning. As it is we constantly go over the same ground and no 

real progress has been made.“83 

Lack of organization was a reflection of 

lack of conviction in high places that 

existing plans were practicable. A few 

days after his letter to Marshall, Eisenhower talked to the Prime Minister and 

found him “quite averse to attempting 

anything in Western Europe. . . . He 

believes it would be slaughter,” Eisenhower noted, “because we are not strong 

enough.” On the other hand, Churchill 

was perfectly confident about the northwest Africa operation-a confidence that 

Eisenhower at this time did not share.84 

The Prime Minister’s mind was, in 

fact, made up. On 6 July 1942 he presided over a meeting of the British Chiefs 

of Staff at which “it was unanimously 

agreed that operation ‘SLEDGEHAMMER’ offered no hope of success, and would 

merely ruin all prospects of ‘ROUNDUP' in 

1943.“85 The next step was to inform the 

Americans. This was done by two cables 

on 8 July, one to the Joint Staff Mission 

in Washington and the other a personal 

message from Churchill to Roosevelt.86 

Both reported the unfeasibility of SLEDCEHAMMER and recommended that the 

Americans proceed with planning for 

GYMNAST, while the British investigate the 

the possibility of attacking Norway 

(Operation JUPITER) . Field Marshal Dill 

83 Ltr, Eisenhower to Marshall, 30 Jun 42. OPD 

file 381, ETO, sec. I. 

84Diary, Office of the Commander in Chief, 5 Jul 

42. Cited hereafter as Diary of CinC. See Bibliographical Note. 

85 McLaren, Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER. 

86 See JCS 24th Mtg, 10 Ju142. 

had a preliminary talk with General Marshall. He found the latter’s reaction SO 

strong that he contemplated cabling a 

warning to his government that to press 

acceptance of GYMNAST at the expense of 

BOLERO would “drive U. S. A, into saying 

‘We are finished off with West and will go 

out in Pacific.’ ” 87As Admiral King was 

out of town, official U. S. reaction was delayed. When King returned on 10 July, 

the Joint Chiefs met and General Marshall proposed just the step he had evidently discussed with Dill: turning from 

Europe to undertake an offensive in the 

Pacific. Admiral King approved, and remarked that the British, in his opinion, 

had never wholeheartedly supported BOLERO. Further, he believed, the Japanese 

were not going to sit tight much longer 

but were planning new attacks in the 

South and Southwest Pacific.88 Marshall 

and King then sent a joint memorandum 

to the President stating their view that 

GYMNAST was indecisive, would prevent a 

SLEDGEHAMMER operation in 1942, and 

curtail or perhaps make impossible 

ROUNDUP in 1943. They concluded: “If 

the United States is to engage in any other 

operation than forceful, unswerving adherence to full BOLERO plans, we are definitely of the opinion that we should turn 

to the Pacific and strike decisively against 

Japan.“89

The memorandum went to Hyde Park. 

The next day General Marshall heard 

rumors that he and King and Harry Hopkins would be sent to London but he still 

had no indication of the President’s views. 

On 14 July the President telegraphed: “I 

87 Draft Cbl in C/S file 381. 

88 JCS 24th Mtg, 10 Jul42. 

89 Memo, King and Marshall for President, 10 Jul 

42. C/S file BOLERO. 

THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

lack of effective organization. Paget told 

him: "If we could only have the organization you have here, we could settle these 

matters in a morning. As it is we constantly go over the same ground and no 

real progress has been made. "83 

Lack of organization was a reflection of 

lack of conviction in high places that 

existing plans were practicable. A few 

days after his letter to Marshall, Eisenhower talked to the Prime Minister and 

found him "quite averse to attempting 

anything in Western Europe .... He 

believes it would be slaughter," Eisenhower noted, "because we are not strong 

enough." On the other hand, Churchill 

was perfectly confident about the northwest Africa operation-a confidence that 

Eisenhower at this time did not share.84 

The Prime Minister's mind was, in 

fact, made up. On 6 July 1942 he presided over a meeting of the British Chiefs 

of Staff at which "it was unanimously 

agreed that operation 'SLEDGEHAMMER' offered no hope of success, and would 

merely ruin all prospects of 'ROUNDUP' in 

1943."85 The next step was to inform the 

Americans. This was done by two cables 

on 8 J ul y, one to the Joint Staff Mission 

in Washington and the other a personal 

message from Churchill to Roosevelt.86 

Both reported the unfeasibility of SLEDGEHAMMER and recommended that the 

Americans proceed with planning for 

GYMNAST} while the British investigate the 

the possibility of attacking Norway 

(Operation JUPITER). Field Marshal Dill 

83 Ltr, Eisenhower to Marshall, 30 Jun 42. OPD 

file 381, ETO, sec. I. 

84 Diary, Office of the Commander in Chief, 5 Jul 

42. Cited hereafter as Diary of CinCo See Bibliographical Note. 

85 McLaren, Notes on SLEDGEHAMMER. 

86 See JCS 24th Mtg, 10 Ju142. 

27 

had a preliminary talk with General Marshall. He found the latter's reaction so 

strong that he contemplated cabling a 

warning to his government that to press 

acceptance of GYMNAST at the expense of 

BOLERO would "drive U. S. A. into saying 

'We are finished off with West and will go 

out in Pacific.' " 87 As Admiral King was 

ou t of town, official U. S. reaction was delayed. When King returned on 10 July, 

the Joint Chiefs met and General Marshall proposed just the step he had evidently discussed with Dill: turning from 

Europe to undertake an offensive in the 

Pacific. Admiral King approved, and remarked that the British, in his opinion, 

had never wholeheartedly supported BOLERO. Further, he believed, the Japanese 

were not going to sit tight much longer 

but were planning new attacks in the 

South and Southwest Pacific.88 Marshall 

and King then sent a joint memorandum 

to the President stating their view that 

GYMNAST was indecisive, would prevent a 

SLEDGEHAMMER operation in 1942, and 

curtail or perhaps make impossible 

ROUNDUP in 1943. They concluded: "If 

the United States is to engage in any other 

operation than forceful, unswerving adherence to full BOLERO plans, we are definitely of the opinion that we should turn 

to the Pacific and strike decisively against 

Japan."89 

The memorandum went to Hyde Park. 

The next day General Marshall heard 

rumors that he and King and Harry Hopkins would be sent to London but he still 

had no indication of the President's views. 

On 14 July the President telegraphed: "I 

81 Draft Cbl in CIS file 381. 

88 JCS 24th Mtg, 10 Jul 42. 

89 Memo, King and Marshall for President, 10 Jul 

42. CIS file BOLERO. 
28 

have definitely decided to send you, King 

and Harry to London immediately .... I 

want you to know that I do not approve 

the Pacific proposal."90 In conversation 

with Marshall the next morning in Washington, Roosevelt called the proposal 

"something of a red herring" and was concerned lest it appear that "we had proposed what amounted to abandonment of 

the British."91 General Marshall did not 

think so, but in any case the matter was 

dropped. 

General Marshall's vehement defense 

of BOLERO stemmed in part from his feeling that the world situation was extremely 

critical. He was fearful, in particular, of 

a Russian collapse. The German summer 

offensive toward the Caucasus had broken 

through the Kharkov front and forced the 

Russians into a general withdrawal. "The 

present action in the Don Basin," General 

Marshall wrote on 13 July, "indicates 

Russia's possible inability to halt the 

massed power of Germany and her Allies. 

Considering the distribution of population in regard to density and race, the location of primary agricultural and industrial areas, and the railroad and road net 

of Russia, it is evident that unless this 

German offensive is soon halted Russian 

participation in the war will become negligible in magnitude, with the inevitable 

result of rendering all planning concerning ROUNDUP and all BOLERO movements 

(of ground troops at least) vain." The 

emergency for which SLEDGEHAMMER was 

planned was at hand, he believed, and 

failure to meet it would doom the chances 

of a cross-Channel attack in 1943. Inva00 Tel. Roosevelt to Marshall, 14 Jul 42. CIS file 

BOLERO. 

91 Memo, Marshall for King, 15 Jul 42. CIS file 

WDCSA 381 War Plans Sec. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

sion of North Africa, in his view, would 

not achieve the necessary diversion to 

save the Russian armies from collapse. 

He cabled his views to General Eisenhower and asked Eisenhower to prepare a 

specific plan on how SLEDGEHAMMER 

might be carried OUt.92 

It was with these convictions as to the 

desperate urgency of SLEDGEHAMMER that 

General Marshall on 16 July left for 

London. With King and Hopkins, he 

went as a personal representative of the 

President with large powers to settle 

strategy. The President's instructions required that SLEDGEHAMMER be strongly 

urged as the most important and perhaps 

imperative task for 1942. If it were found 

impossible, then Marshall should review 

the world situation with King and Hopkins and determine "upon another place 

for U. S. troops to fight in 1942."93 

At the first London meeting, on 20 

July, Churchill outlined his views and set 

the framework for subsequent staff discussions. The first question, he said, was 

the feasibility of SLEDGEHAMMER. Although the British had failed to devise a 

satisfactory plan, they would all listen 

sympathetically to any U. S. proposals. 

However, he went on to question the 

92 Cbl, Marshall to Eisenhower, 13 Jul 42, CIS file 

BOLERO. 

93 Memo, Roosevelt for Hopkins, Marshall, and 

King, Instructions for London Conference,-July 

1942, sgd orig in CIS file 381. This memorandum was 

drafted by the War Department, but Roosevelt made 

considerable changes in it, omitting the Pacific 

threat, and weakening the War Department's paragraph on commitment to ROUNDUP. The War Department draft on the latter point read that if SLEDGEHAMMER were given up, then the Allies should continue "our planned activities and present commitments in other areas. We should proceed with ROUNDUP preparations." In Roosevelt's revision, these two 

sentences were struck out. War Department draft included in Diary of CinCo 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

urgency of SLEDGEHAMMER. Might it not 

be argued that ROUNDUP depended only 

on what the Russians did, and not on 

what the Western Allies might do? He 

wondered whether the ROUNDUP concept 

need be confined to an attack on the 

western seaboard of France. He then discussed the value of invading North Africa and suggested that if the battle for 

Egypt went well it might be possible to 

attack even Sicily or Italy.94 In a written 

review the next day the Prime Minister 

made his own conclusions clear, at least 

by implication. There were two main 

facts to be recognized, he believed: first, 

the immense power of the German military machine, which even without a defeat of Russia could still shift to the defensive in the east and move fifty or sixty 

divisions to France; second, the race in 

the west between attrition of Allied shipping and development of Allied air 

power. "It might be true to say," he wrote, 

"that the issue of the war depends on 

whether Hitler's U-boat attack on Allied 

tonnage or the increase and application 

of Allied air power, reach their full fruition first." 95 Emphasis on these two facts 

as the key to strategy meant postponing 

decisive land operations against Germany 

while carrying out a preliminary policy 

of attrition, chiefly through an increasing 

air offensive. 

Although General Marshall was adamantly opposed to the concept, he found 

himself on weak ground in attempting to 

preserve the sanctity of the ROUNDUP idea 

while carrying out the President's mandate to take action somewhere in 1942. 

General Eisenhower was unable to defend 

SLEDGEHAMMER as an operation offering 

94 Combined Staff Conf. 20 Jul 42. CIS file 319.1. 

95 Memo, 21 Jul 42, WP (42) 311. CIS file BOLEllO. 

29 

even a fair chance of tactical success. 

Eisenhower personally estimated that the 

chances of a successful landing were one 

in two and of being able to build up on 

the Continent to a force of six divisions 

about one in five. Still, he did point out 

that "if we are convinced that the Russian 

Army is now in a desperate situation ... " 

the question of 'the tactical success or 

failure of SLEDGEHAMMER was of little 

moment, and "the only real test of SLEDGEHAMMER'S practicability is whether or not 

it will appreciably increase the ability of 

the Russian Army to remain a dangerous 

threat to the Germans next spring." He 

admitted that the desperateness of the 

Russian situation was a matter of pure 

conjecture, in which there was "considerable difference of opinion." His conclusion, therefore, was that SLEDGEHAMMER 

should be kept alive until the first of September when a decision could be made on 

the basis of the Russian situation at that 

time. 96 

On the other hand, General Eisenhower strongly recommended against accepting GYMNAST as an alternative to 

SLEDGEHAMMER. "GYMNAST/' he wrote, 

"is strategically unsound as an operation 

either to support ROUNDUP or to render 

prompt assistance to the Russians. Its execution now may be a logical alternative 

to 1943 ROUNDUP, but it is not a logical operation to insure execution of ROUNDUP. 

If undertaken now, it should be done on 

the theory that the Russian Army is certain to be defeated and that, consequently, we should take advantage of the 

relatively favorable situation now exist96 Memo (prepared by Gen Eisenhower with advice of Gens Clark and Lee and Col Barker), Conclusions as to the Practicability of SLEDGEHAMMER, 17 

jul 42. Diary of CinCo 
30 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ing to improve the defensive position that 

will be forced upon us in Europe and 

western Asia by a Russian defeat.” 97 

Eisenhower’s analysis anticipated in 

large measure the conclusions of the July 

conference. The British Chiefs of Staff 

were unalterably opposed to SLEDGEHAMMER as an operation without reasonable chance of success. Since the SLEDGEHAMMER force would necessarily be 

largely British and under British command, their opposition was decisive.98 

Marshall reported to the President the 

failure of his first task. The President replied, asking for study of GYMNAST as the 

next most desirable operation, and concluding with a request for “speed in a decision.” 99 Even with SLEDGEHAMMER 

ruled out, General Marshall was still reluctant to commit U. S. strategy irrevocably to the Mediterranean. He therefore 

arrived at a compromise with the British 

which began with agreement “that no 

avoidable reduction in preparation for 

ROUNDUP should be favorably considered 

so long as there remains any reasonable 

possibility of its successful execution before July 1943.” That possibility depended on the Russians, and it was further agreed that “if the situation on the 

Russian front by September 15th indicates such a collapse or weakening of 

Russian resistance as to make ROUNDUP 

appear impracticable . . . , the decision 

should be taken to launch a combined 

operation against the North and North97 Ibid. Italics in original. General Marshall agreed

that SLEDGEHAMMER was not an operation he would 

choose if choice were possible. He believed, however, 

that choice was not possible, that “time was tragically against us.” Memo for the President, 28 Jul 42. 

C/S file 319.1. 

98Memo, Marshall for the President, cited n. 97.

99Cbl, 23 Jul 42. C/S file 381. 

west Coast of Africa at the earliest possible date before December 1942.” 100 

Not only did this agreement leave the 

door open for reconsideration but it made 

clear that the choice was between GYMNAST and ROUNDUP and that a decision to 

go into North Africa should be made only 

after ROUNDUP was discovered impracticable. To General Marshall, as to General 

Eisenhower, the choice of GYMNAST meant 

acceptance of a probable Russian defeat, 

which in turn would prevent Allied invasion of Western Europe. General Eisenhower, reviewing the strategic situation 

on the eve of the conference’s decision, 

admitted that GYMNAST seemed to be the 

only feasible and strategically valuable 

operation open to the Allies in 1942, but 

he added, “Since it is too much to hope 

that the Russians can continue fighting 

unaided, all through 1943, the final effect 

would be the abandonment of ROUNDUP." 101 The conclusion agreed to in conference with the British was only slightly 

less pessimistic. On American insistence, 

the agreement admitted that “a commitment to this operation [GYMNAST] renders 

ROUNDUP in all probability impracticable 

of successful execution in 1943 and therefore that we have definitely accepted a defensive, encircling line of action for the 

Continental European theater, except as 

to air operations and blockade. . . .” lo2 

The door left open at the conference 

did not remain open long. On 25 July 

Harry Hopkins cabled Roosevelt urging 

an immediate decision in order to avoid 

100CCS 94, Operations in 1942/3, 24 Jul 42. This 

paper states the decisions of the London Conference. 

101 Memo for Marshall, Survey of Strategic Situation, 23 Jul 42. Diary of CinC. 

102CCS 94, cited n. n. 100.
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

"procrastinations and delays." 103 The 

President made up his mind at once. He 

called in Secretary Stimson and the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff 104 and, without discussion, 

read to them his decision to go ahead with 

GYMNAST. He saw no reason why the withdrawal of a few troops to the Mediterranean would prevent ROUNDUP in 1943. 

He desired action. To Hopkins, Marshall, 

and King, the President cabled, "Tell 

Prime Minister I am delighted that decision is made." 105 

The ambiguity of the "decision" which 

the President welcomed left the military 

leaders uncertain as to how definite the 

commitment to GYMNAST was. But it was 

perfectly clear that the North African 

project now had the inside track for planning and preparation. By agreement, 

ROUNDUP planning was to continue under 

the Combined Commanders and the 

ETOUSA plans section headed by General Barker. A separate U. S. staff would 

be sent to London to work on North 

Africa. Acceptance of the North African 

operation was sealed by baptism with a 

new code name: TORCH.106 It was also determined that all currently planned operations (TORCH, SLEDGEHAMMER, and 

ROUNDUP) would be under a Vnited 

States Supreme Commander. Pending the 

formal appointment of such a commander, General Marshall and Admiral 

King directed General Eisenhower to 

take immediate control of planning for 

TORCH. If and when TORCH was finally de103 Cited in Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 

61l. 

104 Admiral Leahy, General Arnold, and General 

McNarney. 

105 CbI, 25 Jul 42. CIS file 381; Memo, Gen Deane 

for Admiral Willson, 25 Jul 42. CIS file WDCSA 381 

War Plans Sec. 

106 Agreed at CCS 33d Mtg, 25 Jul 42. 

31 

cided on, the supreme commander of all 

operations in the theater would also command TORCH with a British deputy.107 The 

nationality of the commander for ROUNDUP was not determined. It was laid down, 

however, that he would not have operational control of ground forces in the 

United Kingdom, that his function would 

be training and planning, and that troops 

would "only come under his operational 

command when the operation was 

mounted." 108 

After a week of uncertainty,109 the 

President on the evening of 30 July informed the Joint Chiefs of Staff that he 

wanted to do TORCH but, before he cabled 

the Prime Minister of his decision, he 

would like an estimate of the earliest 

practicable date on which the operation 

could be launchedYo The next day the 

British Joint Staff Mission was notified of 

the White House decision and cabled it to 

107 Later changed at British request in order to 

maintain appearance of an all-American operation 

and provide continuity of U.S. command in case the 

deputy had to take over. [Morton Yarman] TORCH 

and the European Theater of Operations (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: 

Part IV) , MS, p. 20. Hist Div files. 

108 General Marshall speaking at CCS 33d Mtg. 

This controverted an earlier (1 July) recommendation by the Combined Commanders that the ROUNDUP supreme commander also be charged with home 

defense of Great Britain. CC (42) 27, Notes on System of Command for Operation ROUNDUP. SHAEF 

SGS files, Combined Commanders Papers. 

109 At the CCS 34th meeting, 30 July, there was 

considerable vagueness expressed as to whether the 

TORCH decision had been made. Leahy and Dill "had 

the impression" that it had. Admiral King believed 

the President and Prime Minister had not yet decided to "abandon ROUNDUP in favor of TORCH." 

110 Memo, Gen W. B. Smith for JCS, Notes of a 

Conference Held at the White House at 8:30 P.M., 

July 30, 1942, 1 Aug 42. OPD files, exec 5, item I, 

tab 14. General Smith reported: "The President 

stated very definitely that he, as Commander-inChief, had made the decision that TORCH would be 

undertaken at the earliest possible date." 
32 

the British Chiefs of Staff for relay to General Eisenhower. General Eisenhower 

was to assume the position of Supreme 

Commander pending final decision on a 

permanent appointment.111 

In London, General Eisenhower took 

immediate steps to get the operation 

under way. As no new planning staff had 

arrived from the United States, it became 

necessary to employ American officers already in the United Kingdom. That 

meant denuding staffs which had been 

working on Continental planning. General Barker, selected as acting G-3 for 

TORCH, was one of the first to go. A TORCH 

planning committee was set up on a combined basis under Brig. Gen. Alfred W. 

Gruenther (U. S. A.) , and the chief British planners who had developed ROUNDUP 

were also absorbed in the new adventure. 112 

ROUNDUP planning came virtually to a 

standstill. 

The Period of Indecision 

(July-December 1942) 

President Roosevelt's decision to go 

ahead with TORCH 113 meant the indefinite 

postponement of ROUNDUP. That much 

was clear. It was not clear what effect the 

decision would have on grand strategy. 

The April agreements had provided for 

111 Cbl, JSM to Br COS, 31 Jul 42. OPD files, POD 

Super BOLERO, exec I, tab 10; Memo. Marshall for 

WD Classified MC. Commander for TORCH, 6 Aug 42. 

OPD file 381, ETO, sec. II, case 16. 

112 Yarman, TORCH, p. 18. See n. 107. 

113 The decision to do TORCH, as has been indicated, 

was primarily the President's, but Churchill had repeatedly taken the initiative in urging it. In April 

1944 Churchill declared that he would "personally 

assume responsibility before Cod for the decision to 

do TORCH." See Ltr, Cen Wedemeyer to Cen Handy, 

13 Apr 44. OPD files, OPD Mise, bk. 18. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

a concentration on BOLERO in preparation 

for ROUNDUP in 1943. The July agreement 

rejected the principle of concentration 

and accepted instead a "defensive, encircling line of action." Regarding those 

two notions as contradictory, the U. S. 

Chiefs of Staff felt that strategy had been 

overturned. The British Chiefs of Staff, 

on the other hand, recalled the earlier 

ARCADIA principles which had emphasized preparatory operations (including 

attacks through the Mediterranean) in 

1942 before the main attack across the 

Channel. The TORCH decision was clearly 

not at odds with those principles. Acceptance of "defensive, encircling action," 

they believed, meant only recognition of 

the need for a longer prelude to the final 

assault. They characterized the U. S. interpretation as heresy and were alarmed 

lest it take root.ll4 But that it should take 

root was inevitable. For the U. S. Chiefs of 

Staff, under constant pressure to get on 

with the war against Japan, any delay and, 

more particularly, any uncertainty in the 

mounting of the decisive attack on northwest Europe inevitably unsettled the 

whole program for waging the war. Moreover, the connection between TORCH and 

an eventual ROUNDUP was at best indirect. 

If a North African invasion might be regarded, in the long run, as preparatory to 

a cross-Channel attack, the immediate relationship between TORCH and ROUNDUP 

would be competitive. Instead of building 

up forces in the United Kingdom, TORCH, 

if successful, would concentrate them in 

the Mediterranean. What then would be 

the next step? 

114 Cbl, Br COS to JSM. 13 Aug 42. Excerpts, supplied by British Cabinet Office Hist Sec, are in Hist 

Div files. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

Lack of a long-range plan was particularly awkward for the United States in 

1942 when mobilization was just getting 

started. The Army was in process of formation. Deployment had only just begun. 

Expanding productive capacity still had 

to be directed in accordance with priorities established to fit special military 

needs at least a year in advance. U. S. 

planners, studying the decisions of the 

London Conference, concluded that 

while they evidently abrogated the 

strategy implicit in the Marshall Memorandum of April they did not formulate 

any .new strategy. 

Through the summer and fall of 1942, 

the planners wrestled with the problem of 

calculating future needs in troops and 

materiel. In the weeks immediately preceding the July conference the Combined 

Planning Staff had drawn up two deployment papers, defining the basic combined 

strategy and translating it into terms of 

future commitments of troops and munitions in the various theaters of operations.l15 The first study assumed that the 

present strategic concept was: "To conduct the strategic offensive with maximum forces in the Atlantic-Western European Theater at the earliest practicable 

date, and to maintain the strategic defensive in other theaters, with appropriate forces." The second study, based on 

this assumption and on its implementation by the Marshall BOLERO plan, forecast that in April 1944 the offensive on 

the continent of Europe would be in 

progress. Neither study had been approved by the Combined Chiefs when the 

115 CCS 91, Strategic Policy and Deployment of 

United States and British Forces, 7 Jul 42; CCS 97, 

Strategic Hypothesis for Deployment of Forces in 

April 1944, 24 Jul 42. 

33 

TORCH decision forced reconsideration of 

the premises.lI6 There began then a series 

of attempts to explain what had been de· 

cided at the London Conference. Neither 

the planners nor the chiefs could agree. 

What, in particular, was the extent of commitment of ROUNDUP? The British Chiefs 

of Staff, anxious to have the build-up of 

U. S. forces in the United Kingdom continue at the maximum rate, wanted to 

hold to the assumption that in the spring 

of 1944 operations would be either in 

progress or immediately in prospect on 

the Continent.ll7 The Joint Chiefs could 

not see anything in the July decisions that 

would warrant such an assumption. The 

vague promise to consider crossing the 

Channel at some time when "marked deterioration in German military strength 

became apparent and the resources of the 

United Nations, available after meeting 

other commitments, so permit" 118 seemed 

to them an invitation to tie up troops and 

resources in the United Kingdom indefinitely with no assurance that they would 

be used in decisive action. The Joint 

Chiefs were in the meantime deeply conscious of the need to prosecute the war 

against Japan. They were in fact again 

wondering whether they should not reverse their basic strategy. The big issue to 

be decided, General Marshall argued in 

August, was whether the main U. S. effort 

should be in the Pacific or in the EuropeMiddle East area.ll9 The question which 

President Roosevelt a month earlier, before the London Conference, had called a 

"red herring" was now, at least, an issue of 

116 JCS 26th Mtg, 28 Jul 42. 

117 CCS 97/2, 8 Aug 42. See discussion in CPS 

(Combined Planning Staff) 28th Mtg;,7 Aug 42. OPD 

file ABC 370 (7-2-42). 

118 CCS 94. 

119 JCS 28th Mtg, 11 Aug 42. 
34 

all seriousness. Discussion of it centered 

largely upon the deployment of aircraft. 

By the agreement of July the U. S. 

Chiefs of Staff withdrew fifteen groups of 

aircraft from allotment to BOLERO with 

the avowed intention of using them in the 

Pacific. The clause was written into the 

agreement, General Marshall later explained, only in order to remove the 

fifteen groups from the realm of combined discussion.120 I By assigning the 

groups formally to the Pacific, where by 

common consent strategy was primarily 

aU. S. responsibility, the Joint Chiefs reserved the right to dispose of them as they 

saw fit. When the whole question of 

future deployment was sent to the Joint 

Planning Staff, the fate of the fifteen 

groups uncovered a wide range of disagreement on basic strategy.121 Naval 

planners wanted the planes shown deployed chiefly in the South and Southwest Pacific as of April 1943, thus assuming a considerable reorientation of strategy toward increased offensive effort 

against the Japanese. Specifically they 

recommended deploying aircraft according to the priority TORCH} Middle East, 

South Pacific, Southwest Pacific, United 

Kingdom. Army planners, still insisting 

on the primary importance of the whole 

European area, wanted equal priority for 

TORCH} the Middle East, and the United 

Kingdom. They pointed out that the 

Navy's deployment schedules would delay the arrival of planes in the United 

Kingdom by one to three months. General Arnold took up the cudgels to defend 

priority for the European theater. He 

120 JCS 36th Mtg, 6 Oct 42. 

121 JPS 32d Mtg, 31 Aug 42. OPD file ABC 370 

(7-2-42). See also notes on this meeting, 2 Sep 42. 

OPD file ABC 381 (9-25-41), sec. II. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

pointed out that, of fifty-four groups of 

planes allotted to BOLERO-ROUNDUP by the 

Marshall Memorandum, only twenty-five 

remained for the air offensive against 

Germany. He believed that under the 

terms of the July agreements Germany 

was still to be considered the first objective of Allied strategy and that, therefore, 

no strengthening of the Southwest Pacific 

should be undertaken "until the modified 

BOLERO-TORCH plan has first been completely implemented." 122 That modified 

plan, he believed, far from entailing a reduction of air build-up in the United 

Kingdom put the chief burden of maintaining pressure against Germany on the 

air forces. The European theater, he believed, had become an air theater. He 

further argued that it was specious to 

separate TORCH and the Middle East from 

the United Kingdom, since the bomber 

offensive from England in fighting the 

German Air Force and weakening the 

German military potential contributed 

directly to the success of TORCH. The debate between General Arnold and Admiral King on this subject continued into 

the fall without arriving at any resolution.123 Toward the end of October, planners reviewing the matter found that of 

the fifteen groups three had already been 

deployed: one to Hawaii, one to the 

Middle East, three squadrons to the South 

Pacific, and one squadron to Alaska. The 

remaining twelve groups the Joint Chiefs 

then decided should be held in strategic 

122 Memo, Arnold for Marshall, 29 Jul 42. OPD 

file ABC 381 (9-25-41), sec. III. 

123 See JCS 97 series which contains the gist of the 

running argument 'between General Arnold and Ad· 

miral King. For more detailed treatment of this subject see W. F. Craven and J. L. Cate, eds., The Army 

Air Forces in World War II: II, Europe-Torch to 

Pointblank, August 1942 to December 1943 (Chicago, 

1949) . pp. 280-82. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

reserve.124 They were as far as ever from 

knowing what Anglo-American strategy 

was to be. 

Although the Joint Chiefs did not 

agree on how far the BOLERO strategy had 

been or should be modified to step up the 

war in the Pacific, they were clearly pressing for some modification. Even before 

the TORCH decision, the concept of the 

"strategic defensive" in the Pacific had 

been defined to include "limited offensive 

operations." 125 That definition was not 

at once accepted by the Combined Chiefs, 

but in the middle of August they did 

agree to a strategic hypothesis 126 which 

for purposes of troop deployment assumed that by April 1944 there would be 

"an augmentation of forces in the Pacific 

by a readjustment of United States commitments in the European Theater ... 

in order to further offensive operations 

against Japan." In context, however, this 

provision remained at least as vague as the 

earlier agreements. The same hypothesis 

also assumed that in 1944 preparations 

would continue for an invasion of the 

Continent as well as for deception purposes and in order to take advantage of 

a "favorable opportunity or emergency." 

Finally it was assumed also that North 

Africa in 1944 would be occupied by the 

Allies and "intensified operations" would 

be "conducted therefrom." 

It was to this l~st assumption that the 

British Chiefs of Staff and the Prime 

Minister were giving their principal attention. In September Churchill outlined 

his conception of future strategy to the 

124 lCS 97 15,26 Oct 42; lCS 39th Mtg, 27 Oct 42. 

125 CCS 91, cited n. lIS. This paper, however, was 

never approved by the Combined Chiefs. 

126 CCS 97/3, Strategic Hypothesis as to Deploy. 

ment of Forces in April 1944, 14 Aug 42. Approved at 

CCS 36th Mtg. 

35 

President. He was considering two possibilities after the assumed success of 

TORCH: attack into the "underbelly" by 

invasion of Sardinia, Sicily, or even Italy, 

and attack on Norway with the idea of 

giving more direct aid to Russia. ROUNDUP) 

he understood, was definitely off for 1943, 

but there still remained the possibility of 

an emergency cross-Channel operation 

and he believed that all the arguments advanced for SLEDGEHAMMER in 1942 would 

be even more valid in 1943-44,127 The 

President was particularly interested in 

exploiting success in the Mediterranean. 

In November he proposed to Churchill 

that "you with your Chiefs of Staff in 

London and I with the Combined Staff 

here make a survey of the possibilities including forward movement directed 

against Sardinia, Sicily, Italy, Greece and 

other Balkan Areas, and including the 

possibility of obtaining Turkish support 

for an attack through the Black Sea 

against Germany's flank." 128 This was a 

welcome idea to the Prime Minister, who 

replied now that an attack against Sicily 

or Sardinia was an essential step following the cleaning up of North Africa.12D 

The idea, however, was anathema to 

the U. S. War Department. Maj. Gen. 

Thomas T. Handy, Assistant Chief of 

Staff, OPD, expressed adamant opposition to the British views, toward which 

Roosevelt seemed to be leaning. He believed that the Mediterranean operations 

were not logistically feasible, and that in 

any case they would not bring an Allied 

127 Cbl, Eden to Halifax, quoting Cbl, Churchill 

to Roosevelt, 22 Sep 42. CIS file ETO. 

128 Quotation from Cbl, Roosevelt to Churchill, in 

Cbl, Churchill to Roosevelt, 18 Nov 42, incl in lCS 

153, Plans and Operations in the Mediterranean. 

Middle East. and Near East. 

129 Cbl. Churcllill to Roosevelt. cited n. 128. 
36 

force within striking range of Germany. 

He deplored the concept of an emergency 

cross-Channel operation. "Under no circumstance," he said, "can the U. S. agree 

to concentrate large forces in the U. K. 

there to be immobilized until the hypothetical break of German power as envisaged in the British concept." The only 

sound alternatives in his view were 

ROUNDUP as originally planned with a 

specific target date, or abandonment of 

the whole idea of defeating Germany first 

and turning to the offensive in the Pacific.130 

In December 1942 Handy's views were 

echoed in a new strategic concept drawn 

up by a new committee, the Joint Strategic Survey Committee (JSSC) -a body 

of three senior officers whose sole job was 

to maintain a large perspective on the 

major problems of combined direction of 

the war and ad vise the Joint Chiefs on 

matters of policy.13l The first task of the 

JSSC was to recommend to the Joint 

Chiefs a course of action for 1943. It was 

high time that such a course was settled. 

The North African invasion, launched on 

8 November, met almost immediate success and raised wi th new urgency the q uestion which the July decisions had left 

unanswered: What next? 

The core of the strategy recommended 

by the JSSC was concentration on the 

build-up of a balanced force in the United 

Kingdom for a decisive cross-Channel attack before the end of 1943. In the meantime, an air offensive against Germany 

would be carried out from England, 

North Africa, and the Middle East. The 

130 Memo. Handy for CofS, 8 Nov 42. AmericanBritish Strategy. C/S file 381. 

131 JCS 149/D. Charter of the Joint Strategic Sur· 

vey Committee. 7 Nov 42. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

success of the North African operation 

would be exploited by air attacks on Germany and Italy "with the vi~w to destroying Italian resources and morale and 

eliminating her from the war.132 This 

much of the .JSSC policy was accepted by 

the Joint Chiefs. However, the committee's recommendations for the Pacific, 

which amounted to continuation of the 

limited operations for defense and the 

minimum support of China, the Joint 

Chiefs drastically revised after a discussion in closed session. The revision greatly 

enlarged the concept of the strategic defensive against Japan. The Joint Chiefs 

declared that in the Pacific limited offensive operations would be carried out 

not only to secure Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, Alaska, and the lines of communication but also "to maintain the 

initiative in the Solomon-Bismarck-East 

New Guinea area with a view to controlling that area and involving Japan in 

costly counter operations." In Burma an 

offensive should be undertaken to open 

supply routes to China,133 

When these views were put before the 

Combined Chiefs, the British replied 

with their first fully developed statement 

of what may be called their peripheral 

strategy for the defeat of Germany.134 

Germany, they argued, needed a period 

of rest and recuperation; Russia was preventing that. The Allies therefore should 

do everything possible to assist Russia. 

Although Germany had to be reoccupied 

132 JCS 167, Basic Strategic Concept for 1943, II 

Dec 42. 

133 JCS 167/1.20 Dec 42. The revision was done in 

the JCS 46th meeting. The revised paper. JCS 167/1, 

was submitted to the Combined Chiefs of Staff as 

CCS 135. 

134 CCS 135/2. American-British Strategy in 1943, 

3 Jan 43. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

eventually, the Allies were not yet ready 

to attack the Continental fortress. "To 

make a fruitless assault before the time is 

ripe would be disastrous to ourselves, of 

no assistance to Russia and devastating 

to the morale of occupied Europe." Even 

a maximum concentration on building 

up for a cross-Channel attack in 1943 

would assemble only about twenty-five 

divisions in the United Kingdom by late 

summer, as compared to the original estimated requirement in the Marshall 

Memorandum of forty-eight divisions. In 

contrast to the unattractive prospect of a 

shoestring operation across the Channel, 

the British Chiefs of Staff sketched the rewards of pursuing operations in the Mediterranean. "If we force Italy out of the 

war and the Germans try to maintain 

their line in Russia at its present length, 

we estimate that they will be some 54 divisions and 2,200 aircraft short of what 

they need on all fronts .... " The operations they had immediately in mind were 

the invasion of either Sardinia or Sicily. 

But their plans for the Mediterranean 

did not stop there. Following Italian collapse the next step would be the Balkans, 

although it was not clear just what action 

would be possible in that area. In the 

meantime, while concentrating offensive 

action in the Mediterranean, the British 

Chiefs wanted the United States to build 

up an air force of 3,000 heavy and medium bombers in England and also continue to send ground divisions. They believed that, without prejudice to other 

operations, the build-up in the United 

Kingdom could reach twenty-one divisions by the fall of 1943-a force sufficient 

to effect a re-entry into the Continent 

under favorable conditions. As for the 

Pacific the British approved operations 

37 

to reopen the Burma Road, but they did 

not want any other expansion of the war 

against Japan. The reasons for tackling 

Germany first, they wrote, were still 

sound. 

Although these views were in direct 

opposition to the strategic principles previously expressed by the U. S. War Department, the Joint Strategic Survey 

Committee found grounds for compromise. They believed that the ends sought 

by the British and the United States were 

the same: that is, to expel the Axis from 

North Africa, to eliminate Italy, and to 

do so by pressure rather than by occupation of the Italian peninsula. They 

thought the Combined Chiefs were further agreed that no large-scale operations 

should be undertaken against southern 

Europe with the ultimate view of invading Germany therefrom, and that, on the 

other hand, invasion of the Continent 

from the United Kingdom was essential 

to achieve decisive results. The chief disagreements seemed to be on the method 

of exerting pressure on Italy and on the 

timing of ROUNDUP. The U. S. Joint 

Chiefs wanted to force Italy's surrender 

by air bombardment from North African 

bases rather than by continued ground 

operations. The difference of opinion on 

ROUNDUP the JSSC thought might be due 

to misinterpretation. They criticized the 

British statement that concentration on 

the build-up for a cross-Channel attack in 

1943 would interfere with the build-up 

of air forces for the bomber offensive. On 

the contrary, the JSSC believed: "The air 

offensive will of necessity hold precedence 

over the buildup for the land offensive, 

and continue to do so until the results of 

the air operations and the deterioration 

of the Axis situation in general can be 
38 

better estimated in relation to prospective 

land operations." They concluded that 

this difference could probably ~e adjusted with the British without setting a 

definite date for ROUNDUP.135 

This was the last formal word on U. S. 

strategy before the meeting of the Combined Chiefs of Staff with Roosevelt and 

Churchill at Casablanca in the second 

week of January, 1943. In its glossing over 

of deep differences of opinion and its 

ambiguous stand on the cross-Channel invasion, it reflected the lack at this time of 

a strong united conviction in the U. S. 

War and Navy Departments on what U. S. 

strategy should be. General Marshall admitted this when the President asked 

whether it was agreed that they should 

meet the British at Casablanca "united in 

advocating a cross-Channel operation." 

Marshall replied "that there was not a 

united front on that subject, particularly 

among the planners." Even among the 

Chiefs of Staff conviction was not strong. 

In Marshall's opinion, they regarded an 

operation across the Channel more favorably than one in the Mediterranean, "but 

the question was still an open one." 136 

The Casablanca Conference 

When the Casablanca Conference 

opened on 12 January 1943 the Allies for 

the first time felt themselves able to 

choose the time and place for carrying the 

war to the enemy. Rommel had been decisively beaten in North Africa. Although 

the fighting in Tunisia continued, it was 

clearly only a matter of time before the 

135 JCS 167/5. 10 Jan 43. 

136 Minutes of a Meeting at the White House on 

Thur:,day. 7 January 1943, at 1500. OPD files. POD 

exec 10. item 45. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

entire North African shore would be 

cleared. The Russians were already on 

the offensive after stopping the Germans 

in Stalingrad. Generaloberst Friedrich 

Paulus with more than 250,000 Germans 

was encircled and helpless before the 

city; the attempt to relieve him had 

failed. III the meantime the Russians had 

launched two other offensives to clear the 

Don Basin. In the Pacific, Japanese expansion had definitely been checked. The 

land and sea battles of Guadalcanal had 

both been won, although in January the 

island was still not entirely cleared. In 

the six months since the dark days of July 

Allied chances for victory had improved 

remarkably throughout the world. 

In the generally brightening picture, 

however, there were still dark spots. 

Darkest was the German submarine 

menace in the Atlantic. Allied shipping 

losses had reached alarming proportions. 

and there was evidence that the German 

submarine fleet was steadily growing. The 

loss of shipping from all causes up to the 

end of 1942 exceeded new construction 

by about one million tons. During the 

year, 1,027 ships were sunk by enemy submarine attack. 137 This was a threat of the 

first magnitude. Without control of the 

seas the great U. S. war potential could not 

even reach the theaters of war; the Allies 

could not undertake the amphibious operations that were necessary throughout 

the world in order to get at the enemy. At 

the first meeting of the Combined Chiefs 

of Staff at Casablanca, Gen. Sir Alan 

Brooke put the matter bluntly. "The 

shortage of shipping," he believed, "was 

137 Samuel E. Morison. The Battle of the Atlantic, 

September 1939-May 1943 (History of United States 

Naval Operations in World War II: I) (Boston. 

1947). p. 410. Over 1.770 ships were lost from all 

causes during the year. 
CASABLANCA CONFERENCE. Seated: President Roosevelt and Prime Minister 

Churchill. Standing, front row, left to right: General Arnold, Admiral King, General Marshall, Admiral Pound, Air Chief Marshal Portal, General Brooke, Field 

Marshal Dill, and Admiral Mountbatten. 
40 

a stranglehold on all offensive operations 

and unless we could effectively combat 

the U-boat menace we might not be able 

to win the war."138 

The other great weakness in the Allied 

position was a paucity of resources. Despite the large war potential of the United 

States, the troops, shipping, supplies, and 

material actually on hand at the beginning of 1943 were sufficient only for relatively small-scale offensive operations in 

one theater. The major strategic question 

before the Combined Chiefs of Staff at 

Casablanca was where and when these 

slender resources could be committed to 

make the maximum contribution to the 

defeat of Germany. The basic issue was 

similar to the problem faced in July: 

granting that the ultimate aim was to 

strike the decisive blow at Germany 

across the Channel, could such a blow be 

struck in 1943? Put another way the question was: if the prospects for a successful 

ROUNDUP in the summer were dubious, 

was it not better to concentrate on the 

Mediterranean where immediate operations offering a good chance of success 

were possible? 

Churchill had no doubt that this was 

the correct strategy. In November he had 

written the President: "The paramount 

task before us is first, to conquer the 

African shores of the Mediterranean and 

set up there the navy and air installations 

138 CCS 55th Mtg, 14 Jan 43. Bound volumes containing the official U.S. minutes of the Casablanca 

(SYMBOL) Conference are in the OPD files. A single 

copy of the British official minutes is in the SHAEF 

SGS files. For all combined conferences the U.S. and 

British minutes are identical, but the latter include, 

in addition, the meetings of the British Chiefs of 

Staff at Casablanca. Since none of the minutes were 

stenographic, quotations here and throughout the 

text reproduce only secretarial summaries and para· 

phrases of the speakers' words. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

which are necessary to open an effective 

passage through it for military traffic; and, 

secondly, using the bases on the African 

shore, to strike at the underbelly of the 

Axis in effective strength and in the 

shortest time." His opinion in January 

1943 had not changed; he submitted then 

that "this surely remains our obvious immediate objective." 139 

It was not, however, obvious to General Marshall. He felt that there was a 

danger of fighting the war on a day-to-day 

opportunistic basis, of taking a series of 

un-co-ordinated steps promoted by immediate tactical considerations without 

considering the over-all strategy by which 

the Germans could be defeated most efficiently and in the shortest possible time. 

Granted that the victory in Africa opened 

the way for exploitation in the Mediterranean, the question still had to be asked 

how such exploitation would fit into "the 

main plot." Unless it could be proved to 

fit somewhere and constitute, moreover, 

the best means of advancing the plot at 

that time, it should not be undertaken 

no matter how tempting was the prospect 

of an easy military victory. 

In answer to General Marshall's question, there was one obvious approach. 

What else could be done? General Brooke 

developed the argument from necessity. 

He pointed out that, on the Continent, 

Russia was the only Ally with large land 

forces in action. Comparing the Russian 

effort with the twenty-one divisions that 

the Western Allies could hope to land in 

France in 1943, he urged that "any effort 

of the other Allies must necessarily be so 

small as to be unimportant in the over-all 

139 Note by Minister of Defence, 25 Nov 42, WP 

(42) 543, annex to 3d Br COS Casablanca Mtg. 

SHAEF SGS file 337/5, British Min of SYMBOL Conf. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 41 

picture.” He contended that with limited 

resources the Allies could not expect to 

engage any considerable portion of the 

German land forces. The forty-four German divisions estimated to be in western 

Europe, he said, would “overwhelm us on 

the ground, and perhaps hem us in with 

wire or concrete to such an extent that 

any expansion of the bridgehead would 

be extremely difficult.” 140 The argument 

on the relative futility of trying to influence the course of the land battle in Europe was lent considerable cogency by 

Molotov’s prior request to General Marshall for the commitment in “the second 

front” of sufficient troops to draw off forty 

divisions from the Eastern Front.141 This 

was ludicrously beyond the capacity of 

the Western Allies at that time. 

Even if a landing on the Continent 

were feasible, it was likely to be much 

more costly than an assault in the Mediterranean. The British pointed out that 

the rail system of France would permit 

the simultaneous movement of at least 

seven German divisions from the east to 

reinforce the Atlantic Wall, whereas only 

one division at a time could be moved 

from north to south to meet an Allied attack in the Mediterranean. Use of the 

argument also revealed that direct assistance to Russia, the dominant consideration in July, was no longer a primary 

concern. It was further argued that such 

assistance could not be given. ROUNDUP 

preparations could not be completed before the middle of August; it was more 

likely that the operation could not be 

mounted before early autumn. In that 

case, it would not support the Russian 

summer campaign. Finally, it was un140 CCS 58th Mtg, 16 Jan 43. 

141 See above, p. 24. 

likely that the relatively small force which 

the Allies could put on the Continent 

would require the Germans to shift troops 

to defeat it. For the same reason it was 

doubtful whether even the German Luftwaffe could be brought to decisive battle. 

In sum, the argument was that ROUNDUP 

in 1943 would do no good and would invite disaster. 

The Prime Minister continued to 

think of a SLEDGEHAMMER attack against 

the Continent in 1943, and in order to 

make it possible advised planning a Mediterranean operation to be accomplished 

cheaply and quickly after the windup of 

the North African campaign.142 The chief 

arguments for continuing attacks in the 

Mediterranean, however, were the immediate strategic advantages to be gained 

from them. In the first place, since there 

were several plausible objectives in the 

Mediterranean, a skillful use of feints 

might well force the Germans to disperse 

a large number of troops to meet widespread threats to Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, 

the Dodecanese Islands, and the coasts of 

Italy and Greece before any operation 

was actually launched. In the second 

place, if Italy could be knocked out of the 

war (and that in the British view was the 

major immediate objective of any action 

contemplated in the Mediterranean) , the 

Germans would not only have to take over 

the defense of Italy but would also have 

to assume Italian commitments for defense of the Balkans. The Prime Minister 

was also drawn to the possibility of tempting Turkey into the war. He felt that by 

clearing the Mediterranean a valuable 

selling point would be gained for negotiations with Turkey. If Turkey could be 

brought in, the British planned to use the 

142 1st Br COS Casablanca Mtg. see n. 138. 

THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

picture." He contended that with limited 

resources the Allies could not expect to 

engage any considerable portion of the 

German land forces. The forty-four German divisions estimated to be in western 

Europe, he said, would "overwhelm us on 

the ground, and perhaps hem us in with 

wire or concrete to such an extent that 

any expansion of the bridgehead would 

be extremely difficult." 140 The argument 

on the relative futility of trying to influence the course of the land battle in Europe was lent considerable cogency by 

Molotov's prior request to General Marshall for the commitment in "the second 

front" of sufficient troops to draw off forty 

divisions from the Eastern Front.141 This 

was ludicrously beyond the capacity of 

the Western Allies at that time. 

Even if a landing on the Continent 

were feasible, it was likely to be much 

more costly than an assault in the Mediterranean. The British pointed out that 

the rail system of France would permit 

the simultaneous movement of at least 

seven German divisions from the east to 

reinforce the Atlantic Wall, whereas only 

one division at a time could be moved 

from north to south to meet an Allied attack in the Mediterranean. Use of the 

argument also revealed that direct assistance to Russia, the dominant consideration in July, was no longer a primary 

concern. It was further argued that such 

assistance could not be given. ROUNDUP 

preparations could not be completed before the middle of August; it was more 

likely that the operation could not be 

mounted before early autumn. In that 

case, it would not support the Russian 

summer campaign. Finally, it was un140 ccs 58th Mtg, 16 Jan 43. 

141 See above, p. 24. 

41 

likely that the relatively small force which 

the Allies could put on the Continent 

would require the Germans to shift troops 

to defeat it. For the same reason it was 

doubtful whether even the German Luftwaffe could be brought to decisive battle. 

In sum, the argument was that ROUNDUP 

in 1943 would do no good and would invite disaster. 

The Prime Minister continued to 

think of a SLEDGEHAMMER attack against 

the Continent in 1943, and in order to 

make it possible advised planning a Mediterranean operation to be accomplished 

cheaply and quickly after the windup of 

the North African campaign.142 The chief 

arguments for continuing attacks in the 

Mediterranean, however, were the immediate strategic advantages to be gained 

from them. In the first place, since there 

were several plausible objectives in the 

Mediterranean, a skillful use of feints 

might well force the Germans to disperse 

a large number of troops to meet widespread threats to Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, 

the Dodecanese Islands, and the coasts of 

Italy and Greece before any operation 

was actually launched. In the second 

place, if Italy could be knocked out of the 

war (and that in the British view was the 

major immediate objective of any action 

contemplated in the Mediterranean) , the 

Germans would not only have to take over 

the defense of Italy but would also have 

to assume Italian commitments for defense of the Balkans. The Prime Minister 

was also drawn to the possibility of tempting Turkey into the war. He felt that by 

clearing the Mediterranean a valuable 

selling point would be gained for'negotiations with Turkey. If Turkey could be 

brought in, the British planned to use the 

142 1st Br COS Casablanca Mtg. See n. 138. 
42 

country as a base from which to attack the 

Romanian oil fields and open the Black 

Sea route to Russia. They did not contemplate the use of Turkish troops in attacking outside of Turkey. 

The British arguments in favor of the 

Mediterranean as the scene for 1943 attacks were, from a tactical standpoint, 

convincing enough, but they did not meet 

Marshall's objections that the Mediterranean could not be considered the main 

arena for meeting and fighting German 

military might. The Americans believed 

and consistently maintained that Germany's defeat "could only be effected by 

direct military action," 143 and that that 

action must be directed against the main 

body of the German Army in the west. 

The British thought Germany might be 

defeated primarily by destroying the 

enemy's will to resist through air attack 

and encirclement. They reasoned that 

"Germany's will to fight depended 

largely on her confidence in ultimate 

success." 144 Repeated victories by Russia 

and the Western Allies, even if on the 

perimeter of the German Lebensraum, 

would make Germany "realize that the 

prospects were hopeless." If despite that 

realization the Germans still refused to 

surrender, then direct attack from the 

west would be employed to deal the deciding blow. 

The U. S. Chiefs of Staff did not discount the possibility of a sudden German 

collapse. On the whole, however, they 

held firm to the conviction that neither 

the air offensive nor victories in the Mediterranean could so significantly weaken 

the German's will to resist as to justify 

prolonged delay in mounting the final 

143 Admiral King speaking at CCS 58th Mtg. 

144 Air Marshal Portal at CCS 58th Mtg. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

attack. General Marshall stated the 

United States point of view in these 

terms: "It has been the conception of the 

United States Chiefs of Staff that Germany must be defeated by a powerful effort on the Continent, carrying out the 

'BOLERO' and 'ROUNDUP' plans." Aid to 

Russia was important in order to absorb 

German strength, but "any method of accomplishing this other than on the Continent is a deviation from the basic plan." 

He then made it clear that if the Americans should agree to Mediterranean operations they would be accepting a temporary expedient compelled by immediate circumstances. They would not consider that they had thereby approved in 

principle any departure from their overall strategy. The question, Marshall submitted, was: "To what extent must the 

United Nations adhere to the general 

concept and to what extent do they undertake diversions for the purpose of assisting Russia, improving the tonnage situation, and maintaining momentum." That 

this distinction should not be missed, he 

asked pointedly whether the British 

Chiefs of Staff considered that an attack 

now against Sicily was a means to an end 

or an end in itself. Did they view it as "a 

part of an integrated plan to win the war 

or simply taking advantage of an opportunity"? 145 

However, having drawn this line between strategy and expediency, the U. S. 

Chiefs of Staff then agreed that circumstances made a Mediterranean operation 

expedient. After some discussion the 

Combined Chiefs decided that, as between the two possible invasions (Sardinia or Sicily) , Sicily was the more profitable attack with the resources available. 

145 ccs 58th Mtg. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

The principal grounds on which the 

Americans conceded the argument were 

that they had large numbers of troops in 

North Africa which could not be readily 

employed outside the Mediterranean and 

that the Sicilian operation would "effect 

an economy of tonnage which is the major 

consideration." 146 Even in yielding, however, General Marshall said that "he was 

most anxious not to become committed 

to interminable operations in the Mediterranean. He wished Northern France to 

be the scene of the main effort against 

Germany-that had always been his conception." 147 

To this Air Chief Marshal Portal significantly replied that it was impossible 

to say where they should stop in the Mediterranean since the object was to knock 

out Italy altogether. The difference of 

opinion had not been resolved. It had 

only been temporarily abated for the sake 

of arriving at a vital decision to maintain 

the momentum of the war against Germany. 

The question of how to proceed against 

Germany was posed at Casablanca in the 

context of the global war. While devoting 

all possible energy and resources to defeating Germany, it was clear that the 

Allies could not afford simply to turn 

their backs on Japan. It has already been 

pointed out that the U. S. Chiefs of Staff 

since July had veered toward a decision 

to increase substantially the effort in the 

Pacific. They spelled out their new point 

of view to the British for the first time at 

Casablanca. The United States desired 

to maintain pressure against the Japanese, 

146 Marshall speaking at 2d ANFA Mtg. 18 Jan 43. 

The ANFA meetings were those presided over by the 

President and Prime Minister. 

147 CCS 60th Mtg. 18 Jan 43. 

43 

General Marshall told the British Chiefs 

of Staff, in order to forestall another 

"series of crises," which had wrecked offensive plans in the early part of 1942.148 

Maintaining pressure, of course, meant 

mounting attacks. Admiral King estimated that the attacks considered necessary would require roughly double the 

current U. S. forces in the Pacific. There 

was a danger, he pointed out, that without a great effort to assist Generalissimo 

Chiang Kai-shek China might pull out of 

the war. General Marshall added that 

helping China carry the fight against 

Japan "might have a most favorable effect on Stalin." 149 The U. S. Chiefs of 

Staff therefore especially recommended 

pushing operations in Burma. 

The British frankly did not like this 

new attitude. In general they regarded 

the Pacific in much the same light as General Marshall regarded the Mediterranean-an invitation to diversions from 

the main effort. While admitting in principle the need for unremitting pressure 

against Japan, the British Chiefs of Staff 

feared it would mean weakening the offensive against Germany. General Brooke 

tried to force the issue by stating it as a 

problem of reviewing "the correctness of 

our basic strategic concept which calls for 

the defeat of Germany first." He believed 

that the Allies could not take on Germany and Japan at the same time. The 

Americans denied any intention of altering the basic strategy. On the contrary, 

"The whole concept of defeating Germany first," Marshall submitted, "had 

been jeopardized by the lack of resources 

in the Pacific." He recalled how the 

United States had nearly been forced to 

1482d ANFA Mtg. 

149 CCS 56th Mtg. 14 Jan 43. 
44 

withdraw from TORCH because of the danger of reducing the slender resources in 

the Pacific. "A hand-to-mouth policy such 

as this was most uneconomical." It was 

essential to establish a sound position in 

the Pacific. That could not be done simply 

by defensive deployment. The Japanese 

themselves were busy consolidating and 

would certainly continue their attempts 

to advance if they were given a breathing 

spell. To forestall them the Allies must 

attack. Furthermore it would unduly prolong the war if the United States waited 

until after the defeat of Germany before securing positions from which the 

final offensive against Japan could be 

la u nched.150 

The British at last yielded the point. 

They had already agreed to operations in 

Burma to open the road to China. They 

now approved plans to mount both overland and amphibious attacks against the 

Japanese in Burma during 1943. They 

further agreed to the seizure of Rabaul 

and reserved decision on a proposed attack against Truk. 

Casablanca focused attention on 1943 

and concluded with a statement that the 

operations envisaged in 1943 were designed to bring about the defeat of Germany in that year.151 This was for the record-but there were reservations. The 

Americans in particular were not sanguine about the prospects of victory in 

1943. General Arnold asked for a decision 

on what might be done in 1944 so that 

production schedules could be planned in 

advance. General Brooke replied that "we 

could definitely count on re-entering the 

Continent in 1944 on a large scale."152 

150 CCS 60th Mtg, 18 Jan 411. 

151 CCS 155/1, Conduct of the War in 194!!, 19 Jan 

411. 

1&2 CCS 58th Mtg. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

The Combined Chiefs of Staff then proposed setting up a combined command 

and planning organization to plan for 

small-scale raids, a return to the Continent in 1943 under conditions of German 

collapse, a limited operation in 1943 to 

secure a bridgehead on the Continent for 

later exploitation, and last "an invasion in 

force in 1944." 153 

Even though a 1944 ROUNDUP lay far 

ahead in a somewhat clouded future, the 

conference undertook to give preliminary 

shape to its ultimate command organization. Roosevelt proposed a British supreme commander, but on Churchill's 

suggestion decision was postponed. At the 

moment the Prime Minister believed it 

was necessary only to select a commander 

to undertake the planning. This commander, he agreed, should be British, but 

he enunciated the principle that "the 

command of operations should, as a general rule, be held by an officer of the nation which furnishes the majority of the 

force." 154 At a later meeting the Combined Chiefs decided that it would be sufficient to select a British Chief of Staff, together with "an independent United 

States-British Staff." 155 In examining 

this proposal the President questioned 

whether "sufficient drive would be applied if only a Chief of Staff were appointed." 156 General Brooke thought 

that "a man with the right qualities ... 

could do what was necessary in the early 

stages." 157 It was left at that-a curiously 

vague and inauspicious beginning for the 

153 CCS 169, Organization of Command, Control, 

Planning and Training for Cross-Channel Operations, 22 Jan 411. 

1542d ANFA Mtg. 

155 CCS 67th Mtg, 22 Jan 411. 

156 lid ANFA Mtg. 2!! Jan 411. 

151 Ibid. 
THE ROOTS OF STRATEGY 

staff that would write the OVERLORD plan 

and then become the nucleus of the supreme headquarters that carried it out. 

If Casablanca did little to erase the 

vagueness surrounding the ultimate 

ground operations in northwest Europe, 

it at least arrived at more vigorous decisions on an air offensive from the United 

Kingdom. The Combined Chiefs directed 

the initiation at once of a combined U. S.-

British bomber offensive aimed at "the 

progressive destruction and dislocation 

of the German military, industrial, and 

economic system and the undermining of 

the morale of the German people to a 

point where their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened." 158 

Most of the big decisions of the Casablanca conferences were made during the 

first week. General Brooke undertook to 

summarize these for the President and 

the Prime Minister: 

Measures to be taken to combat the submarine menace are a first charge on the resources of the United Nations .... Our 

efforts in defeating Germany will be concerned first with efforts to force them to withdraw ground and air forces from the Russian 

front.159 This will be accomplished byoperations from North Africa by which Southern 

Europe, the Dodecanese Islands, Greece, 

Crete, Sardinia, and Sicily will all be threatened, thus forcing Germany to deploy her 

forces to meet each threat. The actual operaHBCCS 166/1/D. The Bomber Offensive from the 

United Kingdom. 21 Jan 43. See below. Ch. VI. 

169 As noted above, it does not appear from the 

records that this was actually an important consider· 

ation. The strategic concept underlying Mediterranean operations was the much more general idea 

of attrition. 

45 

tion decided upon is the capture of Sicily. 

At the same time we shall go on with preparing forces and assembling landing craft in 

England for a thrust across the Channel in 

the event that the German strength in France 

decreases, either through withdrawal of her 

troops or because of an internal collapse. 

. . . The maximum combined air offensive 

will be conducted against Germany from the 

United Kingdom. By this and every other 

available means, attempts will be made to 

undermine Germany's morale. Every effort 

will be made, political and otherwise, to induce Turkey to enter the war in order that 

we may establish air bases there for operations against Roumania. . . .160 

As an outline of a strategic concept for 

the guidance of planning, these decisions 

were not much clearer than the decisions 

of July 1942. Certainly the extent of commitment to an eventual cross-Channel operation was no more specific. But in providing for the establishment of a planning 

staff and in agreeing to push the BOLERO 

build-u p despite continuing operations in 

the Mediterranean, Casablanca had, in 

fact, laid the groundwork for OVERLORD. 

During the next six months, planning 

and preparations in the United Kingdom 

would of themselves clear much of the 

academic mist from the face of the crossChannel project and convert it from a 

map problem into a plan of action for 

which the necessary men and material 

were on hand or in prospect. And this 

would happen while the debate on strategy continued through a series of compromise decisions scarcely firmer than 

those with which the Casablanca Conference closed. 

160 2d ANFA Mtg. 
CHAPTER II 

Outline Overlord 

(January-July 1943) 

Organization for Planning 

Several months elapsed before the Casablanca decisions to go ahead with 

ROUNDUP plans and preparations began to 

bear fruit. In these months the European 

theater convalesced slowly from the TORCH 

bloodletting, reasserted its independence, 

and turned again to face northwest Europe across the English Channel. 

Recovery was difficult, for, ever since 

the TORCH decision, the Mediterranean 

had enjoyed a ruthless priority on all resources of war. As already noted, TORCH 

had drawn top U. S. and British personnel 

into what was first a planning group and 

later became Allied Force Headquarters 

(AFHQ) , which under Lt. Gen. Dwight 

D. Eisenhower carried out the North 

African invasion. At the same time General Eisenhower retained command of 

ETOUSA, the headquarters controlling 

U. S. forces in the United Kingdom. Despite the difficulties of this dual role the 

arrangement was preserved in order to 

insure that TORCH might draw at will on 

American resources in England. When 

Eisenhower moved to the Mediterranean, 

he appointed an executive deputy theater 

commander, Maj. Gen. Russell P. Hartle, 

to manage theater affairs in the United 

Kingdom. Hartle served in this capacity 

from 2 November 1942 to the end of 

January 1943. Then, according to plan, 

with TORCH firmly established, AFHQ 

and ETOUSA were formally split. Early 

in February Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews 

was named commanding general of ETOUSA. New theater boundaries gave ETOUSA responsibility for operations in the 

whole of Europe except the Iberian 

Peninsula, Italy, and the Balkans.1

It was a large theater but, when General Andrews took over, it was occupied 

by only a handful of the U. S. Army. Before TORCH swept the larder, U. S. forces 

by the end of September 1942 had built 

up in the United Kingdom to about 188,- 

000 men, including one armored and 

three infantry divisions. In the course of 

the next five months, TORCH took three of 

the four divisions, and a total of over 

150,000 troops. Although partially replenished by shipments from the United 

States, net U. S. strength in Britain had 

fallen to 107,801 by the end of February. 

This was the low point. The build-up 

thereafter began to recover slowly. However, the one division passed over by 

TORCH, the 29th, remained the only divi1 See [Robert W. Coakley] Organization and Command in the ETO (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: Part II), MS, Ch. III. 

Hist Div files. 

CHAPTER II 

Outline Overlord 

(January-July 1943) 

Organization for Planning 

Several months elapsed before the Casablanca decisions to go ahead with 

ROUNDUP plans and preparations began to 

bear fruit. In these months the European 

thea ter convalesced slow I y from the TORCH 

bloodletting, reasserted its independence, 

and turned again to face northwest Europe across the English Channel. 

Recovery was difficult, for, ever since 

the TORCH decision, the Mediterranean 

had enjoyed a ruthless priority on all resources of war. As already noted, TORCH 

had drawn top U. S. and British personnel 

into what was first a planning group and 

later became Allied Force Headquarters 

(AFHQ) , which under Lt. Gen. Dwight 

D. Eisenhower carried out the North 

African invasion. At the same time General Eisenhower retained command of 

ETOUSA, the headquarters controlling 

U. S. forces in the United Kingdom. Despite the difficulties of this dual role the 

arrangement was preserved in order to 

insure that TORCH might draw at will on 

American resources in England. When 

Eisenhower moved to the Mediterranean, 

he appointed an executive deputy theater 

commander, Maj. Gen. Russell P. Hartle, 

to manage theater affairs in the United 

Kingdom. Hartle served in this capacity 

from 2 November 1942 to the end of 

January 1943. Then, according to plan, 

with TORCH firmly established, AFHQ 

and ETOUSA were formally split. Early 

in February Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews 

was named commanding general of ETOUSA. New theater boundaries gave ETOUSA responsibility for operations in the 

whole of Europe except the Iberian 

Peninsula, Italy, and the Balkans.! 

It was a large theater but, when General Andrews took over, it was occupied 

by only a handful of the U. S. Army. Before TORCH swept the larder, U. S. forces 

by the end of September 1942 had built 

up in the United Kingdom to about 188,-

000 men, including one armored and 

three infantry divisions. In the course of 

the next five months, TORCH took three of 

the four divisions, and a total of over 

150,000 troops. Although partially replenished by shipments from the United 

States, net U. S. strength in Britain had 

fallen to 107,801 by the end of February. 

This was the low point. The build-up 

thereafter began to recover slowly. However, the one division passed over by 

TORCH) the 29th, remained the only divi1 See [Robert W. Coakley] Organization and Command in the ETO (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: Part II) , MS, Ch. III. 

Hist Div files. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD UANUARY-JULY 1943) 47 

sion in the United Kingdom until the fall 

of 1943.2 

TORCH interfered even more drastically 

with the air corps build-up. The new 

Eighth Air Force was only beginning to 

accumulate its striking power when it was 

required to form the Twelfth Air Force to 

support TORCH. It surrendered to the 

Twelfth Air Force about half of its complement of aircraft (l,lOO planes) and 

much of its key personnel including its 

commander, Maj. Gen. Carl Spaatz. General Eaker, who took command of what 

was left, complained that still worse than 

the loss of planes was the loss of prioriw 

on organizational equipment, spare parts, 

and replacements of aircraft and personnel.3 The net result was that U. S. participation in the bomber offensive against 

Germany was set back eight or nine 

months and did not begin to become effective until the spring of 1943.4 

Stock piles of supplies and equipment 

that had been accumulated in the United 

Kingdom to maintain a cross-Channel operation were also drawn into the Mediterranean, in some cases at a rate even 

faster than the movement of troops. Thus 

the level of supply of some items actually 

declined for the troops that remained in 

Britain. In addition monthly delivery of 

2 [Morton Yarman] TORCfl and the European 

Theater of Operations (The Administrative and 

Logistical History of the ETO: Part IV), MS, pp. 

95ff. Hist Div files. Figures on troop strength are 

derived from Transportation Corps sources and indicate troops actually carried into and out of the 

United Kingdom. Slight discrepancies exist between 

them and the official troop assignment figures. A 

detailed account of troop build-up in the United 

Kingdom will be found in R. G. Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, a volume under preparation in this series. 

S Rpt, Eaker to Arnold, Oct 42, cited in Yarman, 

TORCH, p. 119. 

4 See below, Ch. VI. 

supplies to the United Kingdom which 

in September reached almost 240,000 

long tons had dropped in February to 

20,000 tons. BOLERO shipments began to 

pick up slowly in March but did not regain the September rate until July. 

In the meantime planning for ROUNDUP 

continued under the aegis of the Combined Commanders. The new combined 

planning staff ordered at Casablanca was 

slow in taking shape. The difficulties, 

though relatively minor, seemed to require a large amount of discussion. Casablanca had been vague about both the 

mission and the form of the new staff. 

The specification that it would function 

under a chief of staff to an unnamed supreme commander implied that the planners could henceforth be regarded as the 

nucleus of the headquarters that would 

eventually control the operations. Beyond 

that, Casablanca recalled that a "special 

inter-allied staff" had already been working "for some months" on cross-Channel 

plans, and suggested that "this special 

planning staff should be adapted to the 

new conditions and strengthened by the 

addition of American personnel. They 

should work, under the direction of the 

Supreme Commander (or his deputy until he is appointed) , in conjunction with 

the nucleus of his combined staff in London." 5 

But all this was not much more than 

a collection of working notes by the Combined Chiefs, reminding themselves in a 

general way of the nature of the problem 

they would have to solve later by means 

of a directive actually establishing the organization they recognized as needed. By 

5 CCS 169, Organization of Command, Control, 

Planning and Training for Cross-Channel Operations, 22 Jan 43. 
48 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the end of February the British Chiefs of 

Staff had drafted such a directive, but it 

provided for a predominantly British organization, not very different from the 

Combined Commanders. Addressed to a 

British chief of staff for cross-Channel operations, it directed him to report to the 

British Chiefs of Staff and charged him 

temporarily with the command responsibilities of the supreme commander, pending the latter’s appointment.6 

This draft, as might have been expected, was unsatisfactory to the Americans, who amended it to make the chief 

of staff for cross-Channel operations responsible to the Combined Chiefs and 

limit his responsibility to planning. They 

added further that the Commanding General, ETOUSA, should be considered as 

the direct representative of the United 

States Chiefs of Staff and that he should 

be consulted on all plans with respect to 

the employment of United States forces.7

The American amendments were 

promptly accepted by the British and the 

new directive was approved by the Combined Chiefs on 5 March.8 However, the 

question of when the new staff should be 

organized and what planning responsibility it should have was not thereby 

settled. The British Chiefs of Staff recommended delay. They understood that 

BOLERO build-up plans had been changed 

and that few American troops would actually be present in the United Kingdom 

during 1943.9 They reasoned that the cur6 CCS 169/1, 25 Feb 43; cf. Cbl, Andrews to Marshall, 28 Feb 43. SHAEF SGS file 322.011/3. 

7 CCS 169/2,2 Mar 43. 

8 CCS 74th Mtg. The directive was issued as CCS 

169/3/D. 

9 COS (43) 105 (0) (Final), 8 Mar 43. Cf. Cbl, 

Marshall to Andrews, 22 Feb 43, cited in Min, COS 

rent arrangements for planning by the 

Combined Commanders were therefore 

adequate and should be continued.10

Under the circumstances they were reluctant to spare the necessary senior officers to form a special staff. Instead they 

suggested appointing a chief staff officer 

to the Combined Commanders, to be 

charged with “co-ordinating and driving 

forward the plans for cross-Channel operations this year and next year.” This appointment was actually made, pending 

American approval of the other suggestions. General Brooke selected Lt. Gen. 

Frederick E. Morgan, and the Prime 

Minister and the Secretary of State for 

War at once approved the nomination.11

The U. S. Chiefs of Staff agreed to General Morgan’s appointment but not to the 

reduced planning arrangements. The 

Combined Chiefs consequently turned 

again to consideration of the special combined staff. The directive of 5 March was 

reintroduced for fresh debate, and the 

month of April witnessed an interchange 

of proposals and counterproposals. Out 

(43) 28th Mtg (0), 24 Feb 43. Marshall wrote that, 

because of an urgency in another theater, no shipping would be available for lifts to the United Kingdom in March and April and that the amount of 

shipping to be available in May could not be determined. Minutes also reproduce cable (COS (W) 

492) from British Chiefs of Staff to Field Marshal 

Dill asking Dill to elucidate the urgency in another 

theater and call to the attention of the U.S. Chiefs 

of Staff the British belief that such diversion of 

shipping from BOLERO constituted an abrogation of 

Casablanca decisions. All COS documents, hereafter 

cited, are located in SHAEF SGS files, unless otherwise specified. See Bibliographical Note. 

10 COS (43) 58th Mtg, 6 Mar 43. 

11 COS (43) 63d Mtg, 12 Mar 43. For General 

Morgan’s background and experience, see Lt. Gen. 

Sir Frederick E. Morgan, Overture to Overlord (New 

York, 1950), pp. l-28. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 49 

of this came a revision of planning tasks. 

The conviction had grown since Casablanca that no operations against the 

Continent, even of limted scale, would be 

possible in 1943. The order to plan such 

operations was therefore struck out and 

instead planners were directed to draw 

up a plan to keep the Germans guessing 

about Allied intentions during the year.12 

Although this change in mission was 

the only basic alteration made during 

more than a month of discussion, one 

issue was raised that revealed an important difference in attitude between the 

U. S. and British Chiefs. This was the 

question of the target date for the 1944 

cross-Channel invasion. Casablanca had 

specified only the year: "an invasion in 

force in 1944." The March 1943 directive 

read: "full-scale invasion in the spring of 

1944." The British struck out "spring" 

in their first attempt at amending the directive. The Americans, in their reply, restored it. The final directive compromised: "A full scale assault against the 

Continent in 1944, as early as possible."13 

The Combined Chiefs finally issued a 

directive on 23 April. By that time the 

new organization was already well under 

way. General Morgan had been told in 

March that, whatever the final arrangements, the chief responsibility for planning cross-Channel operations would be 

his. He was handed a file of planning 

papers and required to make recommendations on the form that he thought 

12 The debate can be followed in CCS 169 series 

and in CCS 80th and 8Ist Mtgs, 16 and 23 April 1943 

respectively, with additional reference to the British 

Chiefs of Staff (COS) papers and meetings already 

cited. Cf. Interv, F. C. Pogue with Gen Morgan, 8 

Feb 47. Hist Div files. 

18 CCS 169 series. 

the staff should take. On the understanding then that the supreme commander 

would be British, General Morgan recommended a British organization headed by 

a British chief of staff. He asked that the 

chief of staff be invested with "plenary 

powers, temporarily to impersonate the 

commander-to-be." This body should be 

the nucleus of an Allied headquarters, 

and General Morgan advised against the 

establishment of any British GHQ. He 

wanted, on the other hand, to have British, Canadian, and American army headquarters set up as soon as possible. Allied 

headquarters would deal directly with the 

armies until such time as the build-up of 

forces in the United Kingdom warranted 

the interpolation of army group headquarters. The Allied staff, General Morgan felt, should effect a "complete amalgamation of the British and American 

personnel, sub-branches being headed by 

American or British officers as found suitable." On the other hand it would be desirable to keep British and American administrative affairs separate. He recommended a thorough integration of the 

various services throughout the echelons 

of command as low as army. Finally he 

asked for a grant to his own organization 

of "the highest possible degree of autonomy, at least in the operational sphere."14 

In short, what General Morgan had in 

mind was a compact planning and co-ordinating staff which should enjoy the 

maximum freedom in carrying out its 

mission of preparing for cross-Channel 

operations and which would represent as 

completely as possible an integration of 

14 All quotes from Memo, Morgan for Br COS, 

Cross·Channel Operations, 21 Mar 43, Annex to COS 

(43) 148 (0), 23 Mar 43. 
GENERAL MORGAN, chief OVERLORD planner. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-jULY 1943) 51 

all services of both nations, combined to 

plan and ultimately to carry out the supreme effort of the Allies against Germany. 

In general the staff established in April 

1943 conformed to General Morgan's 

concept. I t was christened COSSAC after 

the initial letters of Morgan's new title: 

Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander (designate), and its principal 

staff officers met officially for the first time 

on 17 April. General Morgan was not immediately given either the executive 

power he asked for or quite the untrammeled direction he requested over "all 

offensive enterprises of whatever kind 

initiated from the United Kingdom." 15 

He was, however, granted sufficient power 

to tackle the task, and his attitude from 

the beginning was that of an executive 

rather than a planner. He told his staff at 

their first meeting that they should not 

consider themselves planners. "The term, 

'Planning staff' has come to have a most 

sinister meaning-it implies the production of nothing but paper. What we must 

contrive to do somehow is to produce not 

only paper; but action." This would not 

be easy in view of COSSAC's lack of executive authority, but despite that General Morgan said: "My idea is that we 

shall regard ourselves in the first instance 

as primarily a co-ordinating body .... We 

differ from the ordinary planning staff 

in that we are ... the embryo of the future 

Supreme Headquarters Staff." He wanted 

to model his staff on that of Marshal Foch 

at the end of World War I-"a really small 

body of selected officers who dealt with 

the major decisions on broad lines, the 

day-to-day work of the war being dele15 Memo, Cross-Channel Operations, cited n. 14. 

gated completely to commanders of army 

groups." 16 

The original COSSAC staff was divided into five branches: Army, Navy, 

Air, Intelligence, and Administration and 

Logistics. Each branch, except Intelligence, was headed by two Principal Staff 

Officers, British and American. The Intelligence branch initially had only a 

single British head. The Principal Staff 

Officers, in turn, had separate staffs split 

vertically by nationality and horizontally 

into sections devoted to the preparation 

of the various plans for which COSSAC 

was responsible. Thus, for example, the 

Army branch headed by a British and an 

American Principal Staff Officer had two 

head planners (British and American) 

and under them British and American officers in three sections working respectively on plan OVERLORD, plan RANKIN 

(the plan for a return to the Continent 

under conditions of German collapse), 

and plan COCKADE (threat to hold the 

maximum number of German forces in 

the west in 1942). In addition there were 

three advisory sections. Naval and Air 

branches had more or less parallel divisions. The Intelligence and Administrative branches were subdivided by sea, air, 

and land; in the Administrative branch 

these subdivisions were doubled by nationality. The Principal Staff Officers 

were responsible for co-ordinating all 

joint problems before presenting them to 

COSSAC. Army, Navy, and Air branches 

prepared the outline appreciations and 

plans. The Intelligence branch was to 

supply the necessary information about 

16 COSSAC (43) 1st Mtg, 17 Apr 43. All COSSAC 

documents referred to are located in the collections 

of COSSAC papers and minutes of staff conferences 

in SHAEF SGS files. See Bibliographical Note. 
52 

the enemy and the Administrative branch 

analyzed the resources called for. The Administrative branch was also responsible 

for developing administrative and logistical plans within the operational frameworkY 

This organization, though fairly satisfactory at first, became cumbersome as 

COSSAC's duties and American representation increased, and as the staff took 

on more the complexion of a supreme 

headquarters. With the appointment toward the end of June of Air Marshal Sir 

Trafford Leigh-Mallory as Air Commander-in-Chief pro tern, the COSSAC 

United States and British air staffs were 

amalgamated into a single staff.Is This 

process of fusing nationalities into a 

single combined organization had started 

informally earlier. The Intelligence 

branch had had a single head from the 

beginning. The Administrative branch 

was integrated very soon after its formation under Maj. Gen. N. C. D. Brownjohn 

(British). On 16 July, General Morgan 

decreed that a single Operations branch 

should be formed with sections grouped 

functionally but not separated by nationality. Complete integration of the 

combined headquarters, however, did not 

take place until the fall when Maj. Gen. 

Ray Barker, Deputy Chief of Staff, announced the abolition of any division 

along national lines in favor of a purely 

functional organization.IO 

11 COSSAC (43) 12 (First Draft), Provisional Organization of COSSAC Staff, 25 May 43. 

18 See below. Leigh-Mallory had an anomalous appointment to make decisions on air matters without 

prejudice to the Air Commander-in-Chief when 

appointed. See COSSAC 12th Staff Mtg, 26 Jun 43. 

10 COSSAC (43) 29th Mtg, 8 Oct 43. Barker was 

presiding in the absence of Morgan, who was visiting Washington. See below, Ch. III. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

It was impossible to keep COSSAC 

small. Even though the day-to-day work 

was in large part delegated to lower headquarters, the co-ordinating functions of 

COSSAC continued to expand up to the 

time when it came of age in January 1944 

as the Supreme Allied Command. Not 

only did its planning duties increase to 

include, for instance, Civil Affairs and 

Publicity and Psychological Warfare, but 

it became imperative to assume the executive obligations implicit in COSSAC's responsibility for the cross-Channel operation. Thus in the fall of 1943 COSSAC 

took over the task of co-ordinating raiding and reconnaissance in northwest Europe in order to relate those activities to 

the ultimate invasion and to the 1943 diversion program.20 A little later General 

Morgan assumed a similar responsibility 

for directing certain aspects of the partisan and underground movements on the 

Continent, so far as these were strategically related to the COSSAC plans. 21 

While organization of the COSSAC 

staff proceeded, the British took steps to 

form their Army, Navy, and Air high commands for the invasion. The whole frame 

of the British field command was firmly 

established in the spring and early summer, and each of the service headquarters, 

preceding similar U. S. organizations by 

several months, became the nucleus of the 

20 COS (43) 2l7th Mtg (0), 16 Sep 43; COS (43) 

624 (0), 13 Oct 43. 

21 COSSAC's authority included operational control of all underground movements directed from 

London, the general direction of planning such 

movements, and the use and co·ordination of instructions on target priorities. See COSSAC (43) 58 

(Final) , Proposals for Control by COSSAC of SOEI 

SO Activities in Northwest Europe, 20 Oct 43. 

ETOUSA concurred by indorsement on 11 Nov 43. 

SHAEF G-3 file Ops C, 322.7 II; d. COS (43) 237th 

Mtg (0), 5 Oct 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 53 

eventual command over the combined 

invasion forces. 22 

By July the Second British Army, the 

First Canadian Army, and 21 Army 

Group all had functioning headquarters. 

The 21 Army Group, under command of 

General Sir Bernard Paget, took over 

from the Home Defence Command all 

planning, training, and executive functions in regard to British expeditionary 

forces. General Morgan at once established close liaison with Paget's staff and 

depended on them thereafter for detailed 

information and advice on the employment of British ground forces. More than 

that, 21 Army Group became the principal advisers on ground tactics and all 

matters of army interest in the assault. 

This inevitably followed from the lack of 

any parallel U. S. organization. With V 

Corps still the highest U. S. tactical headquarters in the United Kingdom, the 

U. S. Army partici pated in COSSAC planning through theater headquarters, ETOUSA. In fact, since no table of organization was set up by the War Department 

for the U. S. half of the COSSAC staff, the 

American COSSAC planners functioned 

on detached service from the G-5 (plans) 

section of ETOUSA. Although both General Andrews and his successor, Lt. Gen. 

Jacob L. Devers,23 took an active part in 

the planning, they could not supply an 

organization parallel to the British for 

detailed examination of army problems. 

This deficiency was not remedied until 

22 Information on establishment of British headquarters from Intervs, F. C. Pogue with Lt Col H. A. 

Pollock (13 Dec 46) , Gen Morgan (8 Feb 47) , Gen 

Barker (4 Oct 46) , and Cen Paget (6 Feb 47) . Hist 

Div files. 

23 General Andrews was killed in an airplane crash 

in Iceland on 3 May 1943. Devers was assigned to the 

European post after having served as Chief of the 

Armored Force at Fort Knox since 1941. 

October when First U. S. Army was established in England. 

The British similarly outdistanced the 

Americans in creating naval and air commands for invasion. On 5 May the British 

Admiralty issued a directive to Admiral 

Sir Charles Little, Commander-in-Chief, 

Portsmouth, appointing him Naval Commander-in-Chief (designate) for the 

cross-Channel operations being planned 

by COSSAC. 24 The appointment was in 

addition to his normal duties as commander of all British naval forces operating out of the Portsmouth area. To handle his new assignment he was authorized 

a special planning staff to be known as 

Naval Staff (X).25 His Chief of Naval 

Staff (X), Commodore J. Hughes-Hallett, 

who had commanded the naval force at 

Dieppe, became a member of the 

COSSAC staff in May.26 

All U. S. naval forces operating from 

the United Kingdom were at that time 

under Admiral Stark, Commander-inChief Naval Forces in Europe. As in the 

case of the U. S. Army, tactical organization for the invasion was delayed until 

the fall when the Twelfth Fleet under 

Rear Adm. Alan G. Kirk was organized.27 

Stark's headquarters, therefore, was 

24 Ltr, H. N. Morrison to Admiral Little. SHAEF 

SGS file 322.011/2. 

25 COS (43) 73d Mtg, 12 Apr 43. 

26 COSSAC Staff Conf, 1 May 43. SHAEF SGS file 

337/14. At the beginning of World War II, HughesHallett was serving as second in command of the 

Norfolk. In 1940 he became deputy director of Local 

Defence at the Admiralty and followed this tour of 

duty with appointment as chairman of the Admiralty's radar committee. He went to Combined Operations Headquarters in 1942. In August 1943 Commodore Hughes-Hallett was replaced on the COSSAC 

staff by Rear Adm. G. E. Creasy. 

27 There had never been any question that the 

British, who supplied the bulk of the naval forces, 

would have the Allied naval command. 
54 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

charged with co-ordinating U. S. preparations for OVERLORD with ETOUSA and 

COSSAC, but had no specific tactical responsibility. Admiral Stark, in addition 

to supplying COSSAC with a U. S. naval 

staff, sent liaison officers to Admiral 

Little’s headquarters and also to the Plymouth and Milford Haven Commands 

which were the bases from which the U. S. 

naval assault forces would sail.28

The beginnings of a Royal Air Force 

organization for support of ground operations on the European continent were 

made in March 1943. Air Marshal Portal 

then proposed the formation of a “Composite Group Headquarters” within the 

fighter command, both to test ideas for organization for Continental operations and 

to function as a command if a German 

collapse should require a return to the 

Continent before detailed preparations 

could be made. The composite group, established on 19 March, grew rapidly into 

a full-scale tactical air force.29 The Tactical Air Force was formally recognized as 

existing from 1 June with Air Vice Marshal Sir John Henry d’Albiac in command.30 Again the U. S. parallel organization came late on the scene with the reconstitution in England of the Ninth Air 

Force in October.31

Size and Shape of the Attack 

When the COSSAC staff began work, 

it had a large amount of experience and 

28Administrative History, U.S. Naval Forces in 

Europe, MS, pp. 237ff. Hist Div tiles. 

29 COS (43) 149 (0), 23 Mar 43; COS (43) 248 

(0), 10 May 43. Also documents in British Air Ministry Collection, excerpted by U.S. Air Forces Historical Unit. 

30D’Albiac was succeeded in January 1944 by Air 

Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham. 

31 For formation of U.S. commands for OVERLORD, 

see below, Ch. V. 

data accumulated through two years of 

planning for ROUNDUP and through experimentation in minor cross-Channel operations. The most important practical 

experience came from the Dieppe raid in 

August 1942. 32 The raid carried out 

under joint British and Canadian command33 and largely with Canadian troops 

-about one thousand British troops and 

fifty U. S. Rangers also took part-was 

originated in Mountbatten’s Combined 

Operations headquarters in order to test 

amphibious tactics and techniques in a 

large-scale operation. The most ambitious 

attack on the French coast up to that time 

had been the raid on St. Nazaire in March 

1942. But St. Nazaire was still only a hitand-run commando foray. Dieppe was 

planned as a miniature invasion, involving the full use of combined arms and 

mass landings of infantry and armor with 

the object of seizing a beachhead. Except 

that there was no intention of holding the 

beachhead, Dieppe was drawn as closely 

as possible to the pattern of a full-scale 

amphibious attack. Specifically it was designed to test the newly developed LCT 

in landing tanks across the beaches and to 

find out whether it would be possible to 

take a port by direct frontal assault. It 

would also test naval organization in managing a considerable landing fleet (253 

ships and craft), and air organization in 

gaining air supremacy over the landing 

area and providing support for the 

ground troops. 

32 For full account of the Dieppe raid, see Col C. 

P. Stacey, The Canadian Army, 1939-1945: An Official Historical Summary (Ottawa, 1948)) pp. 64-86. 

33The Military Force Commander was Maj. Gen. 

J. H. Roberts, commander of the 2d Canadian Division. Naval and air force commanders were British, 

Commodore J. Hughes-Hallett and Air Marshal Sir 

Trafford Leigh-Mallory respectively. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 55 

BRITISH LANDING CRAFT ON BEACH AT DlEPPE 

The raid was carried out on 19 August 

1942 as planned. Tactically, it failed. 

Very heavy enemy opposition resulted in 

severe casualties and the planned withdrawal nine hours after the touchdown 

was carried out under difficulties reminiscent of Dunkerque. Besides nearly 1,000 

dead, about 2,000 Canadians were left behind as prisoners. Of 6,100 men embarked 

on the expedition only 2,500 returned, 

including an estimated 1,000 men who 

never landed. Although the cost was severe, the Dieppe raid provided some valuable experience both for the tactics of 

amphibious operations and specifically 

for the planning for OVERLORD.34 As concerned the latter, Dieppe seems in gen84 For the effect of the Dieppe raid on tactical doctrine, see below, Ch. V. 

eral to have impressed planners with the 

hardness of the enemy's fortified shell and 

the consequent need for concentrating 

the greatest possible weight in the initial 

assault in order to crack it. 

'Whether as a direct result of Dieppe or 

not, ROUNDUP planning in the winter of 

1942-43 took a new turn. It had hitherto 

been assumed that attacks against the 

French coast should be widely dispersed 

in order to prevent the enemy from concentrating on the destruction of anyone 

beachhead. In November 1942, General 

Barker and Maj. Gen. J. A. Sinclair, chief 

British planner, started on another tack. 

In examining the requirements for a suitable assault area for a major operation, 

they premised their study on the principle 

of concentration. Abandoning the ROUND-
56 

UP idea of many separate regimental and 

commando assaults, they assumed one 

main landing in an area capable of development into a lodgment for the whole 

Allied invasion force. 35 

They then analyzed the conditions essential for such an area. It first had to be 

within range of fighter planes based in the 

United Kingdom in order that air supremacy might counterbalance the unusual 

hazards of a major amphibious assault. At 

the time the study was made, fighter cover 

extended only over the coast between 

Cherbourg and Knocke (in the northwest corner of Belgium) . Further to insure air supremacy, the area selected had 

to contain airfields or sites for airfields 

which could be made available to Allied 

fighters at an early date.3s 

The beach defenses had to be capable 

of reduction by naval fire, air bombardment, or airborne troops. It was desirable, 

obviously, that the beach defenses be as 

weak as possible, but the essential thing 

was that there should be a reasonable 

chance of neutralizing them. This requirement, in fact, ruled out only small 

beaches dominated by well-defended 

cliff positions and areas, such as the 

Netherlands, where the enemy could defend by large inundations which the 

Allies had no means of combatting. 

The selected assault area must permit 

35 Capt. M. McLaren, Secretary to the Combined 

Commanders, pointed out that the study reversed the 

ROUNDUP concept of maximum dispersion in order 

to prevent the enemy from concentrating on the 

destruction of anyone bridgehead. Memo, Operation OVERLoR[}-Main Appreciation, 12 Dec 42. 

SHAEF G-3 file 370-43. 

36 This and the following four paragraphs are 

from CC (42) 108, Selection of Assault Areas in 

a Major Operation in Northwest Europe. A late 

draft (5 Feb 43) is in SHAEF SGS file, Combined 

Commanders Papers. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the Allied rate of build-up to compete 

with that of the enemy. From this, other 

conditions followed. The area had to contain one major port that could be captured quickly. It was also desirable that a 

group of ports be close at hand with sufficient combined capacity, when developed, to support the entire force in 

later phases of the operation. Since there 

was no hope of being able to put captured 

ports into workable condition until about 

three months after the landings, it was 

equally important that the selected assault area have beaches suitable for prolonged maintenance operations. They 

therefore had to be sheltered from the 

prevailing winds in order to insure continuous operations even in bad weather. 

More important, the beaches had to have 

sufficient capacity to receive and rapidly 

pass inland the required vehicles and supplies. The critical considerations here 

were not only the size and firmness of the 

beaches but also the existence of adequate 

vehicle exits and adequate road nets behind the beaches. 

Having established the conditions essential to an assault area for a major invasion, Generals Sinclair and Barker then 

proceeded to examine various coastal 

sectors, matching each with the ideal. 

None fitted. Only one came close-the 

sector around Caen. The Netherlands was 

ruled out because it was out of the range 

of fighter cover, because its beaches were 

too exposed and, being backed by sand 

dunes, had inadequate exits for vehicular 

traffic. Finally the Germans could too 

easily defend them by flooding. A scarcity 

of beaches-and those small and exposed 

-disqualified Belgium unless enemy resistance was comparatively light and good 

weather could be counted on for at least 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 57 

a week to allow capture of the group of 

ports from Dunkerque to Zeebrugge. Actually German defenses of the sector were 

very strong, and therefore the feasibility 

of invading it would depend on a substantial lowering of enemy morale. The 

Pas-de-Calais coast, which ROUNDUP planners had regarded as the most likely assault area, was rejected for a major operation because the beaches were exposed, 

strongly defended, and dominated by 

high ground on which the enemy had emplaced artillery. The larger beaches had 

few exits, and the ports in the area had insufficient capacity to maintain a large 

force. Inadequate beaches ruled out the 

Seine sector as well, except as an area for 

subsidiary assault. It was noted that in 

order to use the ports of Le Havre and 

Rouen both banks of the Seine would 

have to be cleared. On the other hand, 

simultaneous attacks on both sides of the 

Seine could not be mutually supporting 

and would therefore be subject to defeat 

in detail. The Seine sector could be attacked with a reasonable chance of success only after a main assault in the Caen 

area. Brittany failed to meet any of the 

major requirements except as to port capacity. It was above all too far from Germany and a lodgment there would result 

in long lines of communication in the advance east. 

The process of elimination left only the 

Caen sectors and the Cotentin Peninsula. 

Caen was desirable from every standpoint 

except the lack of adequate ports. It was 

therefore suggested that Caen be made the 

area of main attack with a subsidiary attack on the east coast of the Cotentin to 

insure the early capture of Cherbourg. 

Even Cherbourg, however, could not 

supply a large invasion force, and it was 

therefore deemed necessary to seize the 

Seine ports or the Breton group in addition. Decision on which group to secure 

would depend on the final objectives of 

the operation and the degree of enemy 

opposition expected. There were objections to both. To take the Seine ports 

would necessitate crossing the river. Dependence on the Brittany ports, as already noted, would mean long lines of 

communications. This risk, planners 

thought, would be acceptable only if it 

were considered "essential to build up a 

large force west of and protected by the 

River Seine." 

This analysis revised during the early 

months of 1943 was at last approved by 

the Combined Commanders on 1 March 

and constituted the basic appreciation for 

subsequent cross-Channel planning. The 

immediate result was a new outline plan 

-the final effort of the Combined Commanders before they turned over the 

planning job to COSSAC. The new plan, 

SKYSCRAPER, provided simultaneous landings on the Caen and east Cotentin 

beaches with four divisions in the assault 

and six in the immediate follow-up. It 

required in addition eighteen Commandos 37 for special assault missions and 

four airborne divisions to interfere with 

the movement of enemy reserves. After 

the initial beachhead, including Cherbourg, had been established, planners assumed the next move would be to secure 

additional port capacity for the build-up. 

They advised advance toward the Seine 

ports, but thought the capture of Le 

Havre might well require a new landing 

northeast of the port in support of the 

37 A Commando was a specially trained and 

equipped British unit roughly equivalent in strength 

to a u.s. rifle battalion_ 
58 

overland attack. Advance would then 

continue northeast to open the port of 

Antwerp and establish the armies between the Pas-de-Calais and the Ruhr. 38 

The avowed object of SKYSCRAPER was 

to provide a gauge of some of the major 

problems to be faced in the cross-Channel 

invasion. Chief of these was the large requirement for resources, especially in 

landing craft. Planners stated the case uncompromisingly. The requirement for 

ten divisions simultaneously loaded was 

an absolute minimum, they said. Even 

that would enable the Allies to take on 

only the present enemy force in the west, 

estimated to consist of an average of two 

coast defense divisions to each hundred 

miles of assault area. Furthermore the tendivision assault force would suffice only 

if enemy troop movements could be completely blocked. 

SKYSCRAPER set its sights deliberately 

high. It was an attempt to break the deadlock which the tangle of interrelated contingencies had imposed on ROUNDUP planning. Planners were pressing now for a 

decision. "If we are to plan and prepare 

for the invasion of Western Europe 

against opposition," they wrote, "it must 

be on the understanding that the resources considered necessary are fully 

realized and that it is the intention to provide them." Therefore, they concluded, 

"T 0 defer the decision is to decide not to 

be ready." But the sights 'seem to have 

been set too high. The British Chiefs of 

Staff argued that the vague notion of "determined opposition" could not be used 

as a criterion for the number of assault 

divisions needed. 39 They decided not to 

38 Abstract from SKYSCRAPER Plan. Hist Div files. 

89 COS (43) 6lst Mtg (0). 30 Mar 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

consider the general principles enunciated in the plan. 40 

Some of the SKYSCRAPER ideas carried 

over into the OVERLORD planning, since 

many of the Combined Commanders' 

planners were transferred to the COSSAC 

staff. On the other hand, rejection of the 

SKYSCRAPER approach by the British 

Chiefs of Staff emphasized a break in the 

planning. The idea of pressing for increased resources seemed to have been 

discouraged in advance. In any case a new 

beginning and a new approach were required. General Morgan made this point 

explicit when he told his staff to consider 

that much useful data had been collected 

but that no plan worthy of the name 

existed. They were to make the maximum 

use of previous planning studies in order 

to save time, but the problem, Morgan insisted, should be seen as something newsomething to be tackled afresh as though 

no planning had gone before. He returned therefore to first principles and recreated the broad strategic frame. 41 

The over-all conception he presented 

was of a major land campaign culminating in the invasion and occupation of 

Germany with forces totaling possibly a 

hundred divisions. The opening picture 

was of Anglo-Canadian armies concentrated in the southwest, and the main 

40 Formal grounds for tabling the paper were that 

COSSAC was about to begin planning for "definite 

operations" and that consideration of general principles would therefore be a waste of time. General 

Paget. commander of 21 Army Group. and one of the 

Combined Commanders. believed. however. that 

the British Chiefs of Staff were generally unfavorable 

to the plan because of the huge bill for resources. 

His interpretation is persuasive. See Gen Paget. Notes 

on the History of Planning for Operations in NorthWest Europe. 30 Dec 43. Hist Div files. 

41 COS SAC (43) II. Plan for a Full Scale Invasion 

of the Continent in 1944. 25 May 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 59 

army waiting in the United States preparing to cross the Atlantic. The need for 

maximum fighter cover dictated that the 

assault should be made on the left flank, 

opposite the British forces. American 

forces might then be brought into the 

bridgehead and sent westward to take the 

ports through which the main American 

army from the United States could be disembarked. Since this plan would involve 

tangling administrative lines, it would 

perhaps be better "to contemplate the 

Anglo-Canadian bridgehead as the left 

flank guard of American assaults to be delivered further to the west." In any case 

the need for opening the Atlantic ports 

meant that the initial assaults were to be 

given a westerly rather than an easterly 

trend. 42 

The broad perspective led General 

Morgan to only one positive conclusion 

as to the choice of an assault area: it must 

be in France. Although both France and 

the Low Countries contained sufficient 

deepwater ports to receive the American 

armies, it was not reasonable to suppose 

that the ports of the Netherlands and 

Belgium could be opened up by assaulting forces. "To demand of the armies of 

the advanced guard that they should cover 

the use of the group of ports of the Low 

Countries is to demand that they should 

in effect themselves fight the battle of 

German y." 43 

Landing Craft Requirements 

N either the precise area of the assault 

nor the question of whether one or many 

42 Note that this is the opposite of the SKYSCRAPER 

principle of pushing northeastward in order to maintain the pressure of the attack on Germany. 

48 COSSAC (43) 11, cited n. 41. 

landings should be made was decided at 

this time. In large part, these decisions 

depended on the approximate scale of 

the operation. While General Morgan 

was conceiving the broad outlines of the 

operation, his staff worked to crystallize 

the concept in terms of landing craft and 

men. This problem brought them right 

back to basic difficulties faced by all the 

cross-Channel planners and solved by 

none of them. How could one calculate 

the size of the assault? What were the determining factors? The Combined Commanders had picked a figure of ten divisions, four in the assault and six preloaded 

to insure a continuous build-up during 

the time the craft used in the assault were 

returning or undergoing repairs for subsequent trips. All ten divisions were to 

land on the first four tides-that is, before 

the end of D plus 1.44 But the only basis 

for this requirement was the Combined 

Commanders' feeling that "a return to the 

Continent against determined opposition" could not be successful with a 

smaller force. In rejecting the whole SKYSCRAPER idea, the British Chiefs of Staff 

pointed out that one could not estimate 

the number of divisions needed to overcome "determined opposition." 45 

In fact, however, no better estimate was 

possible. It was obviously absurd to forecast a year in advance the strength and 

nature of enemy opposition. The only 

possibility was to plan on the basis of German dispositions as they existed in the 

spring of 1943, assume a normal distribu44 SKYSCRAPER Plan; Memo, Gen Barker for Execu· 

tive Planning Section (ETOUSA), Requirements of 

Landing Craft, 9 Mar 43. SHAEF SGS file 560 I. 

45 COS (43) 6lst Mtg (0), 30 Mar 43. Note that 

the British Chiefs of Staff apparently reversed themselves on this point at the Washington Conference 

in May. See below, section following. 
60 

tion of reserves, suppose that German 

commanders would take the best possible 

steps for defense, and add hypothetical 

calculations from logistical tables on the 

capacity of the enemy to move in reinforcements from the east. The net calculation, however, could easily mean nothing. since the number of unknown factors 

was very large and there was ample time 

for the whole picture to change completely before the Allies were ready to attack. 

The attempt to find how large an assault would be required for the job thus 

broke down on the impossibility o~ judging with any realism the size of the job. 

The alternative was to calculate how large 

an assault might be practicable with resources likely to be available and then 

try to see how an operation of such size 

might be assured a reasonable chance for 

success. In May Commodore HughesHallett, chief British naval planner, made 

a guess pending lengthy examination. 

He thought landing craft might be procured for simultaneous assault by four 

divisions including 16,000 men in armored landing craft and 12,000 vehicles 

in LST's and similar ships. A fifth division might be preloaded to land within 

twenty-four hours.46 But an estimate of 

the' availability of craft was almost as 

shaky as an estimate of the need for them. 

Writing to General Handy in April, General Barker said: "Provision of landing 

craft ... constitutes a continuing bottleneck which not only has to be met materially, but must also be overcome from 

the psychological and political aspects as 

well. In other words a shortage ... can 

readily be made the excuse for failure 

46 Memo, 1944 Hypothesis, 15 May 43. SHAEF SGS 

file (1944 Operations) . 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

to do operations which otherwise might 

prove practical." He asked General 

Handy for a clear statement on U. S. production and assurance that the United 

States could provide the necessary craft 

for a cross-Channel attackY 

It was not easy to supply assurances on 

U. S. production of landing craft. In the 

first place the whole idea of using specially 

constructed craft in large numbers for 

amphibious operations was so new that 

no generally accepted doctrine had been 

developed. Thus in the spring of 1943 

Admiral King was reported as saying: 

" ... apparently now it is felt assaults cannot be made without specially designed 

craft." At the same time it was suggested 

that the landing craft bottleneck might 

be partly bypassed by larger use of "makeshift" craft such as barges and river 

"steamers. "48 

Except for small personnel boats the 

U. S. Navy had had no landing craft at 

all until 1937 when it experimented unsuccessfully with a tank lighter. The first 

successful vehicle landing craft was developed by Andrew J. Higgins, a New 

Orleans boat builder, but was not ordered 

by the Navy until September 1940 and 

not contracted for in large numbers until 

spring of 1942. During the first years of 

the war the majority of naval leaders re47 Memo, Landing Craft for Cross·Channel Operations, 20 Apr 43. SHAEF SGS file 560 I. 

48 JCS 7lst Mtg, 30 Mar 43. The British planned to 

use barges and coasters in the invasion and had 

pointed out in April that they were busy converting 

barges for such use. They did state, however, that although miscellaneous vessels might be useful they 

ought not to be employed in the first assault. "There 

is no substitute for specialized landing craft in an 

assault against the most heavily defended coastline in 

the world, despite the fact that the morale of the 

German Army may have deteriorated sufficiently to 

justify an assault on the Continent." Note by Br 

JPS, CPS 63/1,16 Apr 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 61 

sisted the development of landing craft as 

a foolhardy gamble with an untried 

weapon and a waste of resources badly 

needed for naval construction.49 

The initiative in development of large 

landing craft was left to the British who, 

for obvious reasons, were much more 

seriously impressed with the need for such 

craft. British experimentation with 

specialized landing craft began after 

World War I as a result of the invention 

of the tank. Whereas experience had 

seemed to show that personnel could be 

landed on hostile shores by the regular 

vessels of the fleet, the tank clearly could 

be beached only from a special ramp boat. 

In 1920 the British produced a tank 

lighter which, with very few changes, became the LCM (1) (Landing Craft, Mechanized). Too small to carry the medium 

tanks used in World War II, the LCM (1) 

was nevertheless kept in extensive use for 

transporting other vehicles and supplies. 

In 1938 the British at last abandoned the 

theory that special craft were not needed 

to land troops. In that year they produced 

the prototype of the LCA (Landing Craft, 

Assault), a small wooden armored craft 

for ship-to-shore movement of assault infantry. The first large orders for LCA’s 

were placed in September 1939, and subcontracted to small boat and yacht firms. 

Engines for both the LCM and LCA came 

from the United States.50

The LCM and LCA were designed for 

raiding operations. Production was un49Lt. Hamilton S. Putnam and Lt. Craig A. Livingston, Commander-in-Chief Atlantic Fleet, Amphibious Training Command (United States Naval 

Administration in World War II), MS, Vol. I, Ch. 

VIII. Navy Dept files. 

50This and subsequent information on British 

landing craft production was supplied by the British 

Admiralty. 

dertaken only on a very small scale and 

mostly outside the established shipbuilding industry which was already working 

to capacity in attempting to meet vastly 

expanded requirements for merchant and 

naval war vessels. In June 1940 Prime 

Minister Churchill personally ordered 

the design and production of the first 

landing craft capable of carrying expeditionary forces. Worked out by the Combined Operations staff within the British 

Admiralty, this became the LCT (Landing Craft, Tank), designed to carry three 

40-ton tanks and disembark them in three 

and a half feet of water on steep-gradient 

beaches such as those of Scandinavia. The 

first LCT was delivered in November 

1940. Subsequent development of the 

LCT was comparatively rapid. In December 1941 orders were placed for the 

fourth model, LCT (4), the first landing 

craft designed specifically for the shallowgradient beaches of the French coast. It 

was to be able to carry six medium tanks 

and to be capable of rapid mass production.51 

While the LCT-the basic vehicle-carrying landing craft of World War IIwas being perfected, the British also began experimenting with a much larger 

ocean-going ship capable of discharging 

vehicles directly across the beach. Three 

shallow-draft oilers used on Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela were procured and 

converted to prototypes of the LST 

(Landing Ship, Tank) by cutting off 

51 The production lag in the LCT (4) is worth 

note. When the boat was ordered the United States 

had just come into the war; planners in England had 

worked out only the first tentative plan for an 

eventual cross-Channel attack. When the first craft 

was delivered in September 1942, the 1942 season for 

amphibious operations in the Channel was already 

coming to a close. 
62 

the bows, installing bow ramps, and 

scooping out the insides to accommodate 

vehicles. Though designed with shallow 

draft, neither the converted Maracaibo 

nor the first model LST proved satisfactory. Improvements were gradually 

worked out through experimentation and 

study by both British and American designers. The final result was the LST (2), 

an ocean-going ship capable of grounding 

and discharging vehicles on the shallowgradient beaches of France. The United 

States undertook the entire production 

of the LST (2) for both British and 

American use. 

In the spring of 1942 the United States 

began a program for the mass-production 

of landing craft for the 1943 cross-Channel attack as envisaged in the Marshall 

Memorandum. The difficulties of expanding a comparatively small landing 

craft fleet into one tor major amphibious 

operations were enormous. The Navy, 

which was to co-ordinate the program, 

and many of the shipyards that were to 

carry it out were almost wholly lacking in 

experience. The program was superimposed on already swollen naval construction schedules. Contracts therefore had 

to be let to small boatyards and manufacturing companies for whom the construction problems posed were unprecedented. 

The LCT's and LST's were built on inland waterways and it became necessary 

to find and train crews to sail them to 

Atlantic ports. The U. S. Coast Guard, 

which formed the Ferry Command in 

July, undertook this task with almost no 

technically competent personnel. Typical 

of the greenness prevailing to some extent 

throughout the landing craft program was 

the story of a young Ferry Command 

skipper who, piloting his craft down the 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Niagara River at night, missed the turning into the Erie Canal and, despite warnings from the shore, sailed serenely toward 

the falls. By luck he ran aground a few 

hundred yards from the brink. He 

blandly reported afterward that he had 

seen the warning lights at the point where 

he missed the turning but had paid no 

attention because he could not figure out 

what they meant. 52 

Lack of experience delayed the program but did not seriously jeopardize it. 

A more serious difficulty, and one which 

persisted throughout the war, since it had 

no final answer, was the establishment 

of priorities. The material requirements 

for landing craft, chiefly steel and marine 

engines, had to compete with other highpriority building programs. The construction of a landing craft fleet in 1942 

was completed only by the issuance of 

emergency directives and the creation of 

special expediting machinery. When the 

immediate emergency passed with the 

successful landings in North Africa, landing craft construction had to give way in 

the competition for materials to other 

war production which could claim greater 

urgency. The President's January list of 

"must" programs for 1943 omitted landing craft. Escort vessels and merchant 

shipping were a more immediate necessity. The need for escort vessels, in fact, 

was considered so urgent in the early 

months of 1943 that the machinery which 

had been set up to expedite production 

of landing craft was diverted to perform 

the same function for destroyer escorts. 

The 1942 landing craft program ended as 

scheduled in February with a record production of 106,146 light displacement 

52 Putnam and Livingston, Amphibious Training 

Command, cited n. 49. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD QANUARY-JULY 1943) 63 

tons. From then on it declined and in May 

was stabilized at about 60,000 tons 

monthly. This figure was carried forward 

for deliveries during the first half of 

1944.53 

In March 1943 the question of increasing the production of landing craft, particularly for a cross-Channel invasion, 

came before the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The 

British at that time asked the United 

States to examine the possibility of in· 

creasing production, because a shortage 

of LCT's and LST's was likely to make 

a cross-Channel invasion in 1944 difficult. 

They added that Britain could not do 

anything about it since British production was already proceeding at the maximum rate. The British request was met 

with some suspicion.54 The Joint Chiefs 

were inclined to question whether the 

British were making full use of their own 

resources. Admiral King stated flatly that 

any substantial increase in the rate of 

production of landing craft would cause 

serious delays and conflicts with other 

programs. 55 The Navy recalled with alarm 

the dislocation in naval construction 

caused by the 1942 landing craft program. 

After noting that the present schedules 

for delivery of craft during 1943 and early 

1944 would "in no way near approximate 

previous deliveries except in the case of 

~s George E. Mowry, Landing Craft and the WPB 

(Historical Reports on War Administration: WPB 

Special Study No. 11), rev. ed. (Washington. 1946), 

pp. 7. 19-21,25. 

54 One of the principal American planners noted 

that lack of landing craft might be one reason for the 

difficulty of launching an invasion in 1944, but, on 

the other hand, "we have never had tangible indica· 

tion that the British intend to launch [a] crossChannel operation." Penciled note on Gen Wedemeyer's copy (Copy 4) of CPS 63. Production of 

Landing Craft, 19 Mar 43, incl to lCS 248. 26 Mar 

43. P&O Implementing Section files. 

.~ lCS 7lst Mtg. 30 Mar 43. 

LST's," a Navy spokesman strongly recommended that no change be made in 

current production schedules. "It should 

be remembered that in order to get the 

present LST's on time we have to cut 

across every single combatant ship program and give them over-riding priority 

in every navy yard and in every major 

civilian ship-building company. We have 

not and will not for the next 6 months 

recover from all the derangements suffered from the last over-riding Amphibious Boat Program. In my opinion anything approaching a repetition of the 

previous program would be disastrous 

from a standpoint of all other Naval construction .... " ~6 

Allotment of Resources,May 1943 

From the point of view of the COSSAC 

planners in London, the failure to take 

timely steps to increase landing craft production looked at best like shortsightedness and at worst like a deliberate attempt 

to sabotage the cross-Channel invasion. 

Washington, however, had a larger, more 

difficult perspective. The Joint Chiefs 

were concerned not only with a European 

invasion but with establishing the best 

possible balance of forces to carry on the 

global war~ In the spring of 1943 they 

were still operating under the Casablanca 

statement of strategy which required that 

defeat of the German submarine should 

be a first charge on the resources of the 

United Nations. The German submarine 

had not yet been defeated; on the contrary 

~6 Memo, W. S. Farber for Admiral Horne, Rates 

of Production for Landing Craft. App. A to Min. 

lCS 7lst Mtg. Rear Adm. Farber was head of the 

Fleet Maintenance Division (December 1940-0ctober 1943). Vice Adm. Horne was Vice Chief of 

Naval Operations for Materiel. 
64 

the United Nations in March had lost a 

near record tonnage of shipping.57 Any 

decision to curtail the production of escort vessels would not therefore have 

seemed justified. Requests to increase 

landing craft production were at this time 

extremely vague. Noone could say how 

many more LCT's or LST's would be required. No one could state categorically 

that the current production schedules 

would not yield sufficient craft for proposed operations. It has already been 

pointed out that the planners' estimates 

for a cross-Channel invasion had varied 

from a five- to a ten-division lift. By May 

the only conclusion reached was General 

Morgan's warning that although requirements of landing craft could not yet be 

forecast they would be "large enough ... 

to present a very serious problem, which 

has no precedent." 58 

It was with this basic uncertainty as to 

their needs that the British planners arrived in Washington in May 1943 to 

settle, among other things, the allocation 

of resources for 1944 operations in the 

European theater. The availability of resources was a planning problem and 

scarcely a whisper of it reached the high 

council chambers where the President 

and Prime Minister, with the advice of 

the Combined Chiefs, sought to mark out 

world-wide strategy. Yet the whole discussion was colored by the higher level 

debates on strategy and, in turn, decisions 

on landing craft made at planning level 

57 History of the Commander-in-Chief Atlantic 

Fleet (United States Naval Administration in World 

War II) , MS, p_ 463. Navy Dept files; d. Samuel E. 

Morison, The Battle of the Atlantic (History of 

United States Naval Operations in World War ll: I) 

(Boston, 1947), pp. 315, 326, 344, 403. 

58 Memo, Morgan for Br COS, Landing Craft Requirements for Cross-Channel Operations, 24 May 43, 

COSSAC (43) 5. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

were to become pivots of higher strategy. 

For the future of cross-Channel operations in particular, the work of the planners in Washington in May was vastly 

more significant than the pronouncements of the President and Prime Minister. The repercussions of landing craft 

decisions were to be felt all during the 

following year until Churchill at last 

complained with some bitterness that 

"the destinies of two great empires ... 

seemed to be tied up in some god-dammed 

things called LST's whose engines themselves had to be tickled on by ... LST 

engine experts of which there was a great 

shortage. "59 

At the Washington Conference the first 

British statement of requirements for a 

1944 cross-Channel invasion included 

8,500 landing ships and craft to provide a 

lift for ten divisions simultaneously 

loaded for the assault. American planners, comparing this figure with estimated production rates, came up with 

the conclusion that the demand was impossible of fulfillment. It was, in fact, so 

far out of line with reality that the U. S. 

Chiefs of Staff at once suspected the good 

faith of the British in proposing it. They 

wondered whether the impossible bill for 

shipping had not been presented to provide the British with an excuse for not 

doing the operation.60 They ignored the 

fact that the estimate of ten divisions for 

the assault had been arrived at by combined planners in London and had been 

specifically agreed to by ETOUSA.61 In 

59 Quoted in Memo, ASW (J. J. McCloy) for 

Marshall, 26 Apr 44. OPD files, misc bk. 18. 

60 JCS Mtgs, 14-19 May 43. 

61 ETOUSA approval noted in Memo, Barker for 

Executive Planning Section (ETOUSA), Requirements for Landing Craft, 9 Mar 43. SHAEF SGS file 

560 I. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 65 

the context of British arguments at the 

Washington Conference for further operations in the Mediterranean and of 

their openly expressed doubts as to the 

feasibility of a cross-Channel invasion unless German strength in the west could 

be drastically reduced, the suspicion appeared logical. Admiral King, in particular, was convinced that the British 

had no intention of invading the Continent in the spring of 1944. He thought 

they would wreck the prospects of ROUNDUP "on the matter of the number of 

landing craft." General Marshall, taking 

a more temperate and optimistic view, 

agreed that ROUNDUP in its conception as 

a ten-division assault must be recognized 

as "a logistic impossibility" in the spring 

of 1944.62 

It was clear, then, that to argue against 

the British concept of continuing attacks 

in the Mediterranean which the Joint 

Chiefs consistently maintained were incapable of decisive results it was necessary to reduce the size of the contemplated cross-Channel invasion to something within the range of logistic possibility. The Joint Chiefs discussed such 

an operation as a "glorified SLEDGEHAMMER" and conceived it as employing some 

twenty divisions, which meant scaling 

down the number of actual assault divisions to a logistically reasonable force. 

Thus, their doubts as to the seriousness 

of British commitment to a Continental 

invasion in 1944, whether justified or 

not, helped shape their position that 

i planning should be for an operation 

possible with the resources which would 

certainly be on hand in the spring of 

1944. In other words the search for a 

tenable ground to argue against Medi62 JCS 85th Mtg. 19 May 43. 

terranean strategy predisposed the U. S. 

Chiefs of Staff to an acceptance of 1943 

production rates as a limiting factor on 

the scale of Continental operations in 

1944. It became politic to avoid discussing the possibility of increasing landing 

craft production. The issue had to be 

rescued from the quicksands of hypothesis. 

It was. British planners arguing for a 

ten-division assault felt themselves on unsure ground. Rear Adm. C. M. Cooke of 

the U. S. J oint Planning Staff commented 

that each of the British planning papers 

seemed to contain a different assessment 

of landing craft requirements, and that 

their original figure of 8,500 had been 

"talked down" to 4,000.63 As the British 

Chiefs of Staff had previously admitted, 

there were no grounds for defending the 

arbitrary estimate of ten divisions in the 

assault except a feeling that overwhelming strength would be needed. Since this 

was obviously relative and no one could 

foretell what it would be relative to, the 

argument could not carry much weight. 

The Joint Chiefs of Staff instructed 

their planners to re-examine American 

and British capabilities for supplying 

troops and landing craft. The planners 

reported that, assuming two operations 

in the Mediterranean after the conquest 

of Sicily, landing craft could be made 

available in the United Kingdom by the 

spring of 1944 sufficient to lift five divisions simultaneously, three for the assault 

and two for the immediate follow-up. 

They believed a "second follow-up force 

of two divisions can be floated by landing 

craft used in the assault on their first 

turnaround augmented as practicable by 

miscellaneous craft which can be pro68 Ibid. 
66 

vided in the United Kingdom."64 Detailed figures actually revealed a deficit 

of lift for 500 vehicles, but this was considered small enough to be acceptable 

for planning purposes. Troops available 

in the United Kingdom at the target 

date were estimated to total from twentysix to thirty divisions depending on 

whether cannibalization of four British 

divisions proved necessary in order to 

find line of communications troops. 

These planning figures were accepted 

without significant debate and it was 

agreed that General Morgan would be 

ordered to confine his plan to the detailed allotment of 4,504 landing ships 

and craft which planners figured would 

be available.65 In addition to the five 

divisions seaborne in the assault, Morgan 

would plan to use two airborne divisions 

for which he was allotted an admittedly 

inadequate number of transport aircraft.66 

The whole calculation was necessarily 

based on a number of highly debatable 

assumptions, which had not been agreed 

on by the various planning groups and 

which had not been tested by a largescale amphibious operation against a defended coast. By May the COSSAC naval 

staff had adopted a "Standard Method for 

Forecasting Landing Craft Requirements." But this was not used at the 

Washington Conference. The Washing64 CPS 71, Report by Sub-Committee on Availability of Landing Craft for ROUNDHAMMER, 20 May 411. 

ROUNDHAMMER was the code name used at the Washington Conference for the cross-Channel attack. Conceived as an operation midway in size between the old 

SLEDGEHAMMER and ROUNDUP, it borrowed part of each 

code name. 

65 Of these, 3,257 would be supplied by the British; 

1,247 by the United States. 

66 This was to represent no real problem, however. 

See below. Ch. V. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ton estimates were based on quite different assumptions. For instance, while 

COSSAC allotted 3,000 vehicles to each 

assault division to be carried in major 

landing ships or craft, Washington planners figured 4,380.67 

The Washington estimates of the average capacity of the various types of craft 

also differed significantly from COSSAC's 

reckoning. 68 These discrepancies are understandable when the nature of the 

problem of estimating ship capacities is 

considered. In the first place a "vehicle" 

is a flexible term covering everything 

from a Y4 -ton trailer to a tank retriever. 

In actual loading for the operation, for 

instance, VII Corps LCT's carried from 

three to twenty-eight vehicles, depending 

on the type. In striking an average for 

an assault force, much depended on the 

exact composition of the force. Furthermore the average was not likely to obtain 

when applied to smaller units of the 

assault which, for tactical reasons, might 

have to be loaded without regard to economy of space. Thus, the higher the average capacity for planning purposes, the 

more inflexible the tactical employment 

of the force. U ntiI the tactical plan was 

known, planning estimates would naturally vary according to the planner's 

knowledge of, or feeling about, the difficulty of the actual operation contemplated. Throughout the planning period 

it was generally true that the Americans 

tended to be more optimistic than the 

67 Washington estimated only 2,760 vehicles for 

the follow-up divisions, thus striking an average for 

the five divisions of 11,7110. What are called in the 

text "Washington estimates" are all those of the 

subcommittee referred to in note 64. 

68 Washington figures: LCT (3) and (4) -15 

vehicles; LCT (5) and (6) -12 vehicles; LST -50 

vehicles. COSSAC figures: LCT (all types) -10 vehicles; LST -60 vehicles. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 67 

British about the difficulties of the assault 

and hence more willing to push planning 

figures upward toward the theoretical 

maximum. The most optimistic Americans were those on this side of the water. 

One of the greatest weaknesses of the 

Washington calculations which fixed 

COSSAC's resources was that they did 

not take into account possible loss or 

damage to craft in the assault or the time 

required for ships to turn around and 

come back for the build-up forces. As 

one of the chief COSSAC planners 

pointed out, the provision of sufficient 

landing craft for the assault and first 

twenty-four hours did not necessarily insure an adequate build-up.69 The buildup would depend in large part on what 

ships came back from the assault. How 

long would it take them to return, how 

many would be lost, how many damaged, 

how fast could the damaged craft be repaired? It would have been impossible 

for the Washington planners to have arrived at any firm estimates along these 

lines because the choice of an assault 

area had not then been settled and consequently the nature of enemy opposition 

could not even be guessed .at nor the 

length of the sea voyage determined. 70 

69 Memo, Brig Cen K. McLean (Br Army Ops 

Branch), Landing Craft Requirements (Comment 

on Memo by Naval Chief of Staff, 15 May) , 26 May 

43. SHAEF SCS file 560 I. 

70 It is interesting, in this connection, that both 

Washington and COSSAC planners in May were 

contemplating shore-to-shore sailings of the small 

assault craft (LCA's and LCVP's) . This could have 

been feasible only if the force sailed from Dover to 

assault the Pas-de-Calais coast. The longer voyage 

to the Caen area could not have been made in rough 

Channel weather by LCA-type boats. Commodore 

Hughes-Hallett planned to sail a portion of the 

LCA's from Dover and carry the rest on LSI (S) 'so 

Washington planners did not contemplate carrying 

any of the smaller craft aboard larger ships. See 

Another important factor largely omitted from reckoning at Washington was 

the need for close-support craft. The 

principal types mounted guns, rockets, 

or mortars on LCT hulls or similar bottoms. They therefore had to be figured 

into the total production requirements 

for landing craft, even though they provided no assault lift. The failure to allot 

them in anything like adequate numbers, 

in fact, forced COSSAC to convert some 

LCT's and thus increased the shortage 

of landing crafty 

The net effect of the Washington Conference decisions was narrowly to restrict 

not only the size of the cross-Channel 

assault but the degree of flexibility with 

which tactical dispositions could be 

planned. As planning progressed it 

would become increasingly apparent that 

the allocations agreed to by the Combined Chiefs of Staff in May 1943 were 

wholly inadequate for the job. But for 

the moment the figures were accepted 

without serious demur from any quarter. 

It has already been suggested that this 

ready agreement to mount the crossChannel invasion on a shoestring sprang 

at least in part from the context of the 

Washington Conference. American concern with getting a firm decision on a 

definite operation with a definite target 

date led to a willingness to accept an 

operation scaled to resources evidently 

within the capacities of the Allies. The 

British were not likely to take serious 

issue. They attached little importance 

to long-range commitments and conMemo, Hughes-Hallett for CCO, Cross-Channel 

Operations: 1944 Hypothesis (Requirements for 

LCI (S», 22 May 43. SHAEF SGS file 560 I; d. CPS 

71, App. B, 20 May 43. 

71 See below, Ch. III. 
68 

sistently deprecated discussions of strategic principles. They were always more 

interested in the operation which came 

next on the war agenda. 72 

For the British in May 1943, the 

next logical operation was a follow-up 

in the Mediterranean of the invasion of 

Sicily, which was scheduled for July. The 

main project for 1943, they said, was the 

elimination of Italy. "The collapse of 

Italy," said the Prime Minister, "would 

cause a chill of loneliness over the German people, and might be the beginning 

of their doom." 73 The British Chiefs of 

Staff contended that Mediterranean operations were not only the most important 

immediate objective but that they were 

also essential in order to create conditions which would permit the mounting 

of ROUNDUP in the spring of 1944.74 In 

General Brooke's opinion, without further Mediterranean operations, ROUNDUP 

would not be possible before 1945 or 

1946. In a detailed estimate of the probable situation in northwest Europe in 

1944, the British planners concluded that 

the Allies could not hope to compete 

successfully with enemy build-up either 

on the ground or in the air unless the 

enemy's ability to reinforce his coastal 

defenses was weakened by forced withdrawals to take over the defense of Italy 

and Italian commitments in the Balkans. 

They pointed out that there were definite 

limitations to the weight which the 

12 See, for instance, CCS, 288/2, 29 Jul 43, in which 

the British Chiefs of Staff, proposing an agenda for 

the Quebec Conference, wanted to "dispense with 

lengthy discussions on over-all strategic concepts or 

global strategy" and talk about specific operations. 

73 1st White House Mtg, 12 May 43. OPD files, 

Min of TRIDENT Conf. 

74 CCS 87th Mtg, 18 May 43; CCS 234, Defeat of 

the Axis Powers in Europe (Elimination of Italy 

First) , 17 May 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Allies could throw against the Continent 

-limitations chiefly due to landing craft 

but also inherent in the nature of amphibious operations. To ignore these 

would be to risk entering a build-up race 

in which the Allies could probably never 

hope to achieve the necessary margin of 

superiority. Furthermore, failure to 

maintain the momentum of attack in the 

Mediterranean would cast away an unrivaled opportunity to inflict mortal injury on Germany and would give her a 

chance to prepare to parry the final blow. 

"The final blow," they admitted, "can 

only be struck across the Channel; it cannot be delivered from the Mediterranean." 75 But it was essential to do 

everything possible to exhaust and 

weaken Germany before the blow was 

struck. 

With the conclusion the U. S. Chiefs 

of Staff agreed. It was the method they 

challenged. They did not' believe that 

such "minor" operations in the Mediterranean as were within the capabilities of 

the United Nations would draw German 

forces from Russia even if they resulted 

in the collapse of Italy. They believed 

that the main effort against Germany in 

1943 would have to be made by the 

Soviet Union and that the United States 

and Great Britain were incapable of 

effective intervention. On the other 

hand, the Soviets would probably still 

need help in 1944. The Western Allies 

could put themselves in a position to 

render really effective aid then provided 

that they did not dissipate their resources on side shows in 1943.76 Tentatively the Americans suggested that a 

15 CCS 234. 

76 CCS 235, Defeat of Axis Powers in Europe, 18 

May 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD UANUARY-jULY 1943) 69 

limited bridgehead operation against the 

Continent might be attempted during 

1943. But they did not press the point 

against British objections that the bridgehead would lock up the Allied divisions 

employed, cause the Germans to concentrate in France, and so make later invasion more difficult. The President expressed the gist of the American point of 

view at the first plenary session. He disliked the idea of possibly playing into 

German hands by committing large 

United Nations armies in Italy where 

they were in danger of suffering attrition. 

On the other hand he agreed with the 

Prime Minister that American and 

British forces should not be idle between 

the conclusion of the Sicilian campaign 

and the spring of 1944.77 

In the final decision of the conference 

the latter consideration prevailed. The 

debate was resolved more easily than 

similar debates at later conferences, because it did not involve an immediate 

choice between alternative courses of 

action. The Americans opposed Mediterranean operations not in themselves 

but only as they might delay attack on 

northwest Europe. The British opposed 

not the cross-Channel attack but only 

the exclusive devotion of resources to it 

which would rule out action in the Mediterranean. The British feared an immediate opportunity would be thrown 

away through narrow concentration on 

the main goal. The Americans feared 

that by taking the immediate opportunity the chance to pursue the main goal 

might be lost or seriously delayed. 

The conference was able to straddle 

the disagreement. The joint Chiefs of 

Staff secured a firm commitment on the 

17 1st White House Mtg, TRIDENT Conf. 

size and target date for the cross-Channel 

operation. The decisions of the conference as they affected the plan which COSSAC would soon christen OVERLORD provided that "forces and equipment" 

should be established in the United 

Kingdom "with the object of mounting 

an operation with target date 1 May 1944 

to secure a lodgment on the Continent 

from which further offensive operations 

can be carried OUt."78 The Combined 

Chiefs agreed to allot five infantry divisions for the assault, two infantry divisions for the initial build-up,79 two airborne divisions, and an additional twenty 

divisions to be available in England for 

movement into the lodgment area. 

The decision on the target date was 

made without much debate. The joint 

Chiefs of Staff first proposed 1 April as 

the earliest date when suitable weather 

could be expected and as the date that 

coincided with the conclusion of the 

planned bomber offensive designed to 

prepare the attack chiefly by knocking 

out German air power. 80 General Brooke 

proposed a postponement of one month 

to avoid the spring thaw in Russia and 

so permit the Soviet Union to launch a 

78 Draft Supplementary Directive to COSSAC, Amphibious Operations from the UK, inel n to CCS 

250/1,25 May 43. 

79 There is some confusion on the term "followup." The Washington agreement reads five divisions in the assault and two in the follow-up. 

By later usage, however, this is a misnomer. The 

follow-up as generally used in the planning period 

and as consistently used in this book means divisions 

not taking part in the initial assault bu t preloaded 

in craft and shipping to come in immediately behind the assault units. Build-up units are those 

landed on subsequent trips by cr~ft already employed 

in the assault and follow-up waves--or more generally any units which are not actually on board ship 

at the time the assault is mounted. 

80 See below, Ch. VI. 
70 

co-ordinated offensive. This was agreed. 

Admiral King even indicated that a still 

later date might be acceptable and he 

commented that target dates were seldom 

met anyway. The Joint Chiefs were 

mainly concerned that some date be fixed 

to pin down the commitment to the 

operation and insure a certain urgency in 

the planning and preparation. 

The J oint Chiefs yielded to British 

arguments so far as to sanction further 

operations in the Mediterranean but 

only with provisos that strictly limited 

Mediterranean commitments. Each specific operation in the Mediterranean to 

follow HUSKY (the invasion of Sicily) 

was to be subject to approval by the Combined Chiefs of Staff. General Eisenhower, Commander in Chief in North 

Africa, could use for his operations only 

the forces already allotted to his tl~eater. 

I t was further agreed that four U. S. and 

three British combat-experienced divisions in the Mediterranean would be 

held in readiness from 1 November onward for transfer to England to take part 

in the cross-Channel operation.81 This 

was a particularly important decision in 

hardening the resolution to turn in 1944 

from the Mediterranean to northwest 

Europe. 

The COSSAC Plans 

The decisions of the Washington Conference were made known to COSSAC 

late in May. In the meantime the 

COSSAC staff had begun developing 

plans for the three operations for which 

it was responsible. These included, in 

81 CCS 242/6, Final Report to the President and 

Prime Minister, 25 May 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

addition to the cross-Channel attack 

itself, actions to make the Germans believe the Allies would invade Europe during 1943, and operations to take place in 

case of German collapse. 

Cockade 

The main objective of the diversionary 

scheme for 1943, planned under the code 

name COCKADE) was to pin German forces 

in the west by encouraging German expectations of an Allied invasion during 

that year. In addition, by including an 

actual amphibious feint, General Morgan hoped to provoke an air battle that 

would contribute to the destruction of 

the German Air Force. 

This over-all plan included three separate operations, each threatening a different portion of the enemy-held coast. 

The U. S. Army's allotted portion of the 

plan was Operation WADHAM) embodying 

a threat to the Brest Peninsula and designed to persuade the Germans into 

overestimating the strength of U. S. 

forces in the United Kingdom.82 The 

threat was carried out by forces under V 

Corps. At the same time British forces 

in Scotland simulated preparations for 

attack against Norway (Operation TINDALL). But the heart of COCKADE was 

Operation STARKEY 83 directed against the 

Pas-de-Calais and designed to include, as 

an amphibious feint, a landing exercise, 

HARLEQUIN. Plagued, as usual, by the 

shortage of landing craft, COSSAC was 

obliged in the end to halt HARLEQUIN 

short of embarkation, but the rest of the 

STARKEY plan was carried through, cul82 For additional details on WADHAM see V Corps 

History (Paris, 1945) , p. 20. 

83 COSSAC (43) 4 (Final), Operation 'Starkey; 

26 Jun 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-jULY 1943) 71 

minating in minesweeping operations in 

the Channel at the beginning of September. 

It is peculiarly difficult to assess the 

effects of operations like COCKADE. 

Neither in the routine Allied intelligence 

reports nor in surviving German records 

is there evidence of specific and overt 

German reaction. No new troop dispositions were ordered in expectation of immediate invasion of France. On the other 

hand, the German defenders in the west 

were in some stage of alert during most 

of 1943 and it is plausible to suppose 

that knowledge of Allied activities contributed at least in some measure to their 

tenseness. General Morgan, though uncertain as to enemy reaction, believed 

that certain naval activity in the Channel and the flooding of the lowlands behind Caen and the Cotentin beaches 

might be "reasonably ascribed" to the 

feints.84 Whatever the full effect may 

have been on the enemy, COCKADE had 

one clear value for the Allies in providing experience for planning the successful diversionary activities of 1944. 

Outline Overlord 

The duties of COSSAC in supervising 

the execution of COCKADE continued, as 

noted, through the summer of 1943, but 

the staff's chief planning energies were 

turned at the beginning of June to the 

preparation of OVERLORD. Six weeks 

later they had written the outline plan. 

Before examining the details of that 

plan, it is important to observe its general character. 

Outline OVERLORD} in the strict sense, 

84 COS (43), 207th Mtg, 4 Sep 43; d. Morgan, 

Overture to Overlord, pp. 100-103. 

was not an operational plan at all. 85 It 

was not a blueprint for maneuver. No 

field order could have been issued on the 

basis of it, and no troop dispositions 

made. It was a plan for planning, not a 

plan for action. Its tone was discursive, 

not precise and peremptory. It reflected 

the fact that it was drawn by a staff in 

the absence of the commander, and it 

made a patent effort to refrain from tying 

the commander's hand, especially in 

examining the later phases of the operation. It was designed to answer the question implicit in the May decisions of the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff. Given certain 

resources, was an operation against the 

Continent possible in the spring of 1944? 

COSSAC arrived at an answer in Outline 

OVERLORD} first by narrowing down the 

problem through rejecting courses of 

action that seemed impossible with the 

given means, and then by outlining certain conclusions as to the size and shape 

and limiting conditions of a feasible 

operation. Within that outline, details 

were only tentatively sketched in. 

Previous planning had already observed that geography placed rigid limits 

on the operation. Earlier planners concluded that only two geographically feasible assault areas existed-the Caen 

region and the Pas-de-Calais. Although 

85 COS (43) 416 (0), Operation OVERLORD, Report 

and Appreciation, 30 Jul 43, cited hereafter as Outline OVERLORD. Department of the Army files contain 

several copies of the plan. The one used is in SHAEF 

SGS file 381 la. 

The OVERLORD Plan consists of a Digest, three main 

parts: (I, Selection of a Lodgement Area; II, Appreciation and Outline Plan for the Opening Phase 

up to the Capture of Cherbourg; III, The Development of Operations after the Capture of Cherbourg) , 

and twenty-four appendixes (with maps) which include discussions of alternative courses of action and 

studies of special problems. Digest of the plan is 

reprinted below as Appendix A. 
72 

the most recent appreciation made at the 

end of 1942 had rejected the Pas-deCalais, General Morgan revived the idea. 

The Pas-de-Calais had certain obvious 

attractions, inherent chiefly in its proximity to England. Morgan, though recognizing its disadvantages, was reluctant to 

dismiss it out of hand. He therefore 

ordered that the British Army operations branch of COSSAC prepare an estimate and outline plan for an assault on 

the Pas-de-Calais while the American 

branch worked on an operation against 

Caen. 

This order was given early in June 

1943 and about two weeks later the 

British planners had delivered their 

answer. They agreed with the earlier 

planning conclusion. An attack on the 

Pas-de-Calais, they said, must be considered strategically unsound. 86 The 

British appreciation, embodied later in 

an appendix to the OVERLORD plan, reinforced the reasoning of earlier planners. 

The COSSAC staff found only four 

beaches in the Pas-de-Calais suitable for 

assault. These could receive a theoretical 

maximum of two assault divisions on 

D Day provided no delay were imposed 

by landing obstacles or enemy resistance. 

Since there were no ports in the region 

and the beaches were unsheltered, 

blocked, and heavily defended, it seemed 

obvious that the Allies' rate of build-up 

could not hope to compete with the 

enemy's. The expansion of the beachhead, moreover, to include major ports 

for the subsequent maintenance of the 

invasion force would require long flank 

marches east to Antwerp or southwest to 

the Seine ports, both across the whole 

front of the German army. They 

86 COSSAC (43) 11th Mtg, 19 Jun 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

summed up: "Not only does the strength 

of the defences demand a weight of 

assault which the restricted capacity of 

the beaches cannot admit, but the restrictions imposed by the beaches do not 

allow a rapid build-up. Further, even 

if assault were practicable, the geography 

of the area does not permit of the capture 

of sufficient ports to maintain the force, 

and the terrain does not allow of the 

defence and exploitation of the bridgehead by the occupation of successive 

natural obstacles." 87 

Before the end of the month planners 

had ruled out assaults at Le Havre and 

on the Cotentin Peninsula.88 But with 

rejection of the Pas-de-Calais, the decision had actually been made that the 

main attack would take place in the 

vicinity of Caen. (Map Ir Assault landings would be confined to three beaches 

(Lion-sur-Mer-Courseulles, Courseulles--

Arromanches-les Bains, and Collevillesur-Mer-Vierville-sur-Mer).89 This, General Morgan decided, was the maximum 

area that could be successfully attacked 

with the limited forces at his disposal. 

He rejected the earlier idea of a simultaneous landing on the eastern beaches 

of the Cotentin, although he recognized 

its value, and told the British Chiefs of 

Staff that he would like such a landing 

if he could have craft for an extra assault 

division. 90 

-Maps numbered in Roman are placed in inverse 

order inside the back cover. 

87 Outline OVERLORD, App. C. 

88 COSSAC (43) 13th Mtg, 2 Jul 4!1. 

89 These beaches in the event were the center of 

the OVERLORD assault after the operation was ex· 

panded from three to five assaulting divisions. The 

first two beaches were British in both the COSSAC 

and the later plan. The last·named (CollevilleVierville) was the beach later called OMAHA. 

90 JP (43) 260 (Final), Commentary on Operation OVERLORD, 3 Aug 43. SHAEF SGS file 381 la. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 73 

As it was, the plan was to land two 

British divisions over the two eastern 

beaches in the Caen sector, one U.S. 

division over the western beach, and twothirds of one British airborne division in 

the vicinity of Caen.91 In addition, various subsidiary assaults would be necessary by commandos and parachutists to 

neutralize key enemy costal batteries, 

secure crossings over the River Aure, and 

form a defensive flank on the Vireo Details of these missions were left for later 

planning. 

D Day was, of course, not selected, but 

some of the weather and tidal conditions 

governing its selection were discussed. 

Since the target date (Y Day) was 1 May, 

D Day would fall some time during the 

month. There were likely to be twentythree days in May on which the prevailing wind force would permit the beaching of landing craft. Quiet spells of four 

days or more could be expected twice 

during the month.92 But forecasting them 

was another matter. The odds were ten 

to three that a three-day spell of good 

weather could be predicted twenty-four 

houI'S in advance. The incidence of suitable weather for the airborne operation 

was still under investigation when the 

plan was issued, and it was simply noted 

that this would probably impose still 

narrower limitations on the choice of 

D Day. 

The question of whether the assault 

should take place in daylight or darkness 

was not definitely decided though it was 

pointed out that the Navy required daylight in order to control the operations 

91 Presumably at the same time as the seaborne 

landings, although the plan does not make this clear. 

92 A quiet spell was defined as a period in which 

the maximum wind force was nine knots. 

of a large fleet and in order to direct 

effective fire support. This requirement, 

the planners added, was likely to be decisive, even though, from the Army's 

standpoint, an approach to the shore by 

night would be desirable to help preserve surprise up to the last moment. 

It was noted that the initial landing 

should take place about three hours before high water in order that a good-sized 

force might be landed on the first tide. 

Calculations to tie in weather, tide, and 

hours of daylight would be made only in 

later planning, when the optimum conditions for H Hour were finally settled. 

The choice of the Caen area meant a 

decision to delay the capture of ports 

needed for the maintenance of a large 

invasion force. Cherbourg, even if captured early, would not be adequate to 

support the twenty-nine divisions which 

were to be put into the lodgment area. 

Throughout the initial phases of the 

operation a large proportion of supplies 

would have to be landed across the invasion beaches. General Morgan accepted the risk of prolonged beach maintenance because he counted on the completion of at least two artificial ports 

which were then being developed. 

The bold and revolutionary idea of 

prefabricating ports in England and towing them across the Channel had been 

talked about in 1942, but experimentation did not begin in earnest until the 

summer of 1943. The essential ingredients of the artificial ports (which, in 

the prevailing fashion of code names, 

were called MULBERRIES) were the breakwaters to supply sheltered water in which 

small craft could ferry supplies to the 

beaches, and a floating pier (connected 

by treadway to the beach) at which 
74 

larger vessels could unload directly into 

trucks. The solution at last developed 

for the breakwater was to combine 

sunken ships with the so-called phoenixes 

-hollow, floating concrete caissons about 

six stories high. The phoenixes were to 

be towed across the Channel and then 

sunk, by opening sea cocks, and anchored 

in position. The pier was developed as 

a floating platform devised so that with 

the rise and fall of the tide it could slide 

up and down on four posts which rested 

securely on the bottom of the sea.93 

When General Morgan made his plan, 

depending on these devices, the MULBERRIES were still on the drawing boards. 

In fact, engineers were still experimenting with various breakwater devices and 

the vast concrete phoenixes had not even 

been ordered. This circumstance again 

underlined the tentativeness of COSSAC's approach. It was still necessary to 

assume resources that were not at hand 

and conditions that could hardly be foreseen. 

For this reason, such things as the detailed composition of the assault forces 

were left for later planning. It was noted 

only that an unusually high proportion 

of armor and antiaircraft would probably 

be required in the first waves. COSSAC's 

view was that the Allies could count on 

surprise to get them safely ashore and 

through the first crust of the enemy's 

defenses. The critical phase of the operation would be the first battles with the 

enemy's reserves. Because enemy counterattacks could be expected from D Day 

on, the Allies needed to have the maxi93 [Clifford Jones] NEPTUNE: Training, Mounting, 

the Artificial Ports (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: Part VI), MS, II, 112 If. 

Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

mum of armor at their disposal as early 

as possible. "The normal German system," COSSAC observed, "is to concentrate reserves well forward behind threatened sectors, in order to get the maximum forces into action on D Day .... 

The crux of the operation will be our 

ability to land forces quickly enough, 

first, to hold the initial German counterattacks, and then to defeat and drive off 

the large German reserves which will be 

brought in against our bridgehead." 94 

The basic problem was to establish 

and maintain a reasonable margin of 

superiority over the enemy. In this, General Morgan was handicapped from the 

outset by limitation of resources. The 

Combined Chiefs of Staff had instructed 

him to use three divisions in the assault 

and two in the immediate follow-up and 

had allocated a specific number of landing craft and ships for the simultaneous 

loading of these five divisions. When the 

COSSAC staff tried to match men and 

vehicles with allocated shipping and 

form five naval task forces each to carry 

one division, they found that a large percentage of the two follow-up divisions 

could not be tactically loaded and that 

they had more than 1,200 minor landing 

craft left over which were not seaworthy 

enough when loaded to make the long 

cross-Channel trip to Caen under their 

own power.95 

The fact that overheads such as antiaircraft and special engineer units would 

have to be landed on D Day and D plus 1, 

and that a high proportion of tanks 

94 COSSAC (43) 29, Strategical Background, CrossChannel Operation, 1944, 25 Jun 43. 

95 The leftover craft included 195 LCM (1) '5. 376 

LCM (3) ·s. and 660 LCVP·s. Outline OVERLORD. App. 

Z. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 75 

would have to be carried in the assault, 

put an additional strain on shipping resources. The net effect was to compel 

reduction of the immediate reinforcements for the assault and delay their 

landing. On D Day only four follow-up 

reinforced regiments would be landed 

instead of two divisions as specified in 

the Combined Chiefs of Staff directive.96 

On D plus 1 only one and a third divisions could be landed instead of the two 

estimated by Washington planners. Furthermore, COSSAC warned that 75 percent of the vducles in the D-plus-l buildup divisions would have to be loaded in 

ordinary shipping. Not only were there 

risks and difficulties in using large ships 

so early in the operation, but the units 

carried in them could not be unloaded in 

tactical order. It would take twenty-four 

hours after they got ashore before they 

could be organized and equipped for action. "It should be clearly noted," the 

plan warned, "that landing units in this 

manner means that the forces ashore on 

D Day are not reinforced until D plus 2 

with formations operationally available, 

except to the extent of about a brigade 

group [regimental combat team]." 97 

COSSAC was directed to employ two 

airborne divisions in the assault, but the 

allotment of 632 transport aircraft was far 

short of what was needed. This was not 

lift enough even for the two missions 

deemed essential: the capture and neutralization of the coastal batteries at Grandcamp-Ies Bains and Ouistreham-Riva96 Although the plan stated that the limiting 

factor was the capacity of defended beach exits to 

pass vehicles inland. General Morgan later complained that the weakness of the planned follow-up 

was due to shortage of suitable landing craft. COSSAC 

(43) 57 (Final). 30 Sep 43. SHAEF SGS file 560 I. 

D7 Outline OVERLORD, Part II, par. 85. 

Bella and the capture of Caen. The capture of Caen alone was estimated to require a full airborne division. COSSAC's 

decision was nevertheless to employ 

airborne troops on both missions, with 

the main air landings in the vicinity of 

Caen. The planners felt that Caen, an important bottleneck in communications 

from the hinterland to the beaches, had to 

be seized "to avoid defeat in the early 

stages." 98 

General Morgan was always conscious that the Allies, with such limited resources in the early stages, could 

hope at best for only a slender margin of 

superiority. It was thus essential to do 

everything possible to reduce the enemy's 

capacity to resist. Steps were to be taken 

immediately (as of July 1943) to soften 

German resistance by all available means: 

direct sea and air action, psychological, 

political, and economic pressures, and 

sabotage and deception. This softening 

was to constitute the preliminary phase 

of the operation and was to be systematized to produce conditions considered essential to the success of OVERLORD. During 

this phase the main effort of the Allied 

forces would be to reduce German fighter 

strength in western Europe, by bombing 

fighter production plants and airfields 

and by bringing the German fighter force 

to battle under conditions favorable to 

the Allies. At the same time, "but without detriment to the main aim," the 

Allied air offensive would continue the 

progressive destruction and dislocation 

of the German military and economic 

system and the undermining of the 

morale of the German people. It was expected that in these ways the Allies could 

DSlbid., Part II. par. 96. 
76 

insure themselves of absolute air supremacy by D Day. That was set as a condition for the operation "since only 

through air power can we offset the many 

and great disabilities inherent in the 

situation confronting the attacking surface forces." 99 

In the preparatory phase, beginning an 

undetermined time before D Day, the air 

offensive would be intensified and begin 

to hit hard at the enemy's airfields and 

those portions of his transportation system within fighter range of the Caen area. 

Immediately before the assault, air attack 

would focus on rail and road nets directly 

feeding into the battle area. Not until the 

assault phase itself-a matter of hours before the landings-would aircraft attack 

the enemy's beach defenses. 

Important as it was thought to be to 

make the fullest utilization of AHied air 

power, it was considered still more important to conceal as long as possible the 

actual assault area. COSSAC planners believed that it would be possible to preserve a high degree of tactical surprise, 

for, the staff pointed out, "It was evident 

from the weakness of the local defenses 

that the Germans did not consider it likely 

that we could make an assault in force in 

the Caen sector." 100 All preparations 

therefore should studiously avoid calling 

attention to the assault area. 

Further to contribute to surprise as well 

as to reduce enemy strength in the invasion area, two major diversions were to 

be staged. One would be carried out from 

the United Kingdom: a feint aimed at 

the Pas-de-Calais coast to begin about D 

minus 14 and continue during the first 

two weeks of the invasion. It was to follow 

99 COSSAC (43) 29, cited n. 94. 

100 COSSAC (43), 13th Mtg, 2 Jul 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the general lines of the 1943 operation 

pointed at the same area and would include an actual expedition using some of 

the small craft which were unsuitable for 

the main assault. A second diversion 

would be mounted from the Mediterranean against the south coast of France 

to give the impression of an imminent 

major landing there. This was to start 

with a threat before the Normandy 

landings, but preparations would be 

made for an actual landing if German 

forces were withdrawn from southern 

France to meet the OVERLORD attack. Both 

of these diversions became tremendously 

important in later planning and in the 

invasion itself, but in the outline plan 

COSSAC did little more than suggest the 

idea. 101 

Everything possible should be done before the invasion to reduce the enemy's 

capacity to resist on the ground and in the 

air. But this was a highly theoretical 

specification. How much capacity to resist could safely be left to the enemy? At 

what point could preparations be said to 

be complete and the necessary conditions 

for the invasion set up? The answer could 

not be securely pinned to reality, since it 

was patently impossible to estimate enemy 

capabilities so far in advance. The best 

answer was hypothetical. Rejecting the attempt to assess the actual enemy, General 

Morgan calculated the maximum enemy 

which in his opinion the Allies could take 

on. 

Static troops defending the coast line 

were not taken into consideration; it 

101 The diversion against southern France was later 

planned as an actual operation under the code name 

ANVIL; the feint against the Pas-de·Calais remained 

a threat, planned and carried out as Operation FORTITUDE. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 77 

was assumed that they would be defeated by the landing itself. Having got 

ashore, the invasion forces would be able, 

it was thought, to withstand counterattack by two German divisions. A third 

German offensive division could be in the 

area on the assumption that it would have 

to be held in reserve for the defense of the 

Cotentin. By D plus 2 the bridgehead 

could probably hold against attack by two 

additional enemy divisions. By D plus 8 

the enemy should not have more than a 

total of nine offensive divisions in the area 

if the Allies were to have a reasonable 

chance of gaining their objectives. The 

Germans by that date would have had 

time to move all available divisions in 

France and the Low Countries into the 

bridgehead area, except those pinned 

down by diversionary threats to other 

areas. It was believed that threats could 

keep a maximum of three enemy reserve 

divisions away from the bridgehead. In 

other words, the total German offensive 

striking force in France and the Low 

Countries on the invasion date should not 

exceed twelve divisions if the invasion 

was to succeed. 

These calculations evoked considerable 

criticism. General Barker, Morgan's 

deputy, protested the inclusion of any 

conditional clauses in the plan because 

he felt that they would make the plan 

harder to ~ell in Washington. The U. S. 

Joint Chiefs of Staff, he knew, believed 

that the British were cool toward the idea 

of a Continental invasion, and he foresaw 

that specifications as to the maximum 

enemy forces that could be defeated in 

France would only reinforce their 

belief.102 The Joint Chiefs, in fact, reacted 

102 Interv with Gen Barker, 4 Oct 46. Hist Div files. 

as General Barker predicted. Barker had 

to explain that the clause did not mean 

that the operation would have to be canceled if more than twelve enel1lY divisions 

could be brought to oppose it. COSSAC 

meant only that a maximum of twelve divisions could be defeated by the Allied 

ground forces; if there were any more, 

Lhey would have to be reduced by air 

power or other means. 103 This interpretation was accepted, and the conditions 

stood. Later on, however, at the conference with the Russians, they were again 

queried when Stalin simply asked: "And 

what if there are thirteen divisions?" 104 

It was not so much a question as a 

needle jab to elicit further assurance of 

the Allies' firm intention to mount the 

operation. As far as General Morgan was 

concerned, it was not his business to settle 

Allied intentions, but it was his job to determine whether OVERLORD was feasible. 

Since his own resources were limited by 

directive and since no such limitation was 

imposed on the enemy, he could not very 

well return an unqualified verdict. As to 

the artificial rigidity of the conditions, the 

plan itself provided a qualification. "It 

will be realized that the conditions under 

which the operation might be successful 

do not depend solely on the numerical 

strength of the reserves available to the 

Germans. The scale of German resistance 

will depend on such things as the state of 

the French railways and the strength, 

quality, and morale of the enemy's front 

line units." 105 

103 JCS 442/1, Operation OVERLORD, 6 Aug 43; d. 

Marshall's statement to the same effect at CCS 108th 

Mtg, 15 Aug 43. 

1041st Plenary Mtg at Tehran, 29 Nov 43. OPD 

files, U.S. Min of EUREKA Conf. 

105 Outline OVERLORD, Part II, par. 118. 
78 

The first objective of the main assault 

was to secure a bridgehead including 

Grandcamp, Bayeux, and Caen by the end 

of D Day. Initial follow-up forces consisting of two regiments in each sector (British and American) would land on D Day 

and assist assault forces in consolidating 

this bridgehead. Subsequent expansion of 

the bridgehead would take the form of 

thrusts south and southwest from the 

Caen-Bayeux area to defeat the enemy 

west of the Orne River, outflank his forces 

between the Orne and the Dives Rivers, 

and finally secure sufficient depth to make 

the turning movement to attack up the 

Cotentin toward Cherbourg. These operations would cover the first eight days 

of the invasion; by that time twelve divisions would be ashore. During the next 

six days, expansion southwestward would 

continue while a force entered the Cotentin with the mission of capturing Cherbourg by D plus 14. An armored force at 

the same time would strike southeast toward Alenc;on to cover the opening of airfields southeast of Caen. Eighteen divisions would be ashore on D plus 14 and 

the planners estimated that at that time 

"the German forces should have been decisively beaten." 106 

After the capture of Cherbourg and the 

defeat of German forces west of the Orne 

River, COSSAC planners believed the 

enemy would fall back with part of his 

forces on Brittany for the defense of the 

ports there and withdraw the rest east of 

the Seine for the defense of Paris. It would 

106 Ibid., Part III, par. 44; d. Commentary on Operation OVERLORD (cited note 90), in which the planners point out that the advance calculated up to D 

plus 14 was sixty miles as compared with the advance 

of the right flank of Eighth Army in Sicily of only 

thirty miles in three weeks against much less serious 

opposition. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

then be up to the Supreme Commander 

to decide whether 'the Allies' next move 

would be to capture the ports on the 

Seine or those in Brittany. Although his 

decision would depend on estimates of 

his own and enemy capabilities at the 

time, COSSAC presumed that unless the 

Germans were on the point of collapse 

the Allies would be compelled to go after 

the Brittany ports in order to build up a 

large striking army with which to force 

the line of the Seine. To cover the entry 

into Brittany it would be necessary to 

drive the retreating Germans eastward in 

order to secure the line of the Eure River 

from Dreux to Rouen and thence the line 

of the Seine to the sea. This task would be 

carried out by British and Canadian 

armies while the American army was attacking Brittany. In these moves, the planners warned, five guiding considerations 

should be kept in mind: the vital necessity not to outrun heavily strained communications, the importance of early capture of a group of enemy airfields in the 

Dreux-Evreux region and of ground 

for the development of airfields in the 

Ie Mans-Chateaudun area, the value of 

the Seine below Rouen as a complete obstacle, the importance of Dreux, Chartres, 

and Orleans as centers of communication, 

and the value of the Coteaux du Perche 

as a bastion west of Dreux and Chartres. 

In this latter phase, culminating on 

about D plus 50 in the occupation of the 

lodgment area proper bounded by the 

Loire and Seine Rivers, COSSAC put 

great stress on the development of airfields. By D plus 24, for instance, it was 

anticipated that twenty-seven Continental 

airfields should be in operation, on which 

sixty-two squadrons could be based. The 

securing of the lodgment area, planners 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-JULY 1943) 79 

figured, would be followed by a long 

period of reorganization and consolidation. The next phase, the primary objective of which would be the capture of 

Paris and the Seine ports, was conceived 

as a major operation which the Germans 

would resist heavily. Its completion 

would be followed by another pause of 

some three months while the enemy was 

cleared out of the whole of France south 

of the Loire and Dijon and the surrender 

of the Channel Islands was forced. 

The maneuver thus envisaged an 

evenly spaced series of battles, evenly opposed. The planners blueprinted an operation in which the invading armies 

struck hard for an initial foothold, built 

up and pushed forward on all fronts to 

gain maneuver room, paused, gathering 

strength for the next push, and so proceeded by bounds, cracking the enemy 

lines with separate, massed, and carefully 

prepared attacks for each new objective. 

The plan did not foresee the battle of attrition in Normandy nor the breakout 

that followed, nor the long-sustained 

armored drives in pursuit of a broken 

enemy. 

Crushing defeat of the enemy, sehding 

him in headlong and disorganized retreat, 

was a fortune of war which could be 

hoped for but not planned. Besides, by 

the terms of his directive, General Morgan was to plan not the annihilation of 

the German armies but the establishment 

of a lodgment area from which further offensive operations could be carried out. 

His attention was thus naturally focused 

on seizing and consolidating ground, capturing ports and airfields, and building up 

an army which could hold its gains and 

prepare to strike for further conquest. 

Rankin 

Outline OVERLORD was finished and submitted to the British Chiefs of Staff for 

review before COSSAC got around to the 

third task: planning for occupation of the 

Continent in case of German collapse. 

RANKIN, as the collapse operation was 

named, proved an exceptionally difficult 

concept to grasp and translate into a plan 

of action. In the first place it was not at all 

clear what collapse meant. SLEDGEHAMMER and ROUNDUP had both been made 

contingent on a kind of collapse and planners then attempted to define the concept. 

They came up with a rather vague notion 

of marked "deterioration of German 

morale," which seems not to have contemplated any failure of the Nazi government or any withdrawal of forces from the 

west. Rather it denoted a general weakening of the will to resist (as a result, of 

course, of a weakening of the means)-a 

nebulous idea at best. But nothing more 

specific was then needed. SLEDGEHAMMER 

and ROUNDUP both were planned by the 

British as operations involving the maximum available Allied forces as if to meet 

determined enemy opposition. Plans were 

then shelved pending some future intelligence estimate which might indicate 

an enemy situation sufficiently weak to 

give the attacks a reasonable chance of 

success. 

OVERLORD, in contrast, was designed 

from the beginning as an operation with a 

specific target date, to go in against full 

enemy opposition. Such conditions as 

were laid down concerning maximum 

enemy resistance were conditions to be 

brought about by the Allies during the 

period of preparation. They were tactical 
80 

rather than strategic conditions-that is, 

they affected only the limitation of the 

number of German troops that could be 

committed against the lodgment area; 

they did not include any general undermining of Germany's military or political 

potential. The possibility of such general 

deterioration, however, remained and, 

since OVERLORD was being prepared entirely without regard for it, it became necessary to make separate plans to take advantage of collapse when and if it occurred. 

General Morgan was instructed by the 

Combined Chiefs that his organization 

should provide for "the need to re-enter 

the Continent with all available forces at 

the shortest possible notice in the event 

of a sudden and unexpected collapse of 

German resistance. The aim would be to 

seize critical political and military centers 

in Germany in the shortest possible 

time." 107 Soon after the COSSAC staff 

was established General Morgan asked 

the British Chiefs of Staff for a clarification of this directive, because, he said, his 

main object was given him as "the defeat 

of the German fighting forces in NorthWest Europe," whereas the directive to 

prepare for German collapse presupposed 

that the enemy had been defeated. He 

wanted specifically a restatement of his 

major object, a closer definition of the 

phrase "German disintegration," and 

more detail on the "critical political and 

military objectives." 108 

The reply of the British Chiefs of Staff 

was not delivered until 21 June. In the 

meantime General Morgan changed his 

mind about the need for definition. In a 

directive to his staff on 22 May, he said: 

107 CCS 169/8/D, 23 Apr 43. 

lOB COSSAC (43) 2,29 Apr 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

"Little is to be gained by seeking to define 

the phrase 'German disintegration'. Quot 

homines tot sententiae." Instead he suggested a flexible plan capable of variation 

between the extremes of an invasion of 

the Continent to break through a screen 

of resistance, and a landing against no opposition at all. The first plan prepared 

should suppose no resistance, since the 

state of Allied resources would not immediately permit undertaking an opposed landing. He recognized the difficulty of getting hold of a planning 

hypothesis. Since the time of the return 

could not be predicted, no precise estimate was possible of conditions on either 

side of the Channel. But, he pointed out, 

"N ebulous though the setting may be, 

there can be nothing nebulous in the 

event, which must be characterized by 

the utmost speed and precision of movement." The problem was basically similar 

to mobilization in peacetime. The solution consisted, first, in providing machinery to anticipate the event as far 

ahead as possible and, second, in phasing 

preparations so that they will "gain or lose 

momentum as the critical moment is 

judged to be approaching or receding." 109 

The solution at last selected was to 

break up the concept of enemy collapse 

into three definite degrees of collapse and 

provide three corresponding courses of 

action for the Allies. The three conditions 

were case A, which supposed a substantial 

weakening of organized resistance in 

France and the Low Countries, case B, 

which assumed German withdrawal from 

the occupied countries, and case C, unconditional surrender and cessation of 

109 COSSAC (43) 9, Plan for Return to the Con· 

tinent in Face of German Disintegration, 22 May 43. 
OUTLINE OVERLORD (JANUARY-jULY 1943) 81 

organized resistance in northwest Europe,uo 

If the deterioration of German military 

power in the west was not accompanied by 

surrender or withdrawal, Allied action 

would depend on the relative strength of 

German and Anglo-American forces at 

any given date. Before January 1944, it 

was thought that no assault against organized resistance, however weakened, 

would be possible. In January and February a substantial weakening of the German forces might make possible a limited 

bridgehead operation. Since this date 

would find preparations for OVERLORD far 

advanced, the only feasible operation 

would be one that made use of these preparations. The RANKIN plan thus indicated 

a modification of OVERLORD to secure the 

Cotentin Peninsula if it became desirable 

to set the date forward to January or February. After 1 March a drastic reduction 

in German strength would permit a modified OVERLORD assault with substantially 

OVERLORD'S objectives. 

Case A thus involved no special planning difficulty. The problem of following 

up a German withdrawal from France 

was more complicated. If such withdrawal 

was made, it would be done presumably 

with the idea of strengthening the German position. It could therefore be expected that the maximum obstacles would 

be put in the way of Allied occupation. If 

withdrawal was begun in the winter, 

Allied landing would have to wait for the 

evacuation of a major port, since beach 

maintenance in winter weather was impossible on the Channel coasts. The Germans seeking to establish a defensive position at the West Wall (the Siegfried Line) 

llO COSSAC (43) 40 (Final), Plan RANKIN, 13 Aug 

43. 

-the only position that would permit the 

necessary economy of troops-would start 

pulling out from the south and southwest. 

The first port to be vacated would be 

Bordeaux. But this was too far from where 

the Allies could be deployed against the 

Germans to be useful as a port of entry. 

The landing of substantial military forces 

could be begun only when Cherbourg was 

freed. The problem was to get as far east 

as possible in order to get as near as possi ble to the final German defense line and 

insure fighter protection from United 

Kingdom bases. At the same time landings 

could not be made so far east that they 

would be under attack by German mobile 

forces operating in advance of their main 

line of defense. Le Havre and Rouen were 

ruled out as initial ports of entry because 

the Germans were expected to make a 

preliminary stand at the Seine to protect 

and organize the retreat. Landing at Cherbourg, forces would be built up in the 

Cotentin. But this was likely to be a slow 

process in view of anticipated demolition 

of the port. "There can ... be no thought 

of forcing the SEINE at an early stage, nor 

indeed can any major effort be contemplated at any time to speed the enemy's 

withdrawal other than by air action." It 

was pointed out further that a grave disadvantage of landing as far west as Cherbourg was "the immense bridging liabilities which the enemy's legacy of large 

scale demolitions" was likely to cause. 

The store of Allied bridging equipment 

in the United Kingdom was not likely to 

prove adequate for such an undertaking 

before I January 1944.111 

Advance beyond the initial bridgehead 

would depend on the rate of enemy with111 Ibid. 
82 

drawal. It could be retarded by delay in 

the build-up but could not be accelerated. 

When the enemy reached his final defensive position, "There must of necessity be a considerable pause while we 

build up sufficient forces for an advance 

Eastwards." 112 

The plan throughout was conservative 

in estimating the time needed to build up 

strength before joining the final battle. 

The conclusion was that German collapse 

as envisaged under cases A and B might 

permit the Allies to return to the Continent before May 1944 but that such collapse would not materially advance the 

time for decisive action. In short, the 

RANKIN A and B plans offered little military advantages and the grounds for considering them were chiefly that politically 

it might be necessary to press into the occupied countries as soon as the Nazi grip 

on them relaxed. 

As preparations for OVERLORD pro112 Ibid. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ceeded, the only RANKIN operation seriously considered was that under case Ctotal collapse accompanied by unconditional surrender. The plan here involved 

no purely military considerations, being 

a scheme for rapid occupation.ll3 

Although no RANKIN plan was ever put 

into effect, detailed consideration has 

been given to the planning because it reveals that the Allied timetable for the war 

in western Europe was actually much 

more dependent on Allied preparations 

than on the state of the enemy. 

The RANKIN project was kept before 

the planners and periodically re-examined, but its importance as a plan steadily 

dwindled as the OVERLORD target date approached and the proliferation of OVERLORD plans and preparations focused attention more and more on the big invasion. 

113 The relation of RANKIN C to later occupation 

plans (ECLIPSE) will be dealt with by F. C. Pogue in 

The Supreme Command. a volume now under preparation in this series. 
CHAPTER III 

Overlord in the Balance 

(August-December 1943) 

Strategy Reviewed: 

The Quebec Conference 

When the Combined Chiefs of Staff 

parted at Washington in May 1943, they 

left with the sense that many of their decisions had been necessarily tentative and 

would have to be re-examined in the light 

of what happened in the next few months 

in Russia and in the Mediterranean.1 

Near the end of July the Joint Strategic 

Survey Committee reviewed the principal developments for the guidance of 

the Joint Chiefs and found especially 

noteworthy the "substantial improvement in the submarine situation and prospects, satisfactory progress of the bombing 

offensive, unforeseen degree of success attained with HUSKY [the invasion of 

Sicily], indications of the impending collapse of Italy, decision to carry the war to 

the mainland of Italy ... and apparent 

loss of the initiative by the Germans on 

the Eastern Front." 2 This was actually a 

cautious statement of successes which in 

two and a half months had definitely 

tipped the balance of military power in 

favor of the Allies throughout the world. 

At the Casablanca Conference, it will 

be remembered, the Allies had decided 

that the first charge on their resources 

should be the defeat of the German sub1 CCS 95th Mtg. 24 May 43. 

2 JCS 422/1. QUADRANT, 25 Jul 43. 

marine. By the summer of 1943 that defeat had all but been accomplished. Sinkings of Allied ships would continue, but 

on a diminishing scale, while the destruction of enemy U-boats accelerated. The 

turning point in the war on U-boats came 

dramatically in the spring of 1943. 

The Allied counteroffensive began in 

a small way in the early months of 1943. 

Although sinkings continued heavy, 

reaching a peak in March of 141 ships 

lost, the Germans were also beginning to 

lose more heavily, and, though the Allies 

were then unaware of it, the German Admiralty was worried. 3 Early in February 

1943 Grossadmiral Karl Doenitz expressed alarm at the fact that the Allies 

now seemed to have exact knowledge of 

the disposition and in some cases of the 

number of German U-boats in operational areas. At the end of the month he 

reported to Hitler that nothing had been 

sunk that month because nothing had 

been sighted.4 He attributed the failure to 

bad weather and lack of reconnaissance. 

But it was not bad weather that destroyed 

8 See Naval Int Div (Br). History of V-Boat Policy. 

1939-1945. 26 Feb 43. Navy Dept files. This consists 

of transla tions of extracts from documents in the 

files of the V-Boat Division of the German Admiralty. 

4 Ibid. Actually the Allies in February lost 83 ships 

totaling 420.238 tons. See Commander-in-Chief Atlantic Fleet (V.S. Naval Administration in World 

War II) • MS. p. 463. Navy Dept files. 
84 

nineteen V-boats in February and fifteen 

in March. 

For the Germans much worse was to 

come. In March on the suggestion of the 

Canadian Chief of Naval Staff, American, 

British, and Canadian naval commands 

held a conference in Washington to reorganize the Atlantic convoy system. V p 

to that time Atlantic convoys had been 

operated on a combined basis with ships 

of all three nations participating. Friction and inefficiency resulted. It was decided therefore to turn over naval responsibility for the North Atlantic entirely to 

the British and Canadians. The Vnited 

States Atlantic Fleet would escort convoys 

between the eastern seaboard and North 

Africa, as well as certain special fuel 

convoys. The change, effective at the end 

of April, contributed to the conspicuous 

success of the Allied antisubmarine offensive beginning in May. A still greater 

contribution, however, was made by the 

long-range aircraft which the conference 

recommended be allocated to coastal 

areas for antisubmarine work. The Combined Chiefs of Staff assigned nearly all 

the aircraft requested (about half from 

British and half from American sources) 

and specified that all planes would be 

equipped with radar and operated by 

crews specially trained in antisubmarine 

warfare. Steps were being taken also to 

supplement land-based air patrols with 

carrier aircraft. During the winter four 

baby flattops were in process of conversion 

for Atlantic convoy use. The first was delivered in March. In June, three were 

operating in the South Atlantic.5 

\Vith a better-organized convoy system, 

new aircraft, and new detection methods, 

the Allies struck hard at the enemy's 

o Commander-in-Chief Atlantic Fleet, pp. 48111. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

underwater fleet in May. That month 

German V -boat losses soared to 30 percent of all boats at sea. Admiral Doenitz 

told Hitler: "These losses are too high. 

We must conserve our strength, otherwise 

we will play into the hands of the enemy." 

But as to the cause of the disaster Doenitz 

could only speculate. He knew that British aircraft were using a new microwave 

radar and suspected that the same device 

was employed on Allied surface vessels. 

He knew that, whatever the new device 

was, it apparently enabled planes and destroyers to hunt out German submarines 

in the dark and in the fog and destroy 

them. He knew also that the submarines 

had no radar detection set that could warn 

them of the impending attack. In fact, he 

said, "We don't even know on what wave 

length the enemy locates us. Neither do 

we know whether high frequency or other 

location devices are being employed. 

Everything possible is being done to find 

out what it is." Hitler added a dark intuitive note. Perhaps, he suggested, the new 

device involved principles with which the 

Germans were not familiar. "The crisis 

mllst be overcome by all possible means."6 

But it was not overcome. It deepened 

and spread. In June, German submarines 

chalked up only nineteen Allied sinkings; 

in August, only three; and in September 

almost all V -boats had been withdrawn 

from the Atlantic, with the result that the 

U.S. Navy could virtually abolish the 

convoy system in coastal waters.7 

o Berghof Conference, 31 May 43, Office of Naval 

Intelligence, Fuehrer Conferences, 1943. Fuehrer Conferences is a selection of translated documents from 

German naval archives. 

7 Independent sailings were authorized for all ships 

except those carrying aviation fuel and those slower 

than eleven knots. See Commander-in-Chief Atlantic 

Fleet, p. 581. 
GERMAN SUBMARINE UNDER AERIAL ATTACK 
86 

The reckoning at the end of 1943 was 

that three million gross tons of Allied 

and neutral shipping had been sunk as 

compared with more than eight million 

the year before.s But enemy success was 

much less than even these figures show, 

for during the year Allied shipyards had 

put fourteen million tons of new shipping 

on the seas as against only seven million 

in 1942. In other words the net loss in 

1942 of a bout a million tons became in 

1943 a net gain of almost eleven million. 

At the same time estimated sinkings of 

U -boats increased from 85 in 1942 to 237 

in 1943. 

The spring of 1943 marked a sudden 

intensification of the air war against Germany almost as dramatic as the antisubmarine campaign. After the reduction of 

U.S. Air Forces in the United Kingdom 

in the fall of 1942 to furnish air support 

for the North African campaign, American air power in Great Britain remained 

virtually static until the spring. From December 1942 through April 1943, the 

Eighth Air Force based in the United 

Kingdom had just six groups of heavy 

bombers operational each month. During 

May, the number of groups doubled; in 

June, thirteen groups were operational, 

in July, fifteen, and in August, sixteen 

and three-quarters.9 

The build-up was reflected gradually 

in intensified operations. March and May 

each saw nine operations carried out, but 

in March they involved 956 sorties and 

the dropping of 1,662 tons of bombs. In 

May 1,640 sorties were flown and 2,851 

8 Commander-in-Chief Atlantic Fleet, p. 462. 

9 Figures are from Statistical Summary of Eighth 

Airforce Operations, European Theater, 14 Aug 

1942-IJ May 1945, Hq Eighth Air Force, IO Jun 45. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

tons of bombs dropped.1o In short, the 

average mission in March involved about 

106 planes; in May it involved 180. This 

was still a long way from the June 1944 

peak when the average operation was 

undertaken by 1,000 heavy bombers. 

Nevertheless the sudden spurt forward in 

the spring of 1943 was a step decisively 

in the direction of bringing crushing air 

power to bear on the enemy's war machine. 

A similar increase in effort by the British Bomber Command at the same time 

was noted by the Chief of Air Staff, Sir 

Charles Portal. The bomb tonnage 

dropped on enemy territory during the 

second quarter of 1943, he reported, more 

than doubled the tonnage in the first 

quarter. Even after making allowances 

for weather, this achievement, together 

with the accelerated build-up of the 

Eighth Air Force, represented a notable 

net increase in the pressure of the combined air offensive. It was too early to see 

certain or decisive results, but the promise 

of things to come was clear. Air Marshal 

Portal remarked that already Germany 

was being forced into a defensive air 

strategy.ll 

What the Joint Strategic Survey Committee referred to as an "unforeseen degree of success attained with HUSKY" was 

the relatively quick victory in Sicily accompanied by signs of complete Italian 

demoralization. The forces of Field Marshal Harold R. Alexander (General Patton's U.S. Seventh Army and General 

Montgomery's British Eighth Army) in10 Bad weather in April reduced operations so 

drastically that a comparison of April sorties and 

bomb tonnage with May figures would be misleading. For a detailed account of operations see Craven 

and Cate, The Army Air Forces, II. Ch. 10. 

11 CCS I09th Mtg. 16 Aug 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 87 

vaded Sicily on 10 July 1943; thirty-nine 

days later (on 17 August) organized resistance had ended. The overrunning of 

the island had the immediate effect of 

convincing the Italians that their cause 

was hopeless. On 25 July Mussolini 

was forced out. On 8 September the 

Italian government formed by Marshal 

Pietro Badoglio capitulated. The imminence of Italian collapse had been apparent to both the Allies and the Germans 

some weeks in advance, and both sides 

were hurriedly preparing for the next 

move. 

The Germans, believing that there 

might still be some fight left in the 

Italians although their leadership had altogether broken down, in May had made 

plans for moving Army Group B, under 

Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel, into Italy. The move was accomplished 

during July and August while a pretense 

of co-operation with the Badoglio government was maintained.I2 

The prospect of an early Italian collapse convinced the U.S. Chiefs of Staff 

that the time had come for bold action. At 

the Washington Conference in May and 

for some weeks subsequently the principal 

Mediterranean post-HUSKY operations envisaged were the seizure of Sardinia and 

limited-objective attacks on the toe or 

heel of the mainland. Both the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff and General Eisenhower 

favored the mainland operations as more 

likely to produce decisive results, but 

feasibility depended on the progress of 

12 General der Kavallerie Siegfried Westphal, Der 

Feldzug in Italien, MS, Ch. IV. Hist Div files. The 

story of Italian collapse and surrender is treated in 

full by H. M. Smyth in The Sicilian Campaign and 

the Surrender of Italy, a volume now under preparation in this series. 

HUSKy. I3 Planning therefore proceeded 

concurrently for all contingencies, and 

decision was deferred. General Marshall 

thought the choice might be made toward 

the end of July. It was actually about the 

middle of the month that the Combined 

Chiefs proposed scrapping all their earlier 

conservative plans in favor of a direct assault on Naples with a view to full-scale 

exploitation up the peninsula.14 

Before this decision was made, General 

Eisenhower had asked that he be given 

additional troops to follow up the victory 

of Sicily. Specifically he asked for the diversion to the Mediterranean of one 

convoy scheduled for the United Kingdom. The Combined Chiefs of Staff approved his request though it meant a net 

loss to the United Kingdom build-up for 

OVERLORD of 66,000 troopS.I5 

British planners then proposed that 

General Eisenhower's striking power be 

still further increased.I6 But as their proposal would have reduced the OVERLORD 

build-up by another 50,000 troops and 

might have caused postponement of 

either OVERLORD or operations in the 

Pacific, the U.S. Chiefs of Staff demurred. 

They pointed out that, no matter how 

important an action in the Mediterranean 

might be, it could not substitute for action required in the Pacific or northwest 

Europe. In advocating the assault on 

Naples, they said, they had intended a 

bold plan which involved risks, justified. 

13 Meetings at Algiers between Churchill, Marshall, 

Eisenhower, and others, 29 and 31 May 43. Min of 

TRIDENT Conf. 

14 CCS 102d Mtg, 16 Jul 43. The debate during 

July on what to do in the Mediterranean may be followed in the CCS 268 series and in CCS 103d Mtg, 23 

Jul 43, and CCS Spec Mtg, 26 Jul 43. 

15 Rpt, Combined Planning Staff, 15 Jul 43, CCS 

268/2; Msg to Eisenhower, 21 Jul 43, CCS 268/5. 

16 CCS 268/2. 
88 

in their opinion, by the Italian collapse. 

They criticized the British proposal as 

overinsuring the operation at the cost of 

prejudicing agreed strategy elsewhere. 

They could not approve the Naples assault so conceived.17 On this point the 

J oint Chiefs of Staff stood fast and on 26 

July the British yielded.Is The order 

went out to General Eisenhower to plan 

an attack on Naples with only those resources already allotted to his theater. 

These, of course, now included 66,000 

more men that had been earmarked for 

the Mediterranean by the Washington 

Conference. 

Pressure on Germany from the west and 

south by the spring of 1943 was at least 

sufficient to blunt Germany's offensive 

capabilities in these directions. But from 

Germany's standpoint much worse was 

happening in the east. In the two preceding summers the Germans had set their 

armies rolling across huge expanses of 

Russian territory, though the decisive 

victory on both occasions remained just 

beyond their grasp. In July 1943 they 

tried again. They massed armor south of 

the Russian salient at Kursk. The armor 

broke through only to be destroyed in 

great tank battles in the rear of the Russian main lines. The Russians waited only 

a week for t.his situation to develop before 

they launched their first major summer 

offensive with three armies attacking 

about fifty German divisions in the vicinity of Orel. On 5 August the city fell. 

More important, the Russians had finally 

and permanently seized the initiative and 

had begun the dogged battle of attrition 

in which the prize was not territory but 

17 CCS I03d Mtg, 23 Jul 43. 

18 CCS Spec Mtg, 26 Ju113. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

destruction of the German armies. The 

seesaw campaign in which the Germans 

advanced in the summer and retreated in 

the winter was over. Henceforth the main 

German armies in the east would walk in 

only one direction-back toward the 

homeland. 

The war was, of course, not won in August 1943, and it could not have seemed 

so. But at least the brightening of Allied 

prospects was unmistakable. The optimistic might see victory dead ahead; the 

most pessimistic could feel maneuver 

room between their backs and the wall. 

It is certain that when the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff met at Quebec for another 

of the great plenary conferences they 

faced the future with a new sure knowledge of their power. This knowledge in 

turn sharpened the urgency to crystallize 

strategy. It was more clearly than ever up 

to the Allies to determine when and 

where the ultimate decision of arms 

would be sought. 

The Quebec Conference, which opened 

on 12 August, had, unlike the earlier 

meetings at Casablanca and Washington, 

no decisions to make on immediate operations in Europe. The next step in the 

Mediterranean, the invasion of Italy in 

the Naples areas, had already been decided. This fact cleared the decks for a 

full-dress debate on European strategy. 

Fundamental disagreement between the 

U.S. Chiefs of Staff and the British on 

how to defeat Germany had been adumbrated in September 1941, and thereafter 

had underlain all their discussions on 

strategy. But during the first half of 1943 

the opposition of strategic principle had 

been blurred because the immediate and 

pressing issue had always been to decide 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 89 

QUEBEC CONFERENCE. Seated, left to right: Prime Minister Mackenzie King 

of Canada, President Roosevelt, and Prime Minister Churchill. Standing: General 

Arnold, Air Chief Marshal Portal, General Brooke, Admiral King, Field Marshal 

Dill, General Marshall, Admiral Pound, and Admiral Leahy. 

whether or not to carry out a specific operation in the Mediterranean. Once the 

Allies were committed in North Africa, to 

reject exploitation in the Mediterranean 

meant to choose idleness for a considerable Allied force and to surrender the 

clear military advantage of maintaining 

momentum against the enemy. But attacks in the Mediterranean had always 

been conceived as having limited, not decisive, objectives. The ultimate aim, the 

British had argued, was to knock Italy out 

of the war. With the invasion of the Italian mainland, the course of action begun 

by TORCH would therefore reach its goal. 

After the defeat of Italy, continued attacks 

into the Axis underbelly would require 

new tactical and strategic justification. 

\Vith the close of the 1943 summer offensive, furthermore, the old argument in 
90 

favor of Mediterranean ventures as 

interim operations designed to maintain 

pressure on the enemy while preparations 

for OVERLORD were completed would no 

longer apply. On the contrary, for the first 

time since TORCH) Mediterranean operations and the cross-Channel attack became clear-cut alternatives competing for 

consideration as the Allied main effort. 

From every standpoint the Quebec 

Conference seemed to present both the 

urgent need and an ideal opportunity to 

seek a firm resolution on future strategy 

in Europe. Aware of this, the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff made particularly careful preparations to present their views. They analyzed at length the procedure of previous 

conferences, the debating techniques of 

the British, and even the precise number 

of planners required to cope on equal 

terms with British staffs. Quite frankly 

they went to Quebec determined to make 

their ideas prevail by all the means at their 

disposal.19 

This was to be, it must again be emphasized, a friendly debate between Allies 

seeking the same end. Nevertheless it was 

serious, for each Ally brought to it deep 

and honest convictions. It therefore became a matter of grave importance for 

each to find the strongest possible grounds 

on which to rest his case. The American 

ground in earlier conferences had been 

relatively weak. In the first place the British Chiefs of Staff had more readily available and more complete information on 

19 Both the Joint Strategic Survey Committee and 

the Joint War Plans Committee made thorough examinations of British techniques of argument and 

ways of meeting them. See JPS 189, Preparations for 

the Next U.S.-British Staff Conference, 25 May 43; 

JCS 422/1, QUADRANT, 25 Jul 43; Memos and staff 

studies in OPD file ABC 337 (25 May 43) passim. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the European war because they were 

closer to the scene, because they had presided over planning for European operations almost two years before the Americans became involved, because they were 

served by a well-developed intelligence 

system for which the newly arrived Americans had no equivalent, and finally because their own planning staffs were generally more numerous and more experienced. 20 These inequalities evened out 

only gradually as the U.S. Army grew 

and organized itself in the European and 

Mediterranean theaters. 

In the second place, the British Chiefs 

of Staff were a much more tightly knit organization than the U.S. Joint Chiefs. 

This also was due to a longer familiarity 

with the problems of the European war, 

which had permitted them to iron out 

through long association and discussion 

both individual and service differences. 

It was more directly due, however, to the 

influence of the Prime Minister and the 

War Cabinet, who provided a large 

amount of daily guidance in strategic and 

political matters. 21 Through Lt. Gen. Sir 

Hastings Ismay, Military Chief of Staff to 

the Minister of Defence, who attended 

most Chiefs of Staff meetings, the military and political leaders were kept in 

close contact with each other and welded 

into a relatively homogeneous directorate 

20 The British brought a staff of 93 to the Washington Conference in May, and in addition made 

considerable use of the Joint Staff Mission and diplomatic personnel already in this country. The Americans by contrast took only 56 officers to Quebec. See 

JPS 189 and various commentaries thereon in OPD 

file ABC 337 (25 May 43) . 

21 Cf. Winston S. Churchill, The Grand Alliance 

(New York, 1950), p. 28; Eisenhower, Crusade in 

Europe, p. 61. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 91 

of the total British war effort.22 The unity 

of British political and military policy 

was further insured by the British system 

of cabinet responsibility. Churchill, as 

Minister of Defence, together with his 

War Cabinet, was directly answerable to 

the House of Commons for military decisions. It behooved him then to keep in 

close touch with his military chiefs and to 

make certain that he fully understood and 

approved their decisions, even as to detail, in order that he could defend them 

later, if necessary. Churchill was personally inclined, furthermore, to occupy 

himself even more intimately with military affairs than his position required. As 

a long-time student of tactics he could 

contribute substantially at the planning 

level to the conduct of the war. He attended and took active part in many of 

the regular Chiefs of Staff Committee 

meetings. He intervened constantly in 

the planning of operations, not only to 

enunciate principles but to suggest tactical detail. As already noted, he played a 

leading role in the development of landing craft and the artificial ports. He concerned himself in the details of artillery 

and armored tactics.23 

In all these matters he had a lively personal interest. He sent along to the Army 

a stream of memoranda containing all 

manner of suggestions, some practical, 

some not. But all had in common a bold 

enthusiastic approach designed either to 

shock the planners out of what Churchill 

always feared was a narrow professional 

22 Ismay held this position under Churchill all 

during the war. Before Churchill became Prime 

Minister, Ismay was secretary of the Chiefs of Staff 

Committee. Interv, F. C. Pogue with Gen Ismay, 17 

Dec 46. Hist Oiv files. 

23 See Note by the Minister of Defence, 7 Oct 41, 

cited in Churchill, The Grand Alliance, pp. 498-500. 

view of the war or to cheer up his subordinates when the outlook was black.24 

After Dunkerque, when dispatches of 

disaster were piling up in the War Office 

and men were returning from the Continent stripped of their weapons and often 

of their clothes, when there seemed to be 

no hope of giving them even rifles with 

which to defend their country, the Prime 

Minister wrote: "We are stronger than 

ever before. Look how many extra men 

we have here now. Form Leopard Brigades to tear and claw the enemy." 25 

Churchill's close personal leadership 

never amounted to dictatorship. Although he generally called the British 

tune in discussions wi th the Americans, 

it would be a mistake to assume an identity between his views and those of the 

British Chiefs of Staff. Similarly it should 

be noted that what appeared as "British" 

views at the conferences were not necessarily endorsed by all British military 

men. "British" doubts concerning the 

feasibility of OVERLORD) for instance, were 

never shared by General Morgan and his 

staff. 

Despite these differences of opinion, it 

remains true that there was a British point 

of view on strategy which Churchill and 

the British Chiefs of Staff consistently 

maintained. That view favored opportUnIstiC, peripheral operations aimed 

initially at the reduction of German 

24 This was the interpretation of both General 

Barker and General Morgan on the basis of their 

experience on the COSSAC staff. See Intervs, F. C. 

Pogue with Barker, 4 Oct 46, and Pogue with Morgan, 8 Feb 47. Hist Div files. It is worth noting in 

this connection Churchill's impatience with the 

stodgy military professional which runs through his 

account of World War I as a kind of leitmotif. See 

esp. Winston S. Churchill, The World Crisis: 1915 

(New York, 1923), pp. 540-46. 

25Interv with Gen Ismay, cited n. 22. 
92 

power by indirect attack (by air over 

western Europe and by sea, air, and land 

in the Mediterranean), with the ultimate 

object of so weakening German defenses 

in France that a cross-Channel attack 

might be launched in the final phases of 

the war against an enemy whose will to resist was gravely shaken. 26 It was never 

clear precisely what degree of deterioration this involved and no doubt opinions 

would have differed widely. What was 

central, however, to British strategy and 

consistently maintained by its advocates 

was that the date for the final assault 

across the Channel had to be contingent 

and indeterminate. 

On the American side there was rather 

less unanimity in the direction of the war. 

In the first place, traditional American 

isolationism had made this country wary 

of political involvement in Europe. The 

J oint Chiefs of Staff tended therefore to 

develop a purely military perspective that 

considered political implications chiefly 

with an eye to avoiding them. This perspective accurately reflected the popular 

obsession with winning the war as quickly 

and as cheaply as possible-an obsession 

which allowed little room for consideration of America's postwar position.27 One 

26 On the question of possible British political interests in the Mediterranean see below, p. 96, and d. 

Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, pp. 194, 284; Stimson and Bundy, On Active Service, p. 447. 

27 The President was always conscious of this popular feeling. See, for example, Mtg, Roosevelt, Hopkins, and JCS on board ship, 19 Nov 43. Dep CIS 

file 1I0.00 A 48-41 dr 155. The President said "that 

we should not get roped into accepting any European 

sphere of influence. We do not want to be compelled, 

for instance, to maintain United States troops in 

Yugoslavia." See also Memo, Col Gailey (OPD) for 

Gen Handy, Information from the White House, 30 

Jun, quoting portions of Cbl, Roosevelt to Churchill, 

29 Jun 44, in reference to the British proposal to 

divert ANVIL resources to the Adriatic. Roosevelt 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

effect was to make the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

relatively independent of the President 

and State Department in formulating 

strategy. The President, unlike Churchill, 

seldom intervened in detailed military 

planning. He tended to make only the 

large decisions as between fully developed 

alternative courses of action. He was occupied almost exclusively with large perspectives and the political problems involved in the liberation of occupied 

countries, the employment of United Nations 28 forces, and dealings with foreign 

governments affected by proposed military operations. The President generally 

appeared at the Allied conferences as a 

defender of the strategy worked out by 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff.29 Though apparently reasonably convinced of its 

soundness, he was still in the position of 

a man who having accepted persuasion 

from one quarter was psychologically prepared to listen to advice from another. 

The President, in short, because of his 

position, his experience and personality, 

and American opinion, did not create a 

unified American front comparable to the 

British front molded and inspired by the 

Prime Minister.30 

In part, the lack of complete unity in 

American views can be traced to the diwrote: "I would never survive even a minor set-back 

in Normandy if it were known that substantial 

troops were diverted to the Balkans." OPD files, exec 

10, item 71 (Information from the White House) . 

28 The term "United Nations" to designate the 

Allies was apparently first used by Roosevelt at the 

end of 1941. See Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, 

p. 458; d. Ibid., pp. 548-49. 

29 An exception, of course, was the President's initiative in pushing the North African operation. See 

above, Ch. I. 

30 Cf. on this point Stimson and Bundy, On Active 

Service, pp. 428, 439, and Ch. XVII passim; Sherwood, 

Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 446. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 93 

vergent interests of the services. Before 

the establishment of the Joint Chiefs of 

Staff in 1942, the U.S. Army and Navy 

had had little experience in the sort of 

close co-operation now demanded of 

them. Agreement on joint strategy did 

not prove too difficult, but day-to-day implementation continually revealed disparities between the Army and Navy 

points of view. It was not only that the 

services had different habits of thought 

and organizational jealousies; they were 

split by the geography of the war. The 

Army's primary interest was in Europe 

where the bulk of its forces would be 

used. 'The Navy had a similar primary 

interest in the Pacific. The naval members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admirals 

Leahy and King, were not opposed to 

OVERLORD) nor to the basic strategy of defeating Germany flTSt. They simply lacked 

the U.S. Army's single-minded enthusiasm for European projects. On the one 

hand, while there remained any doubt as 

to whether OVERLORD would be mounted, 

they questioned the wisdom of hoarding 

resources in the United Kingdom and so 

delaying the day when the all-out offensive in the Pacific could be started.3! On 

the other hand, they were more open than 

the Army to persuasion that OVERLORD 

might be unnecessary. 

In July 1943 naval representatives on 

the Joint War Plans Committee and the 

Joint Planners actually proposed shifting 

U.S. strategy away from the OVERLORD 

idea. 32 They argued that world condi31 For instance, see JCS 83d and 84th Mtgs, 17, 18 

May 43; see also above, Ch. 1. 

32.IPS 231, Adequacy of the TRIDENT Strategy, 26 

Jul 43. Colonel Bessell, Army member of the JWPC, 

concurred in the memorandum but his concurrence 

did not represent War Department opinion. See .ICS 

444/1. 

tions which had made the cross-Channel 

project the best means of seeking a decision with Germany had so changed as to 

"cast grave doubt over the ROUNDUP concept." The decisive defeat of the German 

armies, they believed, would, if necessary, 

be accomplished by Russia. They accepted the original British idea of a crossChannel operation in the final stages of 

the war, and concluded that, "without 

prejudice to Pacific and Burma operations, the continuing success and great 

momentum of our Mediterranean operations must carryon, at least until after 

Italy is knocked out of the war." The decision by the Combined Chiefs of Staff 

in May, to withdraw seven divisions from 

the Mediterranean for use in OVERLORD) 

appeared to them unsound, since it would 

remove pressure from Germany, preventing a maximum effort in Italy and a possible opportunistic exploitation of Italian 

collapse through invasion of southern 

France. "If Germany chooses to fight in 

Italy," they wrote, "that is the place to 

fight her. There is, indeed, no doubt but 

that the combination of this constant 

wastage of Axis air power [through the 

combined bomber offensive] plus the 

elimination of Italy represents the maximum possible 1943 Anglo-American contribution towards the defeat of the European Axis." 

The proposals, in short, completely reversed the American strategic principles 

consistently defended up to that time by 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The paper, representing "a new trend in U.S. thinking," went informally to Generally Marshall.33 It was considered so seriously that 

33 Copy of .IPS 231 (with attached buck slip) in 

CIS file 381 II. 
94 

when General Barker, deputy COSSAC, 

arrived in Washington with the OVERLORD 

plan he observed a "weakening" of the 

American attitude toward OVERLORD. He 

reported to General Morgan that the 

weakening was induced, "as previously," 

by U.S. naval authorities. He thought he 

had come just in time to strengthen the 

War Department's hand. 34 Actually the 

\Var Department planners had not weakened. They had already begun a thoroughgoing attack on the naval position 

and had presented a separate analysis of 

strategy for consideration by the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff. This returned to the traditional U.S. view on OVERLORD and reaffirmed the May decisions of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, especially in regard 

to the withdrawal of the seven battletrained divisions from the Mediterranean. 

Admiral King did not defend the naval 

planners' report in the Joint Chiefs' next 

meeting on 7 August, and the traditional 

War Department view was accepted again 

as U.S. strategy.35 

The flurry of planners' memoranda at 

the end of July 1943 was the Navy's only 

open challenge of General Marshall's European strategy. Admiral King himself 

was apparently content that, in discus34 Morgan's notes on telephone conversation with 

Barker, r, Aug 43. SHAEF SGS file 381 la. 

35 The original JWPC paper (JPS 231) , which set 

forth the naval point of view, was never presented to 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but it formed the basis for 

JCS 444, which did reach them. The latter paper is a 

slightly toned down version of JPS 231 based on the 

same strategic principles. The formula at the 7 

August meeting was to call for a "reconciling" of the 

reports of the ?'Iavy planners, JCS 444, and the Army 

planners' rejoinder, JCS 444/1. In fact what happened 

was that the Army views were accepted in toto and 

formed the basis for the U. S. Chiefs of Staff memorandum submitted to the British at Quebec as CCS 

303. See OPD file ABC 381 Europe (5 Aug 43) and 

ABC 337 (25 May 43) . 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

sions with the British, U.S. views on European operations should be the vVar Department's view for which General Marshall was the spokesman.36 As European 

matters were the principal and by far the 

most controversial concern of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, General Marshall 

assumed the chief responsibility for defending U.S. strategy in debate with the 

British. To this responsibility Marshall 

brought both conviction and diplomatic 

skill. He was firm in his belief that the 

strategy evolved by the War Department 

was the correct strategy, yet he was always willing to attend the possible merits 

of rival suggestions. He fought hard for 

ROUNDUP in J ul y 1942 and lost primarily 

to the President's insistence on immediate 

action. Thereafter Marshall rode two 

horses, struggling to keep tight rein on 

Mediterranean commitments in order 

that BOLERO could proceed apace. He 

managed this feat by a series of compromises. But, at Quebec, as has been 

suggested, the roads diverged. It seemed 

essential to choose between them. For 

36 On the other hand, General Marshall was scrupulous in letting Admiral King speak first on Pacifie 

matters. 

A graduate of the Virginia Military Institute in 

1901, Marshall was commissioned in the infantry. 

During World War I he was assigned to general staff 

duty and went overseas with the 1st Division, with 

which he served at Luneville, St. Mihiel, Picardy, 

and Cantigny. He worked on the plans for the St. 

Mihiel offensive and then became Chief of Operations of First Army in the midst of the Meuse-Argonne offensive. In May 1919 Marshall was appointed 

aide to General John J. Pershing and held that assignment for the next five years. In 1936 and again 

in 1937 he commanded Red Forces in army maneuvers. The following year he came to the War Department first as Assistant Chief of Staff, War Plans 

Division, and then as Deputy Chief of Staff. After a 

two months' tour as chief of a military mission to 

Brazil in 1939, he was appointed Chief of Staff of the 

Army. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 95 

the first time since July 1942 Marshall 

accepted the need for a showdown with 

the British and undertook to lead the 

fight. To his colleagues he said: "We 

must go into this argument in the spirit 

of winning. If, after fighting it out on 

that basis, the President and Prime Minister [decide] that the Mediterranean 

strategy should be adopted ... the decision [should] be made firm in order that 

definite plans could be made with reasonable expectation of their being carried 

out." 37 

Deeply as General Marshall opposed 

the Mediterranean strategy, he still preferred to settle on that rather than face a 

series of emergency operations and a generally hand-to-mouth strategy. This opposition between a settled plan and a dependence on opportunity was probably 

the most serious difference between the 

American and British points of view-a 

rift wider and more difficult to reconcile 

than any differences over where and 

when the campaigns in Europe were to 

be fought. 

The British said in effect, "How can 

we tell what we should do six months or 

a year hence until we know how we come 

out of next month's action?" The Americans retorted, "How do we know whether 

next month's action is wise unless we 

know where we want to be a year from 

now?" The positions were difficult to reconcile because ultimately both stemmed 

from the respective resources and experiences of the two nations. For a year and 

a half Great Britain stood alone on the 

edge of a hostile Europe fearful a good 

part of the time of being herself invaded 

by the Nazi conquerors. She stood 

81 JCS I04th Mtg. 15 Aug 43. 

counting up her resources and matching 

them against her responsibilities for the 

defense of her own shores and her life 

lines throughout the world. The deficit 

in means must have seemed appalling. 

From 1940 on it was obvious to British 

strategists that, if the war was to be won, 

eventually British armies would have to 

return to the Continent. But all their 

plans for such an eventuality had to recognize that a maximum effort might hurl 

about twenty divisions against the Atlantic Wall. Planners in 1941 and 1942 were 

bound to face strategy as primarily a 

problem of what could be done with such 

a relatively small army. Their invariable 

conclusion was that nothing could be 

done except under conditions of German 

collapse or a very great weakening in 

German morale. It should not be forgotten that the ground war in Europe at 

this time was being fought by massed 

German and Russian armies of hundreds 

of divisions. How could the scales of this 

conflict be tipped by the addition of 

twenty divisions? On the other hand if 

those twenty divisions (the core of an expeditionary force of about one million 

men) were committed in an unsuccessful 

enterprise, it was probable that they 

could never be reconstituted. England's 

striking power on land would thus be 

fruitlessly dissipated. It is not strange 

then that the strategists looked to the 

fringes of the Continent, outside the area 

where the bulk of the German Army was 

engaged. Their best hope for eventual 

success seemed to be to nibble the Nazi 

monster down to size. When this might 

happen no one could foretell. It depended partly on Russian success, partly 

on their own success. If they could get 

away with the first nibble they might try 
96 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

a larger bite. Militarily they did not 

want rigid plans and long-range target 

dates. They did not want what General 

Brooke later called “a lawyer’s agreement” to tie their hands.38 They wanted 

maximum freedom to exploit whatever 

situation arose and promised the best 

chance of furthering their initial object 

of wearing down the German military 

power in preparation for the final blow. 

The Mediterranean, because of the weakness of Italy and because of the unusual 

number and variety of legitimate military objectives, was an ideal area in 

which to work out their policy. Moreover, since the eighteenth century the 

Mediterranean had been an area of 

British political interest. Military aims 

and traditional political concern thus 

both focused on the European underbelly.39 

America came into the war with historic consciousness of her great, unbeaten 

power. Although she was dangerously 

unprepared, her psychology from the 

beginning was offensive. Americans were 

confident they could build huge armies, 

navies, and air forces. For example the 

War Department “Victory Program,” 

38SCAEF 12th Mtg, 27 Mar 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 I. Brooke was at the time refusing to make commitments on the invasion of southern France as a 

diversion for OVERLORD (see Ch. V) He said that 

“it was not militarily sound to run a war on a lawyer’s agreement by making commitments ahead of 

time, thereby losing the necessary and desired flexibility to meet the ever changing conditions and circumstances.” 

39See n. 26. It is impossible to assess what force 

political consideration may have had at any juncture 

in the debate, for neither the Prime Minister nor the 

British Chiefs ever put a political argument on the 

contemporary record. Even at this time (1950) Mr. 

Churchill apparently still does not defend the Mediterranean strategy on political grounds. See Churchill, The Grand Alliance, pp. 660-61. 

prepared in September 1941 in answer 

to the President’s request for an estimate 

of the Army’s needs for waging war, contemplated an army of 215 divisions.40 

The thought was then that the USSR 

might succumb and that America had to 

be ready to take on the German Army 

alone, except for the relatively small contributions of Great Britain. After Pearl 

Harbor the War Department published a 

Troop Basis calling for an army of more 

than ten million men.41 As the war progressed Soviet success made a huge U.S. 

field army unnecessary. But the very 

fact that Americans at the beginning contemplated taking on the German Army 

by themselves and felt it possible is a 

clue to their psychology. As U.S. war 

power accumulated, Americans became 

impatient to bring on the decisive trial 

of strength. It was evident that such a 

trial could never be made in the Mediterranean. Moreover, the attempt to 

nibble away at the German power, the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff believed, would only 

result in attrition of their own strength. 

However great the reservoir of American 

military power, its application was limited by the logistical difficulties of long 

sea communications and the chronic 

shortage of shipping. Every division sent 

into the Mediterranean was a division 

lost for the main battle. It could not be 

moved to another theater without expending the same amount of shipping as 

40 Joint Board Estimate of United States Over-all 

Production Requirements, 11 Sep 41, JB 355, ser 707. 

OPD files. 

41 Both of these estimates were primarily for purposes of planning war production and not mobilization, but they are nonetheless symptomatic of the 

Army’s expansive thinking. Cf. other estimates in 

early 1942 cited in K. R. Greenfield, R. R. Palmer, 

and B. I. Wylie, The Organization of Ground Combat Troops (Washington, 1947). p. 198. 

96 

a larger bite. Militarily they did not 

want rigid plans and long-range target 

dates. They did not want what General 

Brooke later called "a lawyer's agreement" to tie their hands.3s They wanted 

maximum freedom to exploit whatever 

situation arose and promised the best 

chance of furthering their initial object 

of wearing down the German military 

power in preparation for the final blow. 

The Mediterranean, because of the weakness of Italy and because of the unusual 

number and variety of legitimate military objectives, was an ideal area in 

which to work out their policy. Moreover, since the eighteenth century the 

Mediterranean had been an area of 

British political interest. Military aims 

and traditional political concern thus 

both focused on the European underbelly.39 

America came into the war with historic consciousness of her great, unbeaten 

power. Although she was dangerously 

unprepared, her psychology from the 

beginning was offensive. Americans were 

confident they could build huge armies, 

navies, and air forces. For example the 

War Department "Victory Program," 

38 SCAEF 12th Mtg, 27 Mar 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 1. Brooke was 'at the time refusing to make commitments on the invasion of southern France as a 

diversion for OVERLORD (see Ch. V). He said that 

"it was not militarily sound to run a war on a lawyer's agreement by making commitments ahead of 

time, thereby losing the necessary and desired flexibility to meet the ever changing conditions and circumstances." 

39 See n. 26. It is impossible to assess what force 

political consideration may have had at any juncture 

in the debate, for neither the Prime Minister nor the 

British Chiefs ever put a political argument on the 

contemporary record_ Even at this time (1950) Mr. 

Churchill apparently still does not defend the Mediterranean strategy on political grounds. See Churchill, The Grand Alliance, pp. 660...{i1. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

prepared in September 1941 in answer 

to the President's request for an estimate 

of the Army's needs for waging war, contemplated an army of 215 divisions.40 

The thought was then that the USSR 

might succumb and that America had to 

be ready to take on the German Army 

alone, except for the relatively small contributions of Great Britain. After Pearl 

Harbor the War Department published a 

Troop Basis calling for an army of more 

than ten million menY As the war progressed Soviet success made a huge U.S. 

field army unnecessary. But the very 

fact that Americans at the beginning contemplated taking on the German Army 

by themselves and felt it possible is a 

clue to their psychology. As U.S. war 

power accumulated, Americans became 

impatient to bring on the decisive trial 

of strength. It was evident that such a 

trial could never be made in the Mediterranean. Moreover, the attempt to 

nibble away at the German power, the 

J oint Chiefs of Staff believed, would only 

result in attrition of their own strength. 

However great the reservoir of American 

military power, its application was limited by the logistical difficulties of long 

sea communications and the chronic 

shortage of shipping. Every division sent 

into the Mediterranean was a division 

lost for the main battle. It could not be 

moved to another theater without expending the same amount of shipping as 

40 Joint Board Estimate of United States Over-all 

Production Requirements. II Sep 41, JB 355, ser 707. 

OPD files_ 

41 Both of these estimates were primarily for purposes of planning war production and not mobilization, but they are nonetheless symptomatic of the 

Army's expansive thinking. Cf. other estimates in 

early 1942 cited in K. R. Greenfield, R. R. Palmer, 

and B. 1. Wylie, The Organization ot Ground Combat Troops (Washington, 1947) , p. 198. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 97 

would be required to send a fresh division overseas from the United States.42 

Its very presence in the Mediterranean 

sucked in shipping to sustain it and more 

divisions to reinforce it. The Mediterranean, General Marshall thought, was 

a vacuum into which American's great 

military might could be drawn off until 

there was nothing left with which to deal 

the decisive blow on the Continent.43 

And what if, after committing the 

country's resources to the Mediterranean, 

they should be boxed up there, and destroyed? The Americans could not forget that the Mediterranean was practically a closed lake to which Spain held 

the western key. What if the Allied 

armies, after fighting hard for minor 

victories, should be cut off from the 

sources of supply? The possibility did 

not seem unlikely. Franco was a Fascist 

who had certain reasons to be grateful 

to Hitler and might be persuaded at least 

to turn the other way while German 

armies marched through to Gibraltar. 

This fear of being locked up in the Mediterranean was never shared by the 

British, who had long been accustomed to 

faith in Gibraltar and diplomatic bulwarks in the Iberian Peninsula. But it 

remained a strong factor in American 

hostility to Mediterranean commitments 

until well into 1943, when it was finally 

concluded that the Germans no longer 

had enough spare divisions to seize the 

Iberian Peninsula. 44 

42 JCS 293, Limited Operations in the Mediterranean in 1943-44, 7 May 43. 

43 CCS 83d Mtg. 13 May 43. 

44 The fear of a German move through Spain was 

frequently expressed. See, for instance, JCS 52d and 

57th Mtgs, Jan 43; CCS 151/2, 17 Feb 43 and JCS Spec 

Mtg, 26 Jul 43. Appreciation that such a move was 

no longer possible was contained in JCS 438/1, JIC 

The differences of strategic concept 

were fully recognized by both the U.S. 

and British Chiefs of Staff. At Quebec 

they were squarely faced in a debate 

brought on by the Joint Chiefs' submission of a paper outlining strategy for the 

defeat of the Axis in Europe. 45 Their 

paper called for no action. It was a simple statement of principle, giving "overriding priority" to OVERLORD over all 

other European operations. At first reading General Brooke found it for the most 

part unexceptionable. He agreed that 

OVERLORD "should constitute the major 

offensive for 1944 and that Italian operations should be planned with this conception as a background." 46 That agreement, however, was not so positive as it 

sounded. The British view was that the 

Italian operations were essential steps on 

the road that led to OVERLORD. Being 

essential rather than diversionary, they 

acquired in British eyes at least an equal 

importance with the operation for which 

they prepared. The British objected 

therefore to assigning "over-riding priority" to the cross-Channel attack. The 

Joint Chiefs believed that, without such 

priority, Mediterranean operations would 

compete successfully for Allied resources 

and so perhaps make OVERLORD impossible when the time came to mount it. 

For three days the debate precipitated by 

that phrase "over-riding priority" raged, 

often behind closed doors with no secretaries presen t. 

It was no mere verbal dispute. It 

tackled head on the issue of whether or 

Rpt, Estimate of the Enemy Situation~ 1943-1944, 

European~Mediterranean Area, 7 May 43. 

45 See discussions of the Quebec Conference agenda, 

CCS 288 series. 

46 CCS 108th Mtg, 15 Aug 43. 
98 

not the Allies should base their strategy 

on a single-minded concentration on a 

cross-Channel attack in 1944. That there 

should be no doubt of the seriousness of 

the issue, General Marshall stated the 

American view in strong terms. If the 

Allies relied on opportunism, he said, 

they would be "opening a new concept 

which ... weakened ... [the] chances 

of an early victo:ry and rendered necessary a reexamination of . . . [the] basic 

strategy with a possible read justwent 

towards the Pacific." 47 The threat had 

been used before, and was probably not 

taken very seriously. But there was no 

mistaking the new firmness in the American stand. "The United States Chiefs 

of Staff believe that the acceptance of 

this decision [to grant over-riding priority to OVERLORD] must be without conditions and without mental reservation. 

They accept the fact that a grave emergency will always call for appropriate 

action to meet it. However, long range 

decision for the conduct of the war must 

not be dominated by possible eventualities." 48 The debate continued. 

On 17 August 1943, the Combined 

Chiefs at last agreed to a statement of 

policy which on the face of it was acceptance of the American principle, but 

the wording was pregnant with mental 

reservations. Instead of giving OVERLORD 

"over-riding priority," they proclaimed: 

"As between operation OVERLORD and 

operations in the Mediterranean, where 

there is a shortage of resources, av"ailable 

resources will be distributed with the 

main object of insuring the success of 

OVERLORD. Operations in the Mediter47 Ibid. 

48 CCS 303/1, Strategic Concept lor the Defeat of 

the Axis in Europe, 16 Aug 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ranean Theater will be carried out with 

the forces allotted at TRIDENT except as 

these may be varied by decision of the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff." 49 Possible 

eventualities still were riding high. 

American attempts to crystallize strategy were, of course, at bottom merely 

efforts to force the British Chiefs of Staff 

into a hard and fast commitment on 

OVERLORD. How far they succeeded at 

Quebec is difficult to appraise. General 

Brooke, when directly challenged as to 

his faith in OVERLORD) replied that he 

thought OVERLORD would succeed provided that the conditions of restricted 

enemy opposition as laid down in the 

plans were met. The Prime Minister in 

the course of both plenary sessions underlined these conditions. If they were still 

unfulfilled when the target date became 

imminent, then he asked that the Combined Chiefs review the operation. So 

that they would have a second string to 

their bow, he suggested that planning be 

directed now for an alternative operation 

against Norway. In conversation with 

Marshall, on the other hand, Churchill 

said that he "had changed his mind regarding OVERLORD and that we should 

use every opportunity to further that 

operation." 50 He also told General Ismay 

after the conference that "the thing 

looked good." 51 He would not, however, 

commit himself on the issue of the relative priorities of OVERLORD and the Mediterranean. In general it may be said that 

the British Chiefs and the Prime Minister at Quebec endorsed the principle of 

a cross-Channel invasion in 1944 but still 

49 CCS 303/3, 17 Aug 43. TRIDENT was the code name 

for the Washington Conference of May 1943. 

50 JCS 106th Mtg, 16 Aug 43. 

H Interv with Gen Ismay cited n. 22. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 99 

entertained considerable reservations as 

to its feasibility at that date. It would 

take another stormy meeting in the 

winter to settle these for good. 

In the meantime, the reservations were 

less important than the decisions. In 

effect the Combined Chiefs at Quebec 

abided by their agreements of the Washington Conference. They resisted suggestions that the seven battle-trained divisions ought not to be moved out of the 

Mediterranean. They approved General 

Morgan's OVERLORD plan and ordered 

him to continue plans and preparations. 

They further suggested that the plan 

should be enlarged. The Prime Minister 

asked for an increase of the assaulting 

forces by at least 25 percent. He also desired a landing on the east coast of the 

Cotentin. General Marshall agreed. Although these recommendations were not 

embodied in a directive, they constituted 

an authorization to Morgan to overstep 

the limitations imposed on his planning 

by the Washington agreements. 52 

The OVERLORD planners had also asked 

for a diversion against southern France to 

prevent the Germans from moving troops 

from the south to meet the main Allied 

assault in Normandy. The Quebec conferees accepted with very little discussion 

the desirability of such a diversion and 

ordered General Eisenhower, then commanding general of the North African 

theater, to draw up plans for an actual 

operation. It was to be timed to coincide with OVERLORD and have as its objective the establishment of a lodgment 

in the Toulon-Marseille area with subsequent exploitation northward. The 

British expressed some tentative doubts 

52 Capt Mansergh (COSSAC Naval Staff) , Rpt on 

QUADRANT at COSSAC (43) 23d Mtg, 30 Aug 43. 

about the plan. General Brooke believed 

that the invasion should be attempted 

only if the Germans had been "forced to 

withdraw a number of their divisions 

from that area," 53 and the Prime Minister wondered whether air nourishment 

of the French guerilla forces in the region 

might not constitute an acceptable alternative. In the absence of a specific 

plan and before the Italian venture had 

been undertaken, the whole project was 

evidently highly speculative and the most 

that could be decided was to explore the 

possibilities. 

Even the possibilities were admittedly 

very limited. General Eisenhower was 

directed to plan on the basis of resources 

already allotted to his theater, and it was 

estimated that this would allow him a~ 

amphibious lift for only 27,000 troops 

and 1,500 vehicles-a lift, in other words, 

for about one division. It was further 

noted that "the ships and craft shown do 

not provide a balanced assault lift .... " 

However inadequate these resources 

might be, the Quebec planners ruled that 

nothing more would be available. "Augmentation is not considered practicable 

without drawing from OVERLORD." 54 

Despite this ruling, planning would 

reveal in the months ahead that augmentation was essential, and in consequence 

the southern France invasion, though 

conceived by the Americans as an integral part of OVERLORD, would actually 

become another competitor for scarce re-

~s 1st Plenary (Citadel) Mtg, 19 Aug 43. OPD 

files, Min of QUADRANT Conf. 

54 CCS 328/1 Directive to General Eisenhower, 27 

Aug 43, Annex V. The origins and development of 

the southern France operation will be discussed in 

detail by Maj. J. D. T. Hamilton in Southern 

France and Alsace, a volume under preparation in 

this series. 
100 

sources. On the other hand, by providing 

a means to employ forces already located 

in the Mediterranean in direct support 

of the attack against northwest Europe, 

it would prove a useful talking point 

against British advocacy of Balkan adventures or an increased effort in Italy. 

For the fate of OVERLORD, the casual 

suggestion to increase its size was probably the most significant product of the 

Quebec Conference. It set in motion 

plans and preparations that acquired 

their own momentum, which with the 

mere passage of time became increasingly 

difficult to reverse. This fact underlines 

an important characteristic of all the debates among the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff. The debates always prefaced action. Action was required by circumstances regardless of whether minds met 

or not. There was never any question of 

allowing differences to split the AngloAmerican alliance. However great was 

the disparity in strategic thinking, the 

community of basic interests ran deeper. 

The need for common action was more 

vital than any principle under debate. 

Thus, although neither Americans nor 

British perceptibly yielded their separate 

points of view, practical decisions were 

made as if such yielding had taken place. 

The deadlock of ideas was broken by the 

practical politics of compromise, enforced by the necessity of continuously 

acting against the enemy. 

Compromise, furthermore, was made 

possible, as well as necessary, by the 

equality of the Allies. The realization 

that neither America nor Great Britain 

could act alone was implicit in every discussion and every decision. England's 

base and America's resources were alike 

indispensable for a decisive trial of 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

strength with Germany. Each nation 

separately would have been doomed to a 

long and possibly futile struggle. 

Quebec was as inconclusive as the previous meetings had been in attempting 

an unalterable definition of European 

strategy. But operation OVERLORD came 

through the debates unscathed by any 

serious cntICIsm. OVERLORD was the 

weapon. Once forged, it would argue for 

its own use more eloquently than all the 

words in council. 

Landing Craft Again 

General Morgan did not wait for the 

decisions at Quebec to begin a re-examination of his completed plan with the 

view to strengthening it. One of his first 

steps after the plan had been delivered to 

the British Chiefs of Staff was to ask his 

naval staff to estimate, first, the number 

of additional landing craft that would be 

required to load the vehicles of the two 

follow-up divisions tactically so that they 

could be used on D plus I, and, second, 

the number of craft needed to lift another assault division. The figures supplied him on 27 July 1943 almost immediately became irrelevant. 55 Instead 

of being able to contemplate a larger 

assault, Morgan saw his already inadequate supply of landing craft dwindling 

away. 

Of the 653 LCT's which the Washington Conference allotted to OVERLORD and 

which General Morgan from the outset complained constituted a bare and 

dangerous minimum for the task, 44 had 

65 Memo, Capt Mansergh for COSSAC, Appreciation of the Effect of the Provision of Extra Landing 

Craft and Shipping for Operation OVERLORD, 27 Jul 

43. SHAEF SGS file (1944 Operations). 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 101 

been taken by the British Navy for net 

protection duties at Scapa Flow. It was 

possible, though not certain, that some 

might be released in time to take part in 

Overlord. Still more serious, a large

number of LCT’s had to be converted 

into close-support craft for the assault 

because the Combined Chiefs had made 

almost no provision for such craft. Although the burden of neutralizing the 

enemy coastal and beach defenses would 

be undertaken by the air forces and 

naval vessels, the heavy preparatory fires 

would have to be lifted some minutes 

before the assault craft actually touched 

down. It was never imagined that preparatory fire could destroy any significant 

proportion of the enemy defenses. The 

most it could do would be to prevent the 

enemy from manning his guns effectively 

while the bombardment was in progress. 

It was therefore essential for the assaulting force to keep up neutralizing fire 

until the last possible moment. That 

meant small craft, armored and equipped 

with guns and rockets, which could 

maneuver close to the shore and fire as 

the assault waves rolled in. To perform 

this vital task, the Washington Conference allotted OVERLORD just thirteen 

LCG’s (Landing Craft, Gun). Early in 

August 1943, COSSAC was informed that 

only seven of these craft could be delivered in time; the rest would be a month 

late. General Morgan took the opportunity to raise the whole question of the 

inadequacy of the planned close support. 

As a result, the British Chiefs of Staff 

invited him on 12 August to prepare a 

detailed report on the shortage of landing 

craft “and other naval equipment” for 

OVERLORD.56

56COS (43) 186th Mtg (0), 12 Aug 43. 

General Morgan rolled up his sleeves 

and accepted the invitation with zest. He 

told 21 Army Group, which was particularly concerned over the shortage of support craft, that he would take full advantage of the opportunity offered him 

to expound the subject of landing craft 

shortages. “I am aiming,” he said, “to 

give the Chiefs a proper earful.” 57 

Facts for the earful were supplied by 

his naval staff, which calculated shortages based solely on current allocations 

and the three-division assault plan. Altogether about one-quarter of the 648 

LCT’s planned for the assault lift were, 

for various reasons, no longer available. 

In addition to the 44 already noted which 

were being used at Scapa Flow, 36 were 

to be converted to LCT(R)‘s (rocketcarrying craft), 48 would be armored to 

carry direct-support high-explosive weapons, and 36 would probably be needed 

for close support of the U.S. assault division. The latter estimate, in reality, was 

very low. General Devers, ETOUSA 

commanding general, subsequently calculated that the American assault division would require 56 support craft of 

the types that used LCT hulls or the 

equivalent. The net deficit Navy planners set at 164 LCT’s as well as 7 

LCI(L)‘s that had been converted into 

headquarters ships.58 

How was this deficit to be made up? 

The U.S. Chiefs of Staff held out little 

hope that the craft might come from 

57Ltr, Morgan (COSSAC) to Maj Gen W. D. 

Morgan (CofS 21 Army Group), 18 Aug 43. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 I. 

58 COSSAC (43) 50, Landing Craft for OVERLORD, 

10 Sep 43; Memo, Devers for COSSAC, Support Craft 

Required per U.S. Assault Division, 15 Oct 43. 

SHAEF SGS file 560 I. 

OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 101 

been taken by the British Navy for net 

protection duties at Scapa Flow. It was 

possible, though not certain, that some 

might be released in time to take part in 

OVERLORD. Still more serious, a large 

number of LCT's had to be converted 

into close-support craft for the assault 

because the Combined Chiefs had made 

almost no provision for such craft. Although the burden of neutralizing the 

enemy coastal and beach defenses would 

be undertaken by the air forces and 

naval vessels, the heavy preparatory fires 

would have to be lifted some minutes 

before the assault craft actually touched 

down. It was never imagined that preparatory fire could destroy any significant 

proportion of the enemy defenses. The 

most it could do would be to prevent the 

enemy from manning his guns effectively 

while the bombardment was in progress. 

It was therefore essential for the assaulting force to keep up neutralizing fire 

until the last possible moment. That 

meant small craft, armored and equipped 

with guns and rockets, which could 

maneuver close to the shore and fire as 

the assault waves rolled in. To perform 

this vital task, the Washington Conference allotted OVERLORD just thirteen 

LCG's (Landing Craft, Gun). Early in 

August 1943, COSSAC was informed that 

only seven of these craft could be delivered in time; the rest would be a month 

late. General Morgan took the opportunity to raise the whole question of the 

inadequacy of the planned close support. 

As a result, the British Chiefs of Staff 

invited him on 12 August to prepare a 

detailed report on the shortage of landing 

craft "and other naval equipment" for 

OVERLORD.56 

56 COS (43) 186th Mtg (0), 12 Aug 43. 

General Morgan rolled up his sleeves 

and accepted the invitation with zest. He 

told 21 Army Group, which was particularly concerned over the shortage of support craft, that he would take full advantage of the opportunity offered him 

to expound the subject of landing craft 

shortages. "I am aiming," he said, "to 

give the Chiefs a proper earful." 57 

Facts for the earful were supplied by 

his naval staff, which calculated shortages based solely on current allocations 

and the three-division assault plan. Altogether about one-quarter of the 648 

LCT's planned for the assault lift were, 

for various reasons, no longer available. 

In addition to the 44 already noted which 

were being used at Scapa Flow, 36 were 

to be converted to LCT(R)'s (rocketcarrying craft), 48 would be armored to 

carry direct-support high-explosive weapons, and 36 would probably be needed 

for close support of the U.S. assault division. The latter estimate, in reality, was 

very low. General Devers, ETOUSA 

commanding general, subsequently calculated that the American assault division would require 56 support craft of 

the types that used LCT hulls or the 

equivalent. The net deficit Navy planners set at 164 LCT's as well as 7 

LCI(L)'s that had been converted into 

headquarters ships.58 

How was this deficit to be made up? 

The U.S. Chiefs of Staff held out little 

hope that the craft might come from 

57 Ltr, Morgan (COSSAC) to Maj Gen W. D. 

Morgan (CofS 21 Army Group), 18 Aug 43. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 I. 

58 COSSAC (43) 50, Landing Craft for OVERLORD, 

10 Sep 43; Memo, Devers for COSSAC, Support Craft 

Required per U.S. Assault Division, 15 Oct 43. 

SHAEF SGS file 560 I. 
102 

American sources. The United States, 

they decided, could not assign additional 

LCT's to the United Kingdom to replace 

those diverted from OVERLORD to Scapa 

Flow defense duties. 59 The Joint Chiefs 

declared that the United States had never 

built any gun-support craft and did not 

intend to.60 On 10 August Admiral King 

wrote to Admiral Stark: "Production in 

the U.S. and requirements of other 

theaters will permit no advancement of 

present schedule of BOLERO landing craft 

to come from the United States mainland. 

The above matters are being studied at 

the present time and you will be informed 

when decisions are reached_" 61 The decision was reached a few days later to explore the possibility of increasing production, and Admiral King then said he felt 

sure some increase could be achieved. But 

there was considerable doubt whether 

any increases, even if effected, could be 

felt in time for OVERLORD. The program 

of U .S_ landing craft production remained for several weeks clouded with 

uncertainty. 

British production offered no better 

hope. The shipbuilding industry in the 

United Kingdom was near the saturation 

point, especially as regards the employment of available skilled labor. The 

manufacture of landing craft had already 

been expanded to the point where it was 

consuming a quarter of all the steel 

worked into new hulls. To increase it 

further would have involved a host of 

technical difficulties which seemed un-

~9 cos (43) 175th Mtg (0),29 Jul 43. 

60 Memo, Adm Creasy for COSSAC, Provision of 

Support Craft-Progress Report, 2 Sep 43. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 I. 

61 Ltr, King to ComNavEu, 10 Aug 43. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 I. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

economical to British authorities. 62 Not 

until later in the fall did the need for 

more craft appear so urgent that the 

Prime Minister intervened to cancel certain ship construction in order to make 

way for an increase of about sixty landing 

craft for OVERLORD. At the moment, General Morgan's request for a revision of 

the whole shipbuilding program was 

turned down by the British Chiefs of 

Staff.63 

The problem of how to make good 

the deficit in landing craft for a threedivision assault had received only a prelimi lary examination when word came 

from Quebec that the Prime Minister 

wanted the assault increased to four divisions.64 The British Chiefs of Staff asked 

General Morgan to report on that possibility. By the end of September, COSSAC completed a thorough re-examination. So much debate and hypothesis had 

by that time clouded the issue that General Morgan undertook to start afresh, 

recalculate his requirements, and restate 

his tactical thinking. 

"My original Directive" he began, 

"placed at my disposal a quantity of 

landing craft which bore little or no relation, as to numbers and types, to the 

actual requirements of the proposed 

operation." Now, he continued, it was 

pw?osed to strengthen the operation, 

which he fully conceded needed strengthening. But did this mean adding a fourth 

division to the assault? General Morgan 

thought not. He pointed out the dangerous weaknesses of the plan as it stood, 

weaknesses which were thrust on it by the 

62 Information supplied by the British Admiralty. 

63 COS (43) 566 (0), Availability of Landing Craft 

(Tanks) for OVERLORD, 22 Sep 43. 

64 Cbl cited at COS (43) 209th Mtg (0),7 Sep 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 103 

inadequacy of the landing craft allotted. 

"Detailed analysis of the present plan 

shows that while the three assault divisions are only barely adequately mounted 

in craft of suitable types, the immediate 

follow-up formations are most inadequately mounted, and there is a dangerous gap on D-plus-l day." A large proportion of the follow-up forces being 

mounted in ordinary shipping could not 

be tactically loaded and thus would not 

be operationally available on the far 

shore until twelve hours after landing. 

In short most of them were "follow-up" 

in name only; they would not be in position immediately to reinforce the assault 

troops. General Morgan therefore recommended that, before any consideration be given to increasing the number 

of assaulting divisions, all additional 

landing craft that could be raked up 

should be put in to strengthen the followup and provide a floating reserve. "We 

already have far too high a proportion of 

our goods in the shop window," he said. 

"To consider any increase in this proportion without adequate stocking of the 

back premises would in my opinion be 

basically unsound." 65 

Morgan's new calculations of craft 

needed to permit the landing of two full 

divisions in the follow-up for use on 

D plus 1 showed a deficit of 251 LCT's 

for a three-division assault and 389 for a 

four-division assault. In addition, for a 

four-division assault there would be a 

shortage of more than 150 support craft 

using LCT or equivalent hulls. 

Quite apart from this very large landing craft requirement, the four-division 

65 COS (43) 596 (0),30 Sep 43. 

assault struck General Morgan as unwise 

because it would necessitate broadening 

the assault front. Extension to the east 

he believed would bring the assaulting 

troops within range of the Le Havre 

coastal guns, which were among the most 

formidable in the Atlantic Wall. Extension on the right flank of the assault 

would involve landing on the beaches 

northwest of the Carentan estuary. Reversing his previous stand that this would 

be desirable, General Morgan now noted 

that the Germans had already begun 

flooding the hinterland of the Cotentin 

and that therefore the contemplated 

assault in that area was unsound. 

The British Chiefs of Staff were not 

impressed with this argument and continue to advocate a four-division assault, 

the fourth division to be American and 

to be employed against the east Cotentin. 

No suggestions were made as to how the 

evident difficulties might be overcome.66 

However the strengthening of OVERLORD was to be accomplished, there was 

general agreement that strengthening 

was needed, and that this would require 

large new increments of landing craft. In 

the urgent need to find these craft, the 

question of their tactical employment for 

the moment took a back seat. 

In September Donald Nelson, chairman of the U.S. War Production Board, 

went to London and talked to General 

Morgan and his staff about landing craft 

requirements. As a result of his conversations he cabled Charles E. Wilson his 

conviction that LST's and LCT's were 

the "most important single instrument of 

war from the point of view of the Euro06 COS (43) 236th Mtg, 4 Oct 43. 
104 

pean Theater," and that the requirements for them had been "grossly understated." 67 

Planning adequate supplies of landing 

craft, however, was still complicated by 

the competition of other parts of the war 

production program for critical war 

materials, particularly steel plate and 

marine engines. Equally important was 

the competition between landing craft 

and other shipping for priority in the 

nation's crowded shipyards. The Navy's 

1944 shipbuilding program called for a 

50 percent increase of tonnage over the 

previous year, while the Maritime Commission's schedules for merchant shipbuilding remained about the same as 

before. To superimpose on this large 

shipbuilding commitment an increase in 

landing craft production schedules required a careful scrutiny of strategic 

needs for various types of shipping. Furthermore, if changes were to be made in 

apportioning materials and facilities, 

they had to be made long in advance of 

anticipated needs since readjustments in 

the program required time-time to cancel contracts for one type of vessel and 

let contracts for another, time to complete construction already under way on 

one type and initiate construction of 

another. A large part of the Navy's 1944 

shipbuilding program consisted of small 

vessels and destroyer escorts which used 

mostly the same tools, materials, and 

yards as landing craft.68 

67 ChI, Nelson to Wilson, 27 Sep 43, cited in George 

E. Mowry. Landing Craft and the WPB (Historical 

Reports on War Administration: WPB Special Study 

No. 11), rev. ed. (Washington, 1946), p. 29. Wilson 

was chairman of the Production Executive Committee, War Production Board. 

68 Mowry, Landing Craft and the WPB, pp. 33-34, 

51-52. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Time was already short when the question of increasing landing craft production was officially raised at Quebec and 

Admiral King told the Combined Chiefs 

of Staff that he was examining the possibility of building more landing craft by 

halting the construction of 110-foot subchasers. This, he thought, might result 

in an increase of 25 percent, but the estimate was not yet firm.69 On 20 August 

1943, planners, after tentative studies, 

reported that any acceleration in landing 

craft production would probably not be 

felt before 1 April 1944.70 

On 13 September the Chief of Naval 

Operations submitted a new schedule 

calling for a 35 percent increase in landing craft production, saying that it "was 

designed to meet the requirements of the 

operations agreed upon in QUADRANT." 

The Joint Staff Planners commenting 

thereon agreed, with qualifications.n 

"Landing craft destined for OVERLORD," 

they pointed out, "will arrive in time for 

the operation [that is, craft already allotted] though the complete allotment of 

some types from the United States will not 

arrive as early as desired by COSSAC. 

The most critical situation will exist in 

LCT (5 and 6),s. The only solution (if 

the late arrival cannot be accepted) seems 

to be additional withdrawals from the 

MEDITERRANEAN. There is no increased U.S. production in this type of 

craft. ... The QUADRANT decision relative 

to OVERLORD will therefore not be affected 

39 CCS lllth Mtg. 18 Aug 43. 

70 CCS 314/3. Allocation of Landing Craft (Operation oVERLOR[}-Vehicle Lift) , 20 Aug 43. 

71 JCS 462/3. Landing Ships and Craft-Means to 

Increase U.S. Production, I Oct 43. with incl. Ltr. 

Vice Chief of Naval Operations to Chiefs of Bureaus. 

13 Sep 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 105 

by the increased production of landing 

craft." 

At the end of October 1943 logistical 

planners had prepared another study 

which indicated that landing craft production could be further increased, but 

no decision was made and the 1 November production schedules virtually repeated the 1 October schedule. In the 

meantime General Morgan, vlsltmg 

Washington, was led to believe that "if 

sufficiently powerful pressure was applied 

at the right spot, U.S. landing craft production . . . [could] in fact be increased .... " Although he observed that it 

was "extremely difficult to find out just 

exactly whence to have this pressure applied ... ," he still hoped to be able to 

"bring matters to a head."72 In that hope 

he was evidently disappointed. As time 

passed and action was postponed the prospects of producing more craft in time for 

OVERLORD faded. 

Thenceforward procurement of landing craft for OVERLORD proceeded on the 

basis of making the most of existing supply. The principal methods of stretching 

the supply were reallocation from the 

Mediterranean theater, a comb-out of 

training facilities in the United States 

and United Kingdom, increase in serviceability rates, and increased loading. All 

these expedients were fully explored in 

the months following General Eisenhower's assumption of the Supreme Command in January 1944, but up to the last 

minute the situation remained tight and 

threatened to compromise the tactical 

disposi tions for the assa ult. 

72 Ltr, Morgan to Barker, 28 Oct 43. Barker Papers. See Bibliographical Note. 

Questions of Command 

For OVERLORD planners the months following Quebec were filled with frustrations. The order to re-examine the 

strength of the assault brought them up 

against the apparently unanswerable 

question of landing craft availability. 

Still more baffling was the seemingly 

simple directive to carryon with plans 

and preparations. What did it mean? 

General Morgan's original job-the only 

job for which he had a clear-cut directive 

-was finished. He had been told to study 

the possibilities of mounting a crossChannel invasion of a certain size at a 

certain date and say by means of an outline plan whether such an operation was 

feasible. The verdict had been returned. 

To continue planning could mean only 

to plan tactically, to fill in the detail of 

how the operation as outlined could be 

carried out. But this was no job for a 

small planning group designed as the 

nucleus for the Supreme Headquarters. 

It could be done only by the tactical 

headquarters which would have direct 

control of the operation: army group, 

army, and corps. The Quebec order, 

therefore, was actually an order to COSSAC to farm out and co-ordinate tactical 

planning. Such a task obviously required 

executive authority. General Morgan 

was legally only the chief of a planning 

group, without command functions. He 

was, as he pointed out, a relatively junior 

officer.73 It was out of the question to 

give him the substance of command, but 

he was at length given the shadow. The 

73 Ltr, Morgan to Hollis (Secy of War Cabinet). 

2 Sep 43. SHAEF SGS file 322.011/2. 
106 

Combined Chiefs of Staff in September 

made him temporarily responsible for 

"taking the necessary executive action to 

implement" the COSSAC plans, pending 

the appointment of a supreme commander. 74 That this was a stopgap expedient scarcely adequate for the situation 

was apparent to everyone and to no one 

more painfully than to General Morgan 

himself. He wrote to General Devers: 

"While I hate the sight of this whole 

business I am completely at a loss to suggest anything better, short, of course, of 

appointing the great man himself which 

appears to be utterly impossible." 75 

The quasi command thus conferred on 

General Morgan had grave limitations. 

Although, with the backing of the Combined Chiefs, he could now take "executive action" he could not, on his own, 

make command decisions. One command 

decision, in particular, was immediately 

required if preparations for OVERLORD 

were to go forward: what was to be the 

organization of command of the ground 

forces in the assault and in the successive 

phases thereafter? 

The basic principles of combined command had been outlined in 1942 and 

agreed to by the Combined Chiefs of Staff 

in the fall of that year. 76 They stemmed 

from the principle approved at the ARCADIA Conference that one Allied commander should have supreme command 

in each theater of operations.77 But agree74 Annex I to COS (43) 206th Mtg (0), 3 Sep 43. 

75 Ltr, Morgan to Devers, 2 Sep 43. SHAEF SGS 

file 322.011/2. 

76 CCS 75/3, System of Command for Combined 

United States-British Operations, 21 Oct 42. 

77 The Chiefs of Staff Conference, ABC-4, JSSC 2. 

25 Dec 41. ARCADIA Conf Bk. (Marshall's words at 

this meeting are quoted in Sherwood, Roosevelt and 

Hopkins, pp. 455-57.) The principle of unity of 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ment on principle still left a wide area 

for debate on the detailed organization 

of the command for specific operations. 

The COSSAC plan for OVERLORD contemplated the carrying out of a single 

tactical mission by a task force of army 

size and mixed nationality. There was no 

question of the need for a single unified 

command over all ground forces in the 

assault phase. The closest co-ordination 

was essential, both because the immediate objective was the establishment of 

a single bridgehead and because the 

enemy could be expected to probe out 

the boundary between U.S. and British 

forces and, reasoning that it represented 

a point of special weakness, attempt to 

drive a wedge into it. There was, on the 

other hand, no question of the necessity 

for having both American and British 

troops take part in the assault. 78 Military 

and political considerations both required it. The administrative and logistical organizations of the U.S. and British 

armies were so different that to attempt 

to pass one army through the beachhead 

established and organized by the other 

would have involved critical difficulties. 

Even if these difficulties could have been 

accepted, it was still unthinkable that the 

first blow of the supreme offensive of the 

command was embodied first in the Directive to the 

Supreme Commander in the ABDA Area, ABC-4/5, 

10 Jan 42. ARCADIA Conf Bk. The directive assigned 

command over "all armed forces, afloat, ashore, and 

in the air," that belonged to the four participating 

powers (Australia, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, and United States) . 

78 In July General Barker had written: "It can be 

accepted as an absolute certainty that the PM would 

not, for one moment, allow the assault to be made 

wholly by American troops. The same is true with 

relation to the U.S. Government. We must be practical about this and face facts." Memo, Barker for 

Morgan, 4 Jul 43. Barker Papers. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 107 

Western Allies should be struck by the 

armies of only one of them. 

The situation envisaged by OVERLORD 

was actually not very different from that 

existing in the attack on Salerno where a 

British corps was subordinated to an 

American army controlling the assault. 

Apparently, however, it seemed different, 

for the Salerno experience with mixed 

tactical command was conspicuously absent from the discussion of the OVERLORD 

problem.70 

In the OVERLORD plan, COSSAC recommended that one U.S. division be employed on the right of the assault, two 

British divisions on the left, and that all 

three be initially under a British army 

commander. 80 As soon as an American 

army was established on the Continent, 

Allied field command would pass to a 

British army group, which would continue to exercise operational control until the capture of the Brittany peninsula 

or the establishment of a U.S. army 

group in France, whichever occurred 

first. Morgan's reason for recommending 

initially a British chain of command was 

his feeling that it would be easier for 

British commanders to organize and coordinate an assault from a British base. 

It is clear, further, that General Morgan 

wrote the OVERLORD plan under the impression that the supreme commander 

would also be British.81 

79 See, however, below (pp. llO-II) for citation of 

the Salerno experience in a different connection. 

80 COS (43) 416 (0), Operation OVERLORD, Report 

and Appreciation, 30 Jul 43, Part I, par. 40. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 la. 

81 At the first meeting of the COS SAC staff, 17 

April 1943, Morgan announced that Casablanca had 

decided the invasion was to be commanded by a 

British supreme commander with an American deputy. 

Planning recommendations are one 

thing; decision another. It was true that 

the OVERLORD plan had been approved 

without change by the Combined Chiefs; 

but, when General Morgan pressed for a 

ruling on whether this over-all approval 

could be taken to apply to the recommendations on command, he was told 

that the Combined Chiefs had not been 

aware of any "special implications" of 

approving the command system, and that 

in any case details of the plan were subject to change by the supreme commander when appointed. 82 General Morgan replied that a firm decision was required at once if the operation was to 

take place on schedule, and he asked the 

Combined Chiefs to make that decision.s3 

The British Chiefs of Staff then decided to accept General Morgan's proposals in the OVERLORD plan as representing their own point of view, and 

asked for American comment.84 The 

Americans at once began formulating 

counterproposals. They had not agreed 

on any formal reply to the British, however, when the whole question was deflected by the introduction of a new and 

more pressing problem: the need for immediate establishment of an over-all tactical air command. 

A tentative organization of the British 

tactical air forces for support of the invasion had already been set up under 

Air Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory, 

who had been authorized to make planning decisions on the use of the combined 

U.S. and British tactical air forces without prejudice to the later appointment of 

82 COS (43) 206th Mtg (0), 3 Sep 43. 

83 COS (43) 525 (0), Operation "OVERLORD"--Com· 

mand and Control, II Sep 43. 

84 COS (43) 217th Mtg (0),16 Sep 43. 
108 

another air commander-in-chief. 85 At 

Quebec in August 1943, the Combined 

Chiefs agreed to name Leigh-Mallory 

Commander-in-Chief, AEAF (Allied Expeditionary Air Force), but delayed 

writing a directive. 86 This action, in 

effect, formalized his authority to make 

comhined planning decisions on air matters for OVERLORD, but he remained without a combined command. About the 

middle of September Maj. Gen. Lewis H. 

Brereton arrived in England from the 

Middle East with orden; to organize a 

U.S. tactical air force in the United Kingdom. This became the Ninth Air Force, 

formed initially with the headquarters of 

the Ninth Air Force from the Middle 

East and planes from the Eighth Air Support Command taken over from General 

Eaker's command. 

In October the British Chiefs of Staff 

pressed for the immediate integration of 

U.S. and Bri tish tactical air forces under 

Leigh-Mallory's command, and submitted to the U.S. Chiefs on the 12th a draft 

directive outlining AEAF powers and 

responsibilities. 87 Their earlier request, 

meanwhile, for U.S. views on Morgan's 

command and control recommendations 

was still unanswered. On 19 October the 

Joint Chiefs commented on both British 

papers in the same vein. To the proposed directive to the Commander-inChief, AEAF, they replied, "It is the view 

of the United States Chiefs of Staff that 

the issuance by the Chiefs of Staff of 

directives to subordinates of the Supreme 

Allied Commander is unsound." This 

85 COS (43) 138th Mtg (0), 26 Jun 43. See above, 

Ch. II. 

86 CCS 113th Mtg, 20 Aug 43. 

87 CCS 304/2, Directive to the Supreme Allied 

Commander for Operation "Overlord," 12 Oct 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

principle applied equally, the Joint 

Chiefs believed, to the proposed successive command of ground forces in the 

assault. To specify the organization of 

command under the supreme commander would be to encroach on his prerogative. 88 

These two negative replies funneled 

the discussions on OVERLORD command 

into a single debate over the authority of 

the supreme commander, as the Combined Chiefs began the delicate job of 

writing a directive for him. When they 

'undertook the task, the identity of the 

supreme commander was still unsettled, 

but it was known at least that he would 

be an American and there was a strong 

presumption that the choice would be 

General Marshall. 89 It was therefore a 

good bet that decisions left to the discretion of the supreme commander 

would in fact reflect American views on 

command. 

In contrast to the British, the U.S. 

Army always insisted on permitting a 

field commander the maximum freedom 

and discretionary power in the exercise 

of his command. The Americans believed that it was sufficient for the Combined Chiefs to assign the supreme commander a mission and leave to his discretion all the details of how that mission 

should be carried out. They viewed with 

alarm the British tendency to extend the 

control from the highest level down 

through the echelons of command, narrowly specifying the functions of subordinate commanders. When Eisen88 CCS 304/3 and 304/4, 19 Oct 43. All the papers 

in the 304 series bear the title as given in note 87 except 304/1 and 304/4. The subject of these latter two 

is "Command and Control for Operation ·Overlord'." 

89 See below, pp. 112-14. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 109 

hower heard, after his appointment to 

the supreme command of OVERLORD) that 

the British Chiefs of Staff proposed to 

dictate the detailed composition of the 

tactical air forces under him, he complained not only against the specific proposal but against what he called the 

British tendency to freeze organization so 

that commanders could not use trusted 

subordinates in their proper spheres.9o 

The British position seems to have been 

precisely that they were hesitant to trust 

their subordinates. The Prime Minister 

wrote: "In practice it is found not sufficient for a Government to give a General 

a directive to beat the enemy and wait 

to see what happens .... The General 

may well be below the level of his 

task .... A definite measure of guidance 

and control is required from the Staffs 

and from high Government authorities. 

It would not be in accordance with the 

British view that any such element should 

be ruled out." 91 

It was against this background of differing conceptions of the basic principles 

of command that the specific debates on 

OVERLORD command took place between 

the Americans and the British. The principal objections which the Americans advanced to COSSAC's proposals on successive command in the invasion were, first, 

that they would have subordinated American units of division size and smaller to 

direct British command in violation of 

the Casablanca declaration, and, second, 

that they seemed to exclude the supreme 

commander from operational control of 

the assault and early build-up phases. 

90 Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, W8967, 31 Dec 43. 

WD Cable log. 

91 Minute, 24 Oct 43, Annex II to Min, COS (43) 

209th Mtg (0), 25 Oct 43. 

General Devers, in the first formal commentary on the COSSAC proposals, 

argued that both objections could be met 

by having the assault divisions controlled 

by U.S. and British corps commanders 

whose efforts in turn would be co-ordinated under direct command of the 

supreme commander through an advance 

headquarters. COSSAC replied that the 

Devers plan was probably unworkable. 

Supreme Headquarters would not be set 

up for tactical command. It would not 

be organized to control the detail that 

normally flowed through a field army. 

Furthermore it would be impossible for 

the supreme commander to be physically 

located so that he could exercise field 

command of the assaulting forces and 

at the same time carry out his basic 

mission of co-ordinating the whole operation through relations with ETOUSA, 

the air and naval commands, and U.S. 

and British army group headquarters 

and service ministries, all either located 

in London or having established liaison 

and communication with the capital.92 

Despite this criticism, the War Department continued to advocate some 

measure of direct control by the supreme 

commander in the assault. The Devers 

plan, however, was modified to restore 

an army commander to take direct command. The War Department believed 

that the assault army should be American, not British, and this view was apparently accepted as a basis for discussion 

although it was not at once embodied in 

a written agreement. War Department 

thinking, reflected in a series of draft 

92 Ltr, Devers to Morgan (unsgd), 4 Sep 43; Memo, 

Comments on General Devers' Letter on Plan for 

Command and Control of Operation "OVERLORD," 

SHAEF SGS file 322.011/2. 
110 

memoranda and reports during September and October,93 envisaged a command 

setup somewhat as follows: the assault 

would be initially under the Commanding General, First U.S. Army, whose 

forces would consist of airborne troops, 

a British corps, U.S. corps, and Canadian 

corps, each to contribute one division to 

the assault. "During the period from a 

date prior to the assault to be designated 

by SAC 94 until CG, First U.S. Army relinq uishes the overall command of forces 

on the continent to British 21 st Army 

Group, control of operations will be 

exercised directly by SAC to First 

Army." 95 After the first three corps had 

built up on the Continent, a British army 

headquarters would be established. At 

the same time the Continental field command would pass to 21 Army Group. The 

supreme commander's control of the 

operation would then be exercised 

through army group to U.S. and British 

armies. On the arrival of the second 

- U.S. army, First U.S. Army Group would 

assume direct command of all American 

forces under the supreme Allied commander. 

There was no argument about the arrangements thus outlined for the buildup phase. General Morgan, however, was 

still unable to accept the concept of the 

supreme commander's direct intervention in the assault. He was, in fact, unable 

to understand just what was meant. After 

considerable discussion of tlie matter in 

Washington during his visit in October, 

he wrote: 

93 OPD file ABC 381 (22-1-43) sec. 1. 

94 The Supreme Allied Commander. 

95 Draft Memo, Col Roberts (JWPC) for General 

Handy for CofS, 18 Oct 43. OPD file ABC 384 Europe 

(5 Aug 43) sec. la. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

There persists here the thought that S.A.C. 

should have some direct connection with the 

army of assault. l'\ow, what this direct conr1(~ction is to consist of I cannot for the moment say. I am completely bogged down for 

the moment in the diflerences between our 

two languages. It seems that the word "command" has two different meanings in our 

two services. All I can get out of General 

Marshall is that he has a sensation that he 

should in some way control the assaulting 

army, although I am quite sure that his conception falls far short of what we understand 

by the term "command". As far as I can 

make out, it also falls far short of the American conception of command. But how to define it I must confess completely puzzles 

me .... 96 

General Barker, acting head of COSSAC in Morgan's absence, took up the 

problem with his staff in London and 

replied at length. He did not feel that 

General Marshall need be apprehensive 

about the degree of control he could 

exercise over the assaulting army. But 

the control should be that appropriate to 

a supreme commander, not the control 

normally exercised by a tactical headquarters. General Barker wrote: 

I think it goes without saying that the assault must be directly commanded by an 

Army Commander. Furthermore, the fact 

that an Army Group Commander must perforce take over direct command of the operation at a fairly early stage, say D plus 5 or 6 

or thereabouts, makes it essential that said 

Army Group Commander should be closely 

associated with the planning and execution 

of the assault, otherwise there is likely to be 

a break in continuity of command, or at least 

some friction in the change-over as well as in 

the planning for the buildup. After all, the 

SAC can and would intervene at any time 

the situation seems to warrant it. The Salerno operation is a good example of the di96 Ltr, Morgan to Barker, 28 Oct 43. Barker Papers. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) III 

rect intervention of a Commander-in-Chief 

when the operation gets sticky. He would, of 

course, have a senior staff officer from his 

staff on liaison with the Army Commander. 

You will recall that Alexander and Eisenhower both intervened in Clark's battle at 

Salerno, and as the result, Eisenhower ordered the whole weight of the Air and Naval 

forces to concentrate on the battlefield. In 

the assault stage of OVERLORD, it is these two 

weapons, the Air and the l\'avy, that SAC 

would employ to influence the course of the 

battle. Our headquarters will have direct 

telephonic, telegraphic and radio contact 

with Army, Army Group and the Air and 

Naval Headquarters, as well as with our 

liaison officers at these headquarters. In conseq lIenee, the SAC \\!Il be in the closest touch 

with the battle and can intervene quickly 

should the necessity arise.97 

General Morgan agreed and wrote that 

he would "make arrangements for [General Marshall as SAC] to be able to participate directly in Bradley's battle when 

it takes place. What though the planning 

must have been through the other system, 

that is, through the 21 Army Group, I 

am myself satisfied that this is the practical solution having in view the fact 

that the Commander himself will not be 

present throughout the whole proceedings." 98 

American concern with expanding the 

authority of SAC took another direction. 

In the same memorandum in which the 

Joint Chiefs criticized the COSSAC proposed chain of command, they recommended defining the supreme commander's sphere of command to include 

the whole of Germany for purposes of 

conducting air operations.99 The British 

at once demurred, saying that the pro97 Ltr, Barker to Morgan, 3 Nov 43. Barker Papers. 

98 Ltr, Morgan to Barker, 8 Nov 43. Barker Papers. 

99 CCS 304/4, 19 Oct 43. 

posal amounted to giving the supreme 

commander all responsibility for strategic bombing. This responsibility, they 

felt, should remain with the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff. General Marshall observed that "operation POINTBLANK [the 

strategic air offensive] is intended as a 

preparation for OVERLORD and may now 

be extended to operations from Italy. 

Thus it is a part of OVERLORD." 100 

Although there was no argument over 

SAC's right to control the strategic 

bomber forces once the invasion had 

begun, the British strenuously objected 

to turning over command before that 

date. The furthest they would go at the 

moment was to specify in the draft directive to the Commander-in-Chief, 

AEAF, that the strategic air forces would 

be "detailed from time to time by the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff to operate with 

all or part of their effort to meet the 

requirements of the Supreme Commander." 101 They believed that SAC 

control of the Eighth Air Force and RAF 

Bomber Command was unsound. Air 

operations were specialized; air channels 

had been organized through four years 

of war; air operations affected all enemy 

fronts; and, finally, the air offensive already in progress was designed to establish conditions for OVERLORD. This system could not be improved on by putting 

SAC in command.102 The Joint Chiefs 

could not accept the argument. What100 CCS 124th Mtg, 22 Oct 43. 

101 CCS 304/7, 4 Nov 43. This is a "split" paper. 

The first five paragraphs of the draft directive inclosed were agreed on by U.S. and British planners. 

The final paragraphs, dealing with the control of the 

strategic air forces, were reported in two versions 

representing opposing U.S. and British views. 

102 Cbl, Br COS to ISM, 10 Nov 43. SHAEF SGS 

file 322.011/2. 
112 

ever the technical objections might be, 

they held it was unthinkable that the 

supreme commander of any operation 

should not have absolute command of all 

forces needed by him to carry out that 

operation. "A committee," said General 

Marshall, "cannot fight a battle." 103 

The upshot of the debate was a temporary deadlock. It was decided then to 

put the question aside until it became 

critical. At the moment it was more important to issue a directive to the Commander-in-Chief, Allied Expeditionary 

Air Force, authorizing him to organize the 

U.S. and British tactical air forces into a 

single command under SAC. The essential outlines of this command were agreed 

to by the Combined Chiefs of Staff, and, 

despite U.S. objections to issuing directives to subordinate commanders, they 

were embodied in a directive to Air 

Marshal Leigh-Mallory early in November. 104 The AEAF headquarters was 

established as of 15 November, to take 

immediate control of the RAF Tactical 

Air Force and the Air Defence of Great 

Britain. The date at which the Ninth 

Air Force would pass to AEAF command 

was tentatively set for 15 December.105 

Designed first as an appendix to the 

directive to the supreme commander, the 

AEAF directive was issued separately as 

it became apparent that full agreement 

103 CCS 126th Mtg. 5 Nov 43. 

104 The directive was issued through COSSAC. saving the letter of SAC's right to appoint his subordinates. 

105 COS (43) 717 (0). Formation of an Allied Expeditionary Air Force. 17 Nov 43. Air Defence of 

Great Britain replaced Royal Air Force Fighter Command_ "Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford 

Leigh-Mallory" (submitted to the Supreme Allied 

Commander in November 1944). Fourth Supplement 

to The London Gazette No. 37838,31 December 1946. 

pp.37-38. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

on the definition of SAC's authority 

could not immediately be reached. Consideration of the latter problem, in fact, 

was deferred to Jan uary .106 In the meantime at the Cairo Conference in December the supreme commander was at last 

appointed. General Eisenhower, then 

commander in chief in the Mediterranean, was notified of his appointment 

about the middle of December and arrived in England to take command the 

middle of January. It was another month 

before the formal directive from the 

Combined Chiefs was issued to him. But 

the debate over the directive after his 

appointment was mainly verbal. The few 

substantial issues at stake were settled by 

being dropped. In effect the whole directive was trimmed down to what both 

sides could agree to and the settlement of 

such questions as the control of strategic 

air was left for later discussion in which 

the supreme commander's determination 

of his own requirements would be the 

decisive factor. 107 

The appointment of General Eisenhower ended almost a year of uncertainty 

which kept many of the preparations for 

invasion in long suspense. When the 

question of selecting a commander for 

cross-Channel operations was broached 

at the Casablanca Conference, it was 

shelved on the grounds that it was unnecessary to appoint a commander so 

early in the proceeding. Informally it 

was agreed that the commander, when 

appointed, would be British. Casablanca's perspective, it will be remembered, was confined principally to 1943. 

106 After the paper referred to in note 101 (dtd 4 

Nov 43) • the next CCS memorandum on command 

(CCS 304/8) was dated 6 January 1944. 

107 For full text of this directive see below. App. B. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 113 

If a cross-Channel invasion had been attempted that year, the British would inevitably have made by far the greater 

initial contributions of resources. It was 

on that basis, and in consideration of the 

fact that General Eisenhower was commanding in the Mediterranean, that the 

agreement was made. COSSAC was given 

to understand immediately after Casablanca that the matter was settled. The 

Prime Minister informed General Sir 

Alan Brooke that he would be appointed 

supreme commander as soon as it seemed 

advisable to make a formal appointment.108

These arrangements were

settled than they seemed. Churchill, while

agreeing to the choice of a British commander, formally enunciated the principle that the nation contributing the majority of the forces to any combined enterprise should command it. When it became 

apparent that no cross-Channel operations would be launched during 1943 and 

that for the 1944 operation the United 

States would furnish the bulk of the 

troops and materiel, the Casablanca decision on the high command was changed. 

As early as July 1942 the Prime Minister 

had suggested to President Roosevelt the 

appointment of General Marshall to 

command cross-Channel operations.109

Churchill apparently repeated the recommendations at Quebec a year later.llO Although no agreement was reached, rumors 

of Marshall’s appointment leaked tq the 

press, and received increasing credence 

even from those officially concerned with 

108 Interv with Gen Ismay, cited n. 22; cf. Stimson 

and Bundy, On Active Service, p. 439. 

109 Sherwood, Roosedt and Hopkins, p. 615. 

110 Stimson and Bundy, On Active Service, p. 439. 

OVERLORD.111 When President Roosevelt

was asked by General Morgan in October 

for confirmation that General Marshall 

would be given the command, the President replied only that he was still not 

sure.112 

Behind the President’s reluctance to appoint General Marshall to the OVERLORD 

command was the feeling that no one 

could satisfactorily replace him as Chief 

of Staff of the Army and member of the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff.113 In particular 

it was felt that General Marshall had established a working relationship with 

Congress which would be jeopardized by 

bringing in a new man whom Congress 

did not know. There was also a very general sense in the American camp that a 

field command in one theater was not a 

big enough job for the man who for four 

years had occupied the top position in the 

U.S. Army and had taken a leading part 

in formulating strategy throughout the 

world. Partly in an effort to create a job 

suitable for their Chief of Staff, the Americans at the Cairo Conference suggested 

combining the European and Mediterranean theaters under a single commander 

who would have the direction of all operations in Europe.114 The suggestion 

111 Ltr, Col Edwards (OPD) to Gen Edwards 

(CofS ETOUSA) , 5 Sep 43. Pre-Inv files, Devers 

Correspondence. Colonel Edwards wrote: “The newspapers have just announced and rather firmly, that 

SAC is to be Gen. Marshall and suggest that Gen. 

Eisenhower may be C/S [Chief of Staff of the Army]. 

This should clear the atmosphere.” 

112 Interv with Gen Ismay, cited n. 22. 

113See the account in Katherine T. Marshall, Together: Annals of an Army Wife (Atlanta, 1946) , pp. 

69ff. 

114 CCS 408, Command of British and U.S. Forces 

Operating Against Germany, 25 Nov 43; CCS 126th 

Mtg, 5 Nov 43. During a meeting with the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff on shipboard on the way to Cairo, 

President Roosevelt said that it was his idea “that 
114 

stemmed also from American conviction 

that a single command over related operations was more efficient than co-operation between co-ordinate commanders. It 

was turned down by the British on the 

grounds that a single field command over 

such disparate operations was unfeasible 

and that the proposal therefore would 

only mean the creation of an unnecessary 

intermediary between the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff and the theater commanders.115 

Shortly after the British had refused to 

entertain the idea of amalgamating the 

Mediterranean and European commands, 

President Roosevelt decided that General 

Marshall should remain at his post as 

Chief of Staff, and that General Eisenhower, the next logical choice, should 

take command of OVERLORD. 

While principles were being discussed 

on the highest levels, the organization in 

the theater of various headquarters that 

would assume control of the operation 

proceeded. In the early summer the British had constructed the skeleton of their 

tactical command for OVERLORD, complete 

with the creation of headquarters of the 

Second British Army, the First Canadian 

Army, and 21 Army Group. At that time 

the highest U.S. ground force command 

in the United Kingdom was still V Corps. 

In May, General Devers strongly urged 

the War Department to establish a U.S. 

army headquarters,11e It was required to 

parallel British organization, to "initiate 

Marshall should be commander-in-chief against 

Germany commanding all British, U.S., French and 

Italian troops." JCS Mtg, 15 Nov 43. Dep CIS file 

110.00 A 48.41 dr 155. 

115 CCS 408/1, 26 Nov 43. 

116 Ltrs, Devers to Marshall, 18 and 19 May 43. 

Pre-Inv files, Devers Corresponclpnce. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

actual planning for the 1944 operation," 

and finally as part of the scheme to make 

the Germans believe that an attack across 

the Channel would be made in 1943. Two 

months later General Devers further 

recommended that a skeleton headquarters for a U.S. army group also be 

sent to England.n7 

Despite this urging, which was reinforced by General Morgan, the War Department did not become convinced of 

the necessity for an immediate appointment of an army commander until the 

end of August 1943, and insisted then on 

still further delay in naming an army 

group commander.118 The choice of an 

army commander was unanimous: he was 

to be Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, American commander in the battle of Tunisia.119 

His release from the command of II Corps 

then in Sicily was arranged during the last 

week in August, and effected on 7 September. After conferences in Washington, 

Bradley arrived in the United Kingdom 

in October. On the 20th of that month the 

headquarters of the First U. S. Army was 

at last opened. The headquarters had 

been activated in the United States during September with cadre from the Eastern Defense Command,12° 

Army group headquarters was to be allowed to develop gradually out of the 

theater as the need for it grew. At the time 

that General Marshall arranged for the 

appointment of General Bradley as army 

117 Ltr, Devers to Marshall, 6 Jul 43. Pre-Inv files, 

Devers Correspondence. 

118 Ltr, Barker to Devers, 30 Aug 43. Pre-Inv files, 

Devers Correspondence. 

119 For Eisenhower's appraisal of Bradley'S qualifications, see Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 215. 

120 See Cbls, Marshall to Eisenhower, No. 5968, 25 

Aug 43; No. 6595, 1 Sep 43; No. 6904, 4 Sep 43. WD 

Cable log. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 115 

commander he was still not ready to name 

a commander for army group. General 

Devers then proposed that a single superior U.S. headquarters, a U.S. GHQ, 

be established to direct both operations 

and administration, following the precedent of World War J.121 Devers' proposed 

GHQ was to consist of a field headquarters and a rear echelon to handle theater 

functions. It was to be formed gradually 

by doubling the staff sections of ETOUSA 

to constitute forward and rear components. Once the field headquarters moved 

to the Continent, the theater functions 

might be redefined to permit, presumably, a greater independence of operational and administrative commands. 

The Devers proposal did not suit General Marshall, who believed that a maximum separation of operational and administrative functions was desirable.122 

On 18 September the War Department 

agreed in principle to the establishment 

of a U. S. army group headquarters, and 

planning for it was delegated to General 

Bradley in addition to his duties as army 

commander.123 So strongly did General 

Marshall feel that the new headquarters 

should not be burdened with theater responsibilities that he recommended to 

General Devers a physical separation of 

army group from ETOUSA. "I desire that 

the organization of the Army Group 

Headquarters be initially controlled directly by Bradley under your supervision 

and that it not be merely an offshoot, or 

121 Cbl, Devers to Marshall, W4421, 13 Sep 43. WD 

Cable log. 

122 Marshall's views on command in Europe are 

stated in Cbl, Marshall to Devers, R3267, 18 Sep 43; 

Dir to Devers, 24 Sep 43. OPD Misc Exec office file. 

123 Cbl, AGWAR to ETOUSA, 18 Sep 43. Pre-Inv 

files, Devers Correspondence. 

appurtenance to ETO Headquarters." 124 

First U. S. Army Group (FUSAG) was 

activated on 16 October. Its first assigned 

task was opera tional planning under the 

direction of ETOUSA. The operational 

missions of both FUSAG and First Army 

were to be assigned later by COSSAC. By 

this time, however, it had already been 

decided that First U. S. Army would command at least all American troops in the 

assault and that 21 Army Group, chiefly 

because it was early on the scene and had 

participated in COSSAC planning, would 

have over-all ground command in the assault and early build-up phases. In effect, 

those decisions meant that the role of 

FUSAG would be to take over command 

of U. S. troops when two American armies 

had become operational on the Continent, 

that is to say, after the establishment of 

the initial lodgment area. 

I t does not appear that the decision 

giving initial ground command to 21 

Army Group was ever formally confirmed 

by the Combined Chiefs of Staff. When 

General Morgan returned to London in 

November after more than a month's stay 

in Washington, he carried back the instructions and full confidence of General 

Marshall. "He knows exactly what I 

want," General Marshall told General 

Devers in asking the latter for full co-operation with COSSAC.l25 It was presumably in the light of General Marshall's instructions that General Morgan, shortly 

after his return, began to draft a directive 

to the Commander-in-Chief, 21 Army 

Group, which finally fixed the chain of 

command for OVERLORD. 

124 Ltr, Marshall to Devers 24 Sep 43. OPD file ABC 

381 (22-1-43) sec. 1. 

125 Cbl, Marshall to Devers, R5583, 11 Nov 43. WD 

Cable log. 
116 

That directive, issued on 29 November, 

significantly under the letterhead of "Supreme Allied Headquarters," told the 21 

Army Group commander that he would 

be "jointly responsible with the Allied 

Naval Commander-in-Chief and the Air 

Commander-in-Chief, Allied Expeditionary Air Force, for the planning of the operation, and, when so ordered, for its execution until such time as the Supreme 

Allied Commander allocates an area of responsibility to the Commanding General, 

First Army Group." He was also told that 

operations in the assault phase would be 

carried out by U. S. and British corps 

under "the unified command of the Commanding General, First (US) Army," and 

that "the Commanding General, First 

(US) Army ... [would] remain in immediate control of land operations until 

such time as the forces landed warrant, in 

your opinion, the introduction of a second army headq uarters ... to take over 

a portion of the front." 126 

It will be noted that this directive made 

the commander of 21 Army Group an 

over-all ground commander in the initial 

phases co-ordinate in authority to the air 

and naval commanders in chief, but it 

specifically limited his tenure to the first 

part of the operation. In the earliest attempts at devising a formula for unified 

combined command, logic and-it might 

be added-the natural rivalry among the 

services for coequal dignity had seemed 

to demand separate commanders in chief 

under the supreme commander for all 

three services, Air Force, Navy, and Army. 

The Casablanca declaration on command 

had provided for three "assistant" supreme commanders for each of the serv126 Ltr. COS SAC to CinC 21 A Gp. Operation 

'OVERLORD: 29 Nov 43. COSSAC (43) 76. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ices. Mediterranean operations had in effect practiced the doctrine of three coequal commanders, although the operations themselves were small enough so 

that the "ground commander" was never 

more than the equivalent of an army 

group commander. The issue of a ground 

commander for OVERLORD was raised in 

intramural discussions in the Operations 

Division of the War Department in September and came before the Joint Chiefs, 

but was shelved there. The concept of a 

ground commander seemed objectionable 

on practical grounds. Since the supreme 

commander would be American, it was 

considered in September that the ground 

commander, if there was one, would also 

have to be American. But, as one officer 

in OPD pointed out, the "ruling factor" 

determining in practice the nationality 

of the ground commander would be the 

availability of a suitable individual to fill 

the position. He observed further that no 

U. S. commander had the battle experience and reputation to challenge the 

qualifications of the British generals, 

Montgomery and Alexander, for the job. 

The conclusion was obvious: it would be 

impolitic of the Americans to suggest the 

creation of the job.127 

The command organization for OVERLORD, which was at last agreed on in the 

closing months of the year, was retained 

in principle after the assault was broadened from a three- to a five-division front. 

The successive command already established was then phased forward. Two 

armies (U. S. and British) were then to 

make the assault under the direct command of 21 Army Group. General Montgomery, commander of the army group, 

127 Ltr. Col Edwards (OPD) to Gen Edwards. 7 

Sep 43. Pre-Inv files. Devers Correspondence. 
GENERAL MONTGOMERY, ground commander of the Allied assault on the 

Normandy beaches. 
ll8 

was given a de facto ground command for 

the assault phase-the same kind of unified command that under the COSSAC 

plan would have been exercised by First 

Army.128 

The Cairo-Tehran Conferences 

In late October 1943, the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff began looking forward to 

their next staff conference and the issues 

which they expected to be raised there. 

Most of the indications were that the 

Quebec compromises would be reopened 

and the debate would go on as before. 

In proposing an agenda for the conference, the British Chiefs of Staff emphasized their opinion that the most important point for discussion would be a "general review of our future strategy in the 

light of the events which have taken place 

since QUADRANT." 120 That this meant a 

further British attempt to shift additional 

Allied weight to the Mediterranean had 

already become clear through an exchange of views on the disappointingly 

slow progress in Italy. 

On 24 October, General Eisenhower 

sent a long cable to the Combined Chiefs 

of Staff outlining the situation in Italy.l30 

It was, he said, much changed since the 

Salerno landings, and the change was seriously and dangerously to the disadvantage 

of the Allies. At the moment the Allies 

128 Montgomery, however, never received the formal designation of ground commander, and there 

actually remained some confusion, at least on his 

part, as to the duration of his command over ground 

forces on the Continent. The ground commander 

problem will be fully discussed by F. C. Pogue in 

The Supreme Command, a volume under preparation in this series. 

129 CCS 125th Mtg, 29 Oct 43. 

130 Cbl, Eisenhower to CCS, NAF 4B6, 24 Oct 43. 

WD Cable log. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

had eleven divisions in the peninsula. 

They were opposed by nine German divisions, which, it was estimated, could be 

reinforced by fifteen more that were located to the north. At the current rate of 

build-up the Allies would have only sixteen to seventeen divisions by the end of 

January. There was thus a real possibility that the Allies might lose the critical build-up race and be not only stopped 

but defeated. \Vhat General Eisenhower 

feared most of all, however, was that, although he might be able to batter his way 

up the peninsula to Rome, his armies 

would arrive on their objective too weak 

to hold it. He could not stand south of 

Rome because it was important to take 

the capital as a symbol of victory in Italy, 

to capture the airfields north of it, and 

above all to retain the the initiative at 

least until after OVERLORD. Otherwise, the 

Germans would be free to withdraw divisions from Italy to oppose the Normandy 

landings and the main purpose of the 

Mediterranean campaign would be compromised. General Eisenhower concluded 

that he must keep pushing north; to do 

so without fatally exhausting his armies 

he needed landing craft to take advantage 

"of the enemy's inherent weakness," the 

exposure of his flanks to amphibious envelopment. 

After receiving Eisenhower's report, 

the British Chiefs of Staff urgently cabled 

Washington asking that General Eisenhower be backed to the full. Specifically 

they wanted delay in the agreed schedules 

for transferring landing craft from the 

Mediterranean to OVERLORD. They wanted 

this "even if the 'OVERLORD' programme is 

delayed." 131 For the moment the Joint 

131 CCS 379, Operations in the Mediterranean, 26 

Oct 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 119 

Chiefs simply replied that the British 

exaggerated the Seriousness of the Italian 

situation and reminded them of their 

agreement to consider that OVERLORD and 

not the Italian battle was the "primary 

ground and air effort against Germany." 132 But it was clear that strategy 

was on the block again. Again a relatively 

minor practical decision, this time involving the convoy schedules for moving landing craft, raised the large issue of how the 

war in Europe was to be fought. 

The landing craft problem was temporarily settled by an agreement that General Eisenhower might retain, until 15 

December, sixty LST's scheduled for 

transfer to the United Kingdom a month 

earlierJ33 But no one doubted that the 

stopgap settlement was as unreliable as a 

cork in a volcano. In fact, the cable to 

General Eisenhower conveying the Combined Chiefs' decision 134 had no sooner 

been drafted than the British representatives began to argue that General Eisenhower had evidently not asked for enough 

resources, that he should be provided 

with at least a two-divisional amphibious 

lift even though he had requested only 

one.135 

There were other straws in the wind 

that pointed to the resumption of the debate on European strategy. Immediately 

after the surrender of Italy in September 

1943, the British had attempted to pluck 

off the Dodecanese Islands at the entrance 

to the Aegean Sea. They thought that the 

132 CCS 379/1,29 Oct 43. 

133 CCS 379/5,4 Nov 43. At the Cairo Conference, 

the date for transfer of the craft was extended to 15 

January 1944. CCS 132d Mtg, 30 Nov 43; Cbl, CCS 

to Eisenhower, FAN 281, I Dec 43. WD Cable log. 

134 Cbl, CCS to Eisenhower, FAN 271, 5 Nov 43. 

WD Cable log. 

135 CCS 126th Mtg, 5 Nov 43. 

islands would fall readily into the vacuum 

of the general Italian collapse. German 

reaction, however, was unexpectedly 

swift and determined, and Italian assistance to the British, on the other hand, 

was of even less value than anticipated. 

As a result, within a few weeks the British 

had been ejected from their bridgeheads 

with a loss later estimated by the Prime 

Minister at 5,000 first-class troopS.136 Before this happened, in late September, the 

commanding generals of the Middle East 

and Mediterranean theaters had fully examined the possibilities of reinforcing the 

Aegean attack and saving the forces already committed there. They concluded 

that the only operation which could reestablish the Allied position was the capture of Rhodes. In view of heavy German 

air activity and the enemy disposition to 

resist strongly in the area, this operation 

was envisaged as requiring a very considerable contribution of resources from 

the Mediterranean which could be taken 

only from the Italian campaign. General 

Eisenhower, further, saw in an Aegean offensive a constant and probably mounting drain on Mediterranean resources 

which would seriously affect his capacity 

to prosecute the war in Italy. The other 

commanders concerned agreed and it was 

decided to postpone the proposed invasion of Rhodes. At the moment the Combined Chiefs did no more than take note 

of these decisions.137 Since the operation 

was "postponed," however, and not canceled, it could be expected to come up 

again, particularly since the Prime Minis1362d Plenary Mtg at Cairo, 24 Nov 43. OPD files, 

Min of SEXTANT Con£. 

137 See CCS series 365, Future Operations in the 

Eastern Mediterranean. 
120 

ter had always taken a special interest in 

the eastern Mediterranean. 

One of the arguments for pushing operations in the eastern Mediterranean was 

that success in that area might persuade 

Turkey to enter the war on the side of the 

Allies. The project of using diplomatic 

pressure on Turkey to bring her into the 

war had been approved in principle by 

the Combined Chiefs at Casablanca.138 

Since that time various diplomatic overtures had been made through the British. 

Although Turkey remained coy in the 

face of both implied threats and open 

blandishments-threats that without active participation in the struggle against 

the Axis Turkey's position might be 

weak at the peace table, and direct offers 

of military assistance if she did come init still seemed possible at the end of 1943 

that an alliance with Turkey might be 

achieved. The project was given impetus 

by reports that the Soviet Union was especially interested in getting direct and 

immediate support from the Mediterranean area so as to draw off more German strength from the main Eastern 

Front.139 

There were thus three post-Quebec developments that would tend to supply 

fresh fuel for the British argument for 

heavier Mediterranean commitments. To 

these a fourth consideration, indirect and 

intangible, but nevertheless important, 

may be added. Red Army successes in the 

1943 summer offensive had been impressive. The German armies were backed up 

to the line of the Dnepr. The Russians 

did not pause. Bridgeheads were thrown 

across the river. The Germans fought to 

138 See above, Ch. I. 

139 CbI, Deane to JCS, No. 51,9 Nov 43. WD Cable 

log. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

avoid annihilation on various parts of the 

front and in the process fell back as much 

as a hundred miles in the south. By November the main German armies were 

split by the Pripet Marshes; Kiev had 

fallen; the forces in the Ukraine were 

threatened with encirclement; the Crimea 

was cut off. Although the German armies 

gave no sign of collapse, they were fighting to escape destruction and steadily retreating. It seemed impossible that they 

could any longer hope for victory. In the 

meantime the tempo of the Allied air offensive from Great Britain had stepped 

up. There were increasing reports of 

fading morale among enemy prisoners, 

partly induced, it was thought, by letters 

from home describing the devastation 

rained by Allied planes on German cities. 

In London hopes were raised that enemy 

disintegration was near, that the closing 

months of 1918 were about to be reenacted. There was some feeling that plan 

RANKIN (the plan for return to the Continent in case of enemy collapse) was 

more likely to be executed than OVERLORD.14° If collapse were, in truth, so near, 

then the strategy of throwing everything 

into the immediate battle in the Mediterranean and so avoiding, perhaps, the 

necessity of ever having to strike the big 

costly cross-Channel blow took on a new 

plausibility. 

In the continuing policy discussions 

during the weeks before the Cairo Conference the Joint Chiefs of Staff found 

only one new consideration important 

enough to warrant a possible re-examination of their positive commitment to the 

OVERLORD concept: that was the sugges140 Ltr, Barker to Morgan, 20 Oct 43. Barker Papers; 

JCS 533/7, Recommended Line of Action at Next 

U.s.-British Staff Conference, 18 Nov 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 121 

tion of a Soviet preference for immediate

support via the Mediterranean over the 

stronger but delayed attack on northwest 

Europe.141 If the Russians were actually 

to urge accelerated operations in the 

Mediterranean, it would be a complete 

reversal of their previous stand that they 

wanted a second front, that they wanted 

it in northwest Europe, and that they did 

not consider Allied attacks in the Mediterranean as a substitute. Yet in November it seemed quite possible that the Soviet Union might make just this reversal. 

The circumstances are worth examining 

in some detail. 

In October, U.S. and British military 

and diplomatic representatives met with 

the Russians in Moscow to discuss various 

problems of military collaboration.142 

Marshal K. E. Voroshilov put before the 

conferees three Soviet proposals for hastening the successful conclusion of the 

war: (1) preparations by the United 

States and Great Britain during 1943 to 

insure an invasion of northern France; 

(2) inducements to Turkey to enter the 

war on the side of the United Nations; 

(3) inducements to Sweden to permit the 

use of air bases for the war against Germany. In answer to the first proposal Maj. 

Gen. John Russell Deane and General 

Ismay outlined the conclusions of the 

Quebec Conference and reassured the 

Soviets that the decision to mount OVERLORD was firm. General Deane found it 

141Min of Mtg, Roosevelt, Hopkins, and JCS, 19 

Nov 43, cited n. 27. Cf. below, n. 144. 

142 The principal U.S. representatives were Secretary of State Cordell Hull, Ambassador W. Averell 

Harriman, and Maj. Gen. John R. Deane. Deane, 

following the conference, was to establish a U.S. 

military mission to the Soviet Union. The British 

were represented by Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden 

and Gen. Sir Hastings Ismay. 

worth remarking that these assurances 

were accepted by the Russians and that 

the Russians did not press to have the 

target date on OVERLORD put forward. 

Still more remarkable to General Deane 

was their calm acceptance of statements 

that OVERLORD might have to be delayed. Reporting on this to the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff, General Deane said that 

it opened up the possibility that the 

USSR’s attitude on a second front in the 

west had been altered by recent successes 

of the Red Army, that the Russians were 

now laying greater stress on immediate 

assistance. General Deane’s impression 

was strengthened when Molotov complained that Allied pressure in Italy had 

been insufficient to prevent the Germans 

from moving divisions to the Eastern 

Front. Soviet leaders could not understand why two nations of the combined 

resources of the United States and Great 

Britain could not tie up more than a 

handful of enemy forces.143 

General Deane was convinced by all 

these signs that the Russians were working around to a demand that American 

and British armies intensify the campaign 

in Italy or perhaps launch an invasion of 

the Balkans. He cabled the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff on 9 November to be prepared 

for such a demand at the Tehran Conference. He told them that it was quite 

likely that Russian enthusiasm for a 

cross-Channel attack had cooled. He believed the Red Army was now confident 

143General Deane reported in detail to the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff in a series of cables in October and 

November 1943. See esp., Cbls No. 2, 19 Oct; No. 4,21 

Oct; No. 28, 29 Oct; No. 34, 31 Oct; No. 47, 6 Nov; 

No. 51, 9 Nov. WD Cable log. The story of the conference is briefly but accurately told in Deane’s book: 

John R. Deane, The Strange Alliance (New York, 

1947). pp. 16ff., 35. 

OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 121 

tion of a Soviet preference for immediate 

support via the Mediterranean over the 

stronger but delayed attack on northwest 

E urope.l41 If the Russians were actually 

to urge accelerated operations in the 

Mediterranean, it would be a complete 

reversal of their previous stand that they 

wanted a second front, that they wanted 

it in northwest Europe, and that they did 

not consider Allied attacks in the Mediterranean as a su bsti tute. Yet in N ovember it seemed quite possible that the Soviet Union might make just this reversal. 

The circumstances are worth examining 

in some detail. 

In October, U.S. and British military 

and diplomatic representatives met with 

the Russians in Moscow to discuss various 

problems of military collaboration.H2 

Marshal K. E. Voroshilov put before the 

conferees three Soviet proposals for hastening the successful conclusion of the 

war: (I) preparations by the United 

States and Great Britain during 1943 to 

insure an invasion of northern France; 

(2) inducements to Turkey to enter the 

war on the side of the United Nations; 

(3) inducements to Sweden to permit the 

use of air bases for the war against Germany. In answer to the first proposal Maj. 

Gen. John Russell Deane and General 

Ismay outlined the conclusions of the 

Quebec Conference and reassured the 

Soviets that the decision to mount OVERLORD was firm. General Deane found it 

141 Min of Mtg. Roosevelt. Hopkins. and JCS. 19 

Nov 43. cited n. 27. Cf. below. n. 144. 

142 The principal U.S. representatives were Secre· 

tary of State Cordell Hull. Ambassador W. Averell 

Harriman. and Maj. Gen. John R. Deane. Deane. 

following the conference. was to establish a U.S. 

military mission to the Soviet Union. The British 

were represented by Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden 

and Gen. Sir Hastings Ismay. 

worth remarking that these assurances 

were accepted by the Russians and that 

the Russians did not press to have the 

target date on OVERLORD put forward. 

Still more remarkable to General Deane 

was their calm acceptance of statements 

that OVERLORD might have to be delayed. Reporting on this to the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff, General Deane said that 

it opened up the possibility that the 

USSR's attitude on a second front in the 

west had been altered by recent successes 

of the Red Army, that the Russians were 

now laying greater stress on immediate 

assistance. General Deane's impression 

was strengthened when Molotov complained that Allied pressure in Italy had 

been insufficient to prevent the Germans 

from moving divisions to the Eastern 

Front. Soviet leaders could not understand why two nations of the combined 

resources of the United States and Great 

Britain could not tie up more than a 

handful of enemy forces. H3 

General Deane was convinced by all 

these signs that the Russians were working around to a demand that American 

and British armies intensify the campaign 

in Italy or perhaps launch an invasion of 

the Balkans. He cabled the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff on 9 November to be prepared 

for such a demand at the Tehran Conference. He told them that it was quite 

likely that Russian enthusiasm for a 

cross-Channel attack had cooled. He believed the Red Army was now confident 

143 General Deane reported in detail to the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff in a series of cables in October and 

November 1943. See esp .• Cbls No.2, 19 Oct; No.4. 21 

Oct; No. 28. 29 Oct; No. 34.31 Oct; No. 47. 6 Nov; 

No. 51, 9 Nov. WD Cable log. The story of the con· 

ference is briefly but accurately told in Deane's book: 

John R. Deane, The Strange Alliance (New York, 

1947) , pp. 16ff., 35. 
122 

of its ability to move into Berlin without 

benefit of the squeeze from the west. 

The prospects of mounting OVERLORD 

as planned could not have seemed very 

brigh t to the J oint Chiefs of Staff as they 

traveled to Cairo for the first conversations with the British before the meeting 

with the Russians.1 44 Shortly after their 

arrival the Joint Chiefs asked Ambassador John G. Winant for his impressions of 

British thinking so that they might be 

prepared for the inevitable debate. 145 Mr. 

Winant began by saying that "he thought 

the British had no idea of abandoning ... 

[OVERLORD] but that they did oppose a 

fixed date for it." The British, he said, 

were anxious to mount the operation at 

the right "psychological moment" and 

they didn't think that moment could be 

predicted so far ahead of time. British defeat in the Dodecanese had much upset 

the Prime Minister and had confirmed 

him in the opinion that the Germans were 

still superior to both Great Britain and 

the United States on land. British military 

men, Ambassador Winant added, felt that 

the Prime Minister's views on the Dodecanese defeat were "considerably out of 

perspective," but they agreed in fearing 

the German capacity to build up rapidly 

on the ground to oppose the OVERLORD 

landings, despite Allied superiority in the 

air. In short, he believed, the British still 

doubted that the Allies could attack successfully at a fixed date which was de144 See Mtg. Roosevelt, Hopkins. and JCS, 19 Nov 

43, cited n. 27. At that meeting Marshall expressed 

the opinion that the British might like to "ditch" 

OVERLORD now in order to go into the Balkans. Roose· 

velt thought the Russians might press for an attack 

up the Adriatic to the Danube to tie up with Russian 

forces entering Romania. 

145 JCS l27th Mtg, 22 Nov 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

pendent only on the state of Allied preparations; they still wanted to wait for a 

moment of German weaknessJ46 

Winant's interpretation of British views 

Vias confirmed in the course of the conference. Early in the proceedings the 

Prime Minister emphasized the British 

commitment to OVERLORD but begged for 

some "elasticity" in order to expedite 

Mediterranean operations. 147 The necessary elasticity he thought could be 

achieved by delaying OVERLORD about five 

or six weeks. Landing craft destined for 

transfer from the Mediterranean to the 

United Kingdom could be held in the 

Mediterranean long enough to carry out 

amphibious assaults behind the German 

lines in Italy and undertake the invasion 

of Rhodes. 

The Prime Minister's views were further elaborated and formally presented 

by the British Chiefs of Staff the following day.148 They proposed the following 

actions: push the offensive in Italy until 

the Pisa-Rimini line was reached, nourish guerrilla movements in Yugoslavia, 

Greece, and Albania, induce Turkey to 

enter the war, open the Dardanelles supply route to the Soviet Union, and promote chaos in the Balkans. They added 

that, if these actions meant delaying OVERLORD, then that delay should be accepted. 

These proposals, counter to U.S. strategy built around the absolute priority of 

OVERLORD, should have called forth a debate at least as vigorous as that at Quebec. Actually, the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

promptly accepted the British program as 

146 Ibid. 

147 2d Plenary Mtg, 24 Nov 43. 

148 CCS 409, "Overlord" and the Mediterranean, 25 

Nov 43. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 123 

a basis for discussion at the Tehran Conference and afterward. The Joint Chiefs' 

acquiescence did not mean that they had 

relaxed their conviction of the transcending importance of OVERLORD. In accepting 

British proposals as a basis for discussion 

with the Russians, they were underlining 

the fact that final decision had to take 

into account Soviet views. They did not 

thereby agree to argue for the British 

stand; they intended only to present it in 

order to elicit Soviet reaction.149 

There the matter rested when the preliminary Cairo conferences broke up and 

the Combined Chiefs of Staff traveled to 

Tehran for the central and critical meeting with the Russians. The keynote of the 

Tehran meetings was set by the first 

plenary session on 28 November 1943 between President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, and Marshal Stalin.l50 Because the main object of the Tehran Conference was to get the Soviet views on 

strategy as a basis for co-ordinating U ni ted 

Nations' policy, it was Marshal Stalin who 

at that first meeting called the tune. He 

wasted no time making clear the Russian 

view. After listening to some preliminary 

oratory by the President and Prime Minister, he cut short his own introductory remarks with a blunt "Now let us get down 

to business." Within a few minutes he 

announced all the major elements of 

USSR strategy as it affected the Western 

149 ccs 13lst Mtg, 26 Nov 43. 

150 This and the following narrative of the Tehran 

(EUREKA) Conference are from the official U.S. minutes of the meeting, bound with the minutes of the 

Cairo (SEXTANT) Conference. OPD files. The records 

kept by the U.S. and British secretaries of the plenary 

political-military meetings at Tehran were not afterward co-ordinated. For purposes of the discussion 

here, however, the discrepancies are unimportant and 

the U.S. minutes have been used throughout. 

Powers. He declared first that, as soon as 

Germany had been defeated, the Soviet 

Union would join with the United States 

and Great Britain in the offensive against 

Japan. Announced casually as though it 

were a point well understood, this was actually his first official assurance of Russian 

intentions in the Pacific, and it had, as 

will be seen, profound effect on AngloAmerican strategy. Stalin then took up 

the Italian front. Allied victories there, he 

thought, had been important, but "they 

are of no further great importance as regards the defeat of Germany." The USSR, 

he continued, believed that the most suitable point of attack against Germany was 

northwest France. Thus in a few sentences 

he scouted General Deane's prognostications of a change in the Soviet attitude. 

The Americans were pleased, if somewhat 

surprised. 

The Prime Minister wanted to know 

whether operations in the eastern Mediterranean to take some weight immediately off the USSR would not be acceptable even though they might mean a delay 

of a month or two in mounting OVERLORD. 

Stalin replied that he did not consider it 

worth while to scatter British and U.S. 

forces. On the other hand he was very 

much interested in the suggestion made 

by both the President and Mr. Churchill 

that an invasion of southern France was 

being considered as a diversion for OVERLORD. He did not look on it exactly as a 

diversion. Simultaneous attacks from the 

northwest and south appealed to him as 

a single pincer attack the pattern of which 

was familiar from many Red Army victories. 

Stalin's interest in an assault on southern France caught the U.S. and British 
TEHRAN CONFERENCE. Left to right: Marshal Stalin, President Roosevelt, 

and Prime Minister Churchill. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 125 

delegations unprepared.l5l The President 

and Prime Minister told Stalin that no detailed examination of the project had yet 

been made, but that their staffs would 

study it. It was a curious approach, possibly calculated to avoid making any firm 

commitment. But it ignored a large 

amount of quite detailed planning work 

already done for the operation. It ignored 

General Eisenhower's recommendations 

made to the Combined Chiefs of Staff on 

29 October, opposing the operation in 

view of inadequate resources.152 Most important of all it ignored the fact that the 

bulk of the planning staffs had been left 

in Cairo. The only material on hand at 

Tehran to "start" the study was a copy of 

the 9 August outline plan which was very 

much out of date. 153 It was on the basis 

of this old plan that the skeleton planning 

staff at Tehran drew up a draft memorandum for the President's consideration. Following the August plan, the 

memorandum recommended a two-division assault with a build-up to ten divisions. There was, however, no reliable information as to the resources likely to be 

available. On the critical matter of landing craft supplies, the memorandum was 

necessarily vague; its general conclusion 

was that there probably would be enough 

craft "to move two assault divisions by 

short haul from Corsica and Sardinia to 

151 This can readily be deduced from the records 

and was specifically stated by Colonel (now Brig. 

Gen.) Bessel in conversation with the author, 5 

March 1947. It is further confirmed by statements of 

General Ismay to Dr. F. C. Pogue, in the interview 

cited above, note 22. 

152 Cbl, Eisenhower to CCS, NAF 492, 29 Oct 43. 

WD Cable log. 

153 JPS 249, Plan for Invasion of Southern France, 

9 Aug 43. 

Southern France under favorable weather 

conditions .... " 154 

On the basis of this study and under 

considerable urging by Marshal Stalin, 

the Americans and British before leaving 

Tehran committed themselves to mounting OVERLORD with a supporting operation against the south of France during 

May 1944. It was clear that Marshal Stalin 

considered the two operations as a single, 

inseparable military undertaking. 

This was the Soviet view of what AngloAmerican armies should do to hasten the 

end of the war in Europe. The view was 

hammered in during the conference, as in 

every meeting the Soviet representatives, 

abetted by the Americans, sought to pin 

down the most unequivocal possible 

agreement on OVERLORD.155 All other 

operations in the Mediterranean Stalin 

waved aside as diversion. "He had no interest in any ... [Mediterranean] operations other than those into Southern 

France." 156 He admitted the desirability 

of getting Turkey into the war, but 

doubted that it could be done. In any case 

he felt that Turkey's participation was a 

comparatively unimportant matter. The 

important point was that he did not wish 

the Western Allies to contemplate any diversion whatsoever from OVERLORD. OVERLORD was the main question, not Turkey 

or Rhodes or the Balkans. To make sure 

that there would be no wavering in the 

preparations for OVERLORD; Marshal Stalin 

154l)nnumbered Memo, Operation Against South· 

ern France, 29 Nov 43. OPD file ABC 384 Europe (5 

Aug 43) sec. 9a. 

155 It is clear that the Soviet views had force in the 

conference because they were also American views. 

For a plausible analysis of President Roosevelt's role 

at Tehran see Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, pp. 

789ft 

156 Plenary Mtg, 29 Nov 43. Statement not reported 

in British minutes. 
126 

urged that a supreme commander be appointed at once. He felt that the operation 

could not progress until someone had 

clear and single responsibility for it. Both 

Stalin and Churchill emphasized that the 

choice was the President's to make; all 

agreed that the appointment should be 

settled within the next fortnight. 

The air was cleared when the Americans and British gathered again at Cairo. 

The question of postponing OVERLORD in 

favor of Mediterranean diversions was 

scotched at last. The one big problem 

that remained alive and would grow 

from now on more robust and obstreperous was how to carry out the commitment to invade southern France (Operation ANVIL) at the same time as OVERLORD. In agreeing to ANVIL) the Prime 

Minister had stipulated that the strength 

of the assault be not less than the two divisions which the Tehran staff had indicated were feasible. But back in Cairo the 

Combined Planners looked over the landing craft figures and reported that there 

was actually enough lift for only one division in the assault and two-thirds of a 

division in the immediate follow-up. Estimating that a two-division assault would 

require a simultaneous lift for 45,500 men 

and 7,740 vehicles, planners calculated a 

probable shortage of lift for 6,500 men 

and 3,200 vehicles. That deficit might be 

made good, they reasoned, by diverting 

frQIl) the Pacific one month's allocation of 

landing craft-or a total of 26 LST's and 

26 LCT's-and then taking 5 LeT's from 

OVERLORD. With reference to the latter 

recommendation, the planners noted that 

OVERLORD was already getting 24 more 

LCT's than had been counted on at the 

Quebec Conference and that therefore 

the diversion of these five craft was "not 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

materially at the expense of that operation." The diversion of a month's supply 

of craft from the Pacific would probably 

force the postponement of an operation 

planned against Truk, and they suggested 

that, if that operation could not be delayed, then it would be necessary to make 

up the deficit for it by transferring craft 

from the South Pacific.157 

Here was the sign of things to come. 

The "numbers racket" of shuffling allocations of landing craft around the globe, a 

half dozen here, a half dozen there, had 

begun and it would not end until late in 

1944. 

One possible source for more landing 

craft was the cancellation of a proposed 

amphibious assault (BUCCANEER) against 

the Andaman Islands, in connection with 

operations to open the Burma Road. The 

British, who had always felt that offensive 

action against Japan could wait until after 

the defeat of Germany, now took the 

initiative in urging cancellation. "It appeared," said Air Marshal Portal, "that 

in order to carry out a successful operation in the South of France, other operations would have to suffer." 158 Specifically, he thought, the operation that 

should suffer was BUCCANEER. The Joint 

Chiefs of Staff were opposed at first, but 

after consultation with the President they 

finally agreed to accept a smaller amphibious assault requiring not more than half 

the lift. The surplus craft could thus be 

diverted to Europe.159 

157 CCS 424, Amphibious Ope~ations Against the 

South of France. 5 Dec 43. 

108 CCS 133d Mtg. 3 Dec 43. 

159 This decision and its impact on strategy in 

Burma as well as on U.S.-China relations will be discussed in full by C. F. Romanus and R. Sunderland 

in Command Problems, 1940-1944, a volume under 

preparation in this series. 
OVERLORD IN THE BALANCE (AUGUST-DECEMBER 1943) 127 

In the course of the discussion Admiral 

King expressed alarm over the tendency 

to regard the Pacific area as a pool of resources for the European theater.160 But 

in view of the priority of OVERLORD and 

ANVIL as the paramount operations of 

1944, and the chronic shortage of landing craft, it was in fact inevitable to regard any non-European theater of operations as potentially a stock pile to be 

raided in order to fatten the ETO. The 

point was perhaps best made by a cable 

which General Marshall sent in December to all theater commanders and defense commands. "The landing craft situation is critical," General Marshall 

wired, "and will continue to be so for 

some time to come. Any possible increase 

in production is far behind the increasing demand for landing craft. You are directed to make every landing ship and 

craft available for and apply them to the 

IGO CCS 135th Mtg, 5 Dec 43; JCS 132d Mtg, 28 Nov 

43. 

maximum battle effort.' , IGI The word 

went around the world: to Cairo, Algiers, 

Tehran, Chungking, Southwest Pacific 

Area, Fort Shafter (Hawaii), Noumea 

(New Caledonia), Quarry Heights 

(Canal Zone), Anchorage, and Adak Island (Alaska). Every craft saved was 

precious; wherever it was on the globe 

its fate was tied up with the fate of OVERLORD. 

The net effect of the reallocation of 

craft at the Cairo Conference was to give 

OVERLORD an additional 26 LST's, 24 

LCI(L)'s, and 64 LCT's above the allocations set at Quebec; and to give ANVIL 

an additional 41 LST's, 31 LCI (L)'s, 3 

XAP's, and 6 LSI(L),s.162 These were significant additions but their impressiveness would pale before the increasing demands of the big invasion, as continued 

planning brought out the military realities of the task to be done. 

161 Cbl, R6820, 11 Dec 43. WD Cable log. 

162 CCS 428 (rev), Relation of Available Resources 

to Agreed Operations, 15 Dec 43. 
CHAPTER IV 

The German Army In France 

1940-1943 

Organization of the West 

German leaders in the fall of 1943 read 

their newspapers and pored over intelligence reports with special interest. 

Crisis in the east had been reached and 

passed; there would be no more massed 

German offensives, no decisive victories. 

Crisis in the west was approaching. In 

October, news of the military conference 

in Moscow convinced Hitler and his staff 

that the opening of the second front was 

imminent. The conclusion was modified 

later as press releases from the Tehran 

Conference were taken to indicate a postponement of the invasion for perhaps 

two or three months. The best guess then 

was that the Allies might ‘attack any time 

after February 1944, but probably in the 

spring. Whatever the exact time schedule, most German leaders had little doubt 

that invasion was close at hand.1

While the Moscow Conference was 

going on, Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von 

1 Oberkomnando der Wehrmacht (see n. 19) / 

Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab, Kriegstagebuch (referred 

to hereafter as OKW/ WFSt, KTB) 1.IX.-31 .XII.43, 

11 Dec 43; cf. MS # B-283 by Blumentritt, OB 

WEST (see n. 2) Chief of Staff, who after the war 

wrote that following the declarations from Moscow 

and Tehran the German commanders knew that 

Germany was to be beaten; before that time they 

still hoped for an agreement with the Western Powers. See, however, later estimates of Allied intentions 

in Ch. VII, below. 

Rundstedt, Commander in Chief in the 

West, was putting the final touches on a 

long, frank, pessimistic report on the 

state of his defenses. The burden of the 

report was that his army was not in any 

way prepared to resist the expected Allied attack. In three years of occupation 

little had actually been accomplished to 

make Fortress Europe a military reality.2 

With the conquest of France in June 

1940, Hitler believed that he had won 

the war.3 He had no plans ready for the 

next step. He could not understand why 

any more victories should be necessary to 

convince Great Britain that it was hopeless to prolong the struggle. But Britain’s 

stubbornness, though inexplicable, was 

clearly a fact. Hitler noted in July that 

the British Government was apparently 

2 Beurteilung der Lage Ob. West am 25.X.43, 28 

Oct 43 (cited hereafter as Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 

43) , Oberbefehlshaber West (referred to hereafter as 

OB WEST) Ia Nr. 550/43. Oberkommando des 

Heel-es (see n. 19), Generalstab des Heeres/Operationsabteilung (referred to hereafter as OKH/Op.- 

Abt.) , 28 Oct 43. The German term “Oberbefehlshaber West,” which may mean either the Commander in Chief West or his headquarters, has been 

rendered as “OB WEST” when it refers to the headquarters and as “Commander in Chief West” when 

it refers to the person. 

3 See The Private War Journal of Generaloberst 

Franz Halder, 22 Jul 40 (trans) , MS. Hist Div files. 

Cited hereafter as Halder Diary. Halder was Chief 

of the General Staff of the German Army from 1938 

to September 1942. 

CHAPTER IV 

The German Army In France 

1940-1943 

Organization of the West 

German leaders in the fall of 1943 read 

their newspapers and pored over intelligence reports with special interest. 

Crisis in the east had been reached and 

passed; there would be no more massed 

German offensives, no decisive victories. 

Crisis in the west was approaching. In 

October, news of the military conference 

in Moscow convinced Hitler and his staff 

that the opening of the second front was 

imminent. The conclusion was modified 

later as press releases from the Tehran 

Conference were taken to indicate a postponement of the invasion for perhaps 

two or three months. The best guess then 

was that the Allies might attack any time 

after February 1944, but probably in the 

spring. Whatever the exact time schedule, most German leaders had little doubt 

that invasion was close at hand.1 

While the Moscow Conference was 

going on, Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von 

10berkommando der Wehrmacht (see n. 19) / 

Wehrmachtjuehrungsstab, K riegstagebuch (referred 

to hereafter as OKW /WFSt, KTB) 1.lX.-J1.XIl.43, 

II Dec 43; d. MS # B-283 by Blumentritt, OB 

WEST (see n. 2) Chief of Staff, who after the war 

wrote that following the declarations from Moscow 

and Tehran the German commanders knew that 

Germany was to be beaten; before that time they 

still hoped for an agreement with the Western Powers. See, however, later estimates of Allied intentions 

in Ch. VII, below. 

Rundstedt, Commander in Chief in the 

West, was putting the final touches on a 

long, frank, pessimistic report on the 

state of his defenses. The burden of the 

report was that his army was not in any 

way prepared to resist the expected Allied attack. In three years of occupation 

little had actually been accomplished to 

make Fortress Europe a military reality.2 

With the conquest of France in June 

1940, Hitler believed that he had won 

the war.3 He had no plans ready for the 

next step. He could not understand why 

any more victories should be necessary to 

convince Great Britain that it was hopeless to prolong the struggle. But Britain's 

stubbornness, though inexplicable, was 

clearly a fact. Hitler noted in July that 

the British Government was apparently 

2BeuTteiLung deT Lage Ob. West am 25.X.4J, 28 

Oct 43 (cited hereafter as Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 

43) , Oberbefehlshaber West (referred to hereafter as 

OB WEST) Ia Nr. 550/4J. Oberkommando des 

Heeres (see n. 19), Generalstab des Heeres/Operationsabteilung (referred to hereafter as OKH/Op.-

Abt.), 28 Oct 43. The German term "OberbejehlshabeT West," which may mean either the Commander in Chief West or his headquarters, has been 

rendered as "OB WEST" when it refers to the headquarters and as "Commander in Chief West" when 

it refers to the person. 

a See The Private War Journal of Generaloberst 

Franz Halder, 22 Jul 40 (trans), MS. Hist Div files. 

Cited hereafter as Halder Diary. Halder was Chief 

of the General Staff of the German Army from 1938 

to September 1942. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 129 

set on fighting to the finish,4 and he 

therefore began serious consideration of 

plans to deliver the cauj) de grace. 5 The 

obvious and most convincing method was 

InvaSIOn. 

The projected invasion was given the 

code name SEELOEWE (SEA LION) and 

Army and Navy planners set to work in 

a race against time to solve the manifold 

and unfamiliar problems of a largescale amphibious operation. The first 

big problem was that there were no 

landing craft, and very little shipping of 

any description. By gathering up all the 

barges from inland waterways itt the cost 

of paralyzing large sections of industry, 

the Germans could reckon on barely 

enough shipping space to put an effective 

force ashore in England. G But towed 

barges at the mercy of the slightest windroughened seas were hardly ideal. The 

perils of improvisation, furthermore, 

would be heightened by the lack of 

naval protection. The only way to guard 

the convoys seemed to be to mass all 

submarines and light surface vessels on 

the North Sea flank and at the same time 

mount a diversionary expedition on the 

Atlantic side to draw the British Fleet 

away from the main crossing. The Navy 

was decidedly cool toward the project. 

Grossadmiral Erich Raeder, the Navy 

Commander in Chief, as early as July 

had uncovered so many risks that he 

strongly recommended against the operation except as a last resort. 7 

Hitler agreed. Quite apart from the 

, Halder Diary, 13 .lui 40. 

<I Conf, 20 lun 40, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1940, 

Vol. I. 

"Annex 2, Conf, 25 Jul 40, Ibid., Vol. II. It was 

planned to land 90,000 men in the first six days. 

7 Confs, I I .Jul 40 andl3 Aug 40, Ibid., Vois. I and 

II. respectively. Cf. Halder Diary, 31 lui 40. 

dangers of SEELOEWE, Hitler did not 

like the political implications of conquering England by invasion. He saw that the 

defeat of England would be followed by 

disintegration of the British Empire. The 

beneficiaries of such a collapse, he 

thought, would be Japan and the United 

States, not Germany.8 He wanted not the 

destruction but the surrender of Great 

Britain. To force surrender, he believed 

it was necessary to deprive the British 

finally and completely of all hope in ultimate victory, They therefore must be 

confronted with a solid political front on 

the Continent embracing Spain, Italy, 

and a vanquished Russia,9 Defeat of 

Russia was particularly important. Hitler thought that England drew hope 

chiefly from the continued independence 

of the Soviet Union and the United 

States. By knocking out Russia, the Germans would remove one source of hope 

and considerably dim the other; Russia's 

defeat would leave Japan strong in the 

Pacific and would probably prevent the 

United States from becoming an effective ally of Great Britain in Europe. 

"\Vith Russia smashed," Hitler argued, 

"Britain's last hope would be shattered." 

On 31 July 1940 Hitler decided that 

Russia's destruction "must therefore be 

made a part of this struggle [against 

England]."lo He set the spring of 1941 

as the target date and ordered preparations made for a lightning blow to 

knock out Russia in not more than five 

111 on thS.ll 

The decision to attack Russia resulted 

immediately in a reorganization and exR Halder Diary, 26 Jul 40. 

9/bid., 31 Jul 40. Planning proceeded fitfully for 

an alliance \dth Spain and the seiZllre of Gibraltar. 

10 Halder Diary, 31 Jul 40. 

ll/bid., 17 Aug 40. 
130 

pans ion of the Army. The goal set was 

to build up from 143 to 180 divisions.12 

As all three of the army groups that defeated France, A) B) and C) were to be 

shifted to the Eastern Front by the spring 

of 1941, it became necessary to create 

a new headquarters to take over the occupation of France. This was Army 

Group D, formed during September and 

October under command of Generalfeldmarschall Erwin von Witzleben. In order 

to relieve the Army High Command at 

once for exclusive attention to the east, a 

theater commander, Oberbefehlshaber 

West (Commander in Chief West) was 

designated about the same time to take 

charge of all offensive or defensive operations that might be mounted in the west. 

Field Marshal Rundstedt, still in command of Army Group A (the force earmarked for SEELOEWE), was concurrently appointed Commander in Chief 

West with full command over Army 

Group A and tactical command over 

Army Group D and Armed Forces Commander Netherlands (Wehrmachtbefehlshaber Niederlande ).13 

While these command changes were 

being effected, the German commanders 

were rapidly becoming convinced that 

SEELOEWE was not a sound operation 

of war. The Navy had set the period 

20-26 September as the earliest date on 

12 Memo, Heeresaufbau aUf 180 Divisianen, 10 Sep 

40, OKW /Wehrmachtfuehrungsamt, Abteilung 

Landesverteidigung, Gruppe II, Nr. 1650/40. Translation found in German Manpower, MS. Hist Div 

files. This is a study by German Military Documents 

Section, WD G-2, prepared in 1946 from original 

German records. 

13 Order, Oberbefehlshaber West, 26 Oct 40, Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres (referred to hereafter as 

Ob.dB.). OKH/Op.Abt., Befehlsbefugnisse 30.V.40-

2.II.42. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

which it could be ready.14 But readiness 

even on this date hinged on the ability 

of Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering's 

Luftwaffe to knock out the British Royal 

Air Force. In the Battle of Britain Goering tried and failed as British fighter 

pilots demonstrated skill and courage 

that took heavy toll of the attackers. 

There followed a succession of postponements, which gained nothing; the Royal 

Air Force remained unconquered and 

the weather, the final insuperable obstacle, only became more stormy and unpredictable as the season advanced. With 

an improvised landing fleet, composed 

largely of river barges only a third of 

which were self-propelled, the Germans 

needed a relatively long period of almost 

flat calm.15 Such periods were rare in October and could not be forecast. By the 

middle of October SEELOEWE had been 

definitely called off. Preparations were to 

be continued for a landing in the spring 

but chiefly as a deception measure to keep 

up the pressure on the British.16 

Rundstedt thus remained in France 

with his A rmy Group A during the 

winter of 1940-41.17 In April 1941 he 

was moved out, and command in the 

west passed to von Witzleben, commander of A rmy Group D. Witzleben 

was left with three armies, the Seventh 

and Fifteenth occupying the long coast 

line from the Spanish border to Antwerp, 

and the First disposed in the interior 

with headquarters near Paris. 

The threat of invasion or even of damaging raids by the English against the 

14 Halder Diary, 30 Jul 40. 

16 Ibid., 26 Jul 40. 

16 Order, Aufgaben und Gliederung im Westen ab 

Oktaber 1940,17 Oct 40. Heeresgruppe A, KTB 25.· 

VI.-17.X.40, Anlagen, Teil III. 

17 Heeresgruppe A, KTB West, 1.l.-J3.lV.41. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 131 

Con tinen t in 1941 was so sligh t as to be 

negligible. Nevertheless, Witzleben began 

taking certain steps to put his defense in 

order. In June, the former Inspector of 

Western Fortresses was appointed Inspector of Land Fortresses in the West 

and attached for tactical purposes to 

OB WEST. His headquarters was moved 

from Metz to Paris near that of Witzleben, and his first task was the inspection of the defenses of the Channel 

Islands. 

The military reason for defending the 

Channel Islands was chiefly to protect 

coastal traffic. Hitler, however, attached 

to the islands a far greater political importance. He believed the British would 

be forced to retake them for the sake of 

prestige.Is Conversely they were precious 

to him as the only British territory 

directly under his domination. In midsummer 1941 the 319th Division) reinforced with machine gun, artillery, antitank, and antiaircraft units to the strength 

of about 40,000 men, was ordered to the 

islands. This garrison comprising some 

of the best troops and best equipment 

in the west was to remain on Channel 

guard duty, inactive and useless for the 

rest of the war. 

Up to the end of 1941 the only German-built fortifications on the French 

mainland were seven heavy coastal bat18 Interpretation of WarliIllont (see n. 52) in 

Geschichte des Oberbefehlshaber West, edited by 

Generalleutnant Bodo Zimmermann (Ia (G-3) of 

OB WEST) . This is a million· word manuscript pre· 

pared in part by Zimmermann. in part by generals 

and general staff officers associated with OB WEST, 

OKW, OKL (Oberkommando der Luftwaffe), OKH. 

OKM (Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine), and various subordinate commands. It was written under the 

auspices of the Historical Division of the U. S. War 

Department between 1946 and 1948. Cited hereafter 

as MS # T-12l (Zimmermann et al.). 

teries between Boulogne and Calais emplaced for the shelling of England during 

preparations for SEELOEWE) a few other 

naval coastal batteries, and some U-boat 

pens. The coastal battery emplacements 

were built for the Navy by Organization 

Todt, the construction organization 

formed in 1938 to build the West Wall. 

After SEELOEWE was called off, Hitler 

directed Organization Todt to construct 

bombproof U-boat pens along the Atlantic coast, especially at Brest, Lorient, 

and St. Nazaire. That project, to protect 

what Hitler came more and more to 

regard as his principal offensive weapon 

against the Western Powers, absorbed 

most of the labor and materials available 

for fortification of the west. When Witzleben in September 1941 proposed that 

the Army begin work on permanent defenses, the Army High Command 

(OKH)I9 had no construction battalions 

to give him and he had to make informal 

arrangements with the Navy to borrow 

such of their workers as were idle. Despite the difficulties, Witzleben at the 

end of 1941 ordered the armies, corps, 

and divisions under him to reconnoiter 

defense sites along the coast and begin 

construction.20 

This was the first step toward fortifying the west against eventual Allied 

invasion, but without the necessary allotment of labor and materials it could not 

accomplish much. The actual building 

190berkommando des Heeres. Until December 

1941 this was the headquarters and staff for General· 

feldmarschall Walther von Brauchitsch, Commander 

in Chief of the Army. At that time Hitler took direct 

command of the Army and OKH was directly sub· 

ordinated to him. In addition it was nominally subordinate for certain purposes to the Oberkommando 

der Wehrmacht (OKW, Armed Forces High Com· 

mand) . 

20 MS # T-12l (Zimmermann et al.). 
132 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

FIELD MARSHAL VON RUNDSTEDT AND GENERAL ]ODL. Von Rundstedt (left) was Commander in Chief West; General Jodi was chief of Armed 

Forces Operati-onal Staff. 

of the Atlantic Wall cannot be said to 

have begun before the spring of 1942. 

By then the first Russian winter counteroffensive, coupled with American entry 

into the war, had forced Hitler to reckon 

more seriously with prolongation of hostilities and the consequent possibility of 

major action in the west. 

Early in March 1942 Field Marshal 

Rundstedt was appointed Commander 

in Chief West to replace Witzleben.21 

21 Officer's Personnel Files, Field Marshal von 

Rundstedt. OKH / Heeres-Personalamt, Personalakten. Witzleben was put in the OKH Fuehrer Reserve. 

that is, in a pool of officers unassigned but on active 

duty and available for service. Rundstedt's appointment as Commander in Chief West was "acting" as 

of 8 March and was made permanent on I May 1942. 

Rundstedt was one of the senior officers 

and leading military personalities in 

Germany. He had been in charge of 

early planning for the Polish campaign 

of 1939 and had commanded an army 

group in that campaign. In 1940 in France 

he again commanded an army group. 

After the victory over France, he was 

placed in charge of planning and preparations for the invasion of England. On 

the abandonment of that project, Rundstedt participated in the first offensive 

against Russia as commander of Army 

Group South until the end of 1941, 

when he was relieved because of ill 

health. In March 1942 he reported to 

Hitler that his health was restored and a 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 133 

week later received the command in the 

west. 

Two weeks after Rundstedt's appointment, Hitler issued his basic order for 

the defense of the west.22 Sole responsibility for the defense of all Germanoccupied territory in the west including 

the Netherlands was given to the Commander in Chief West, and he, along 

with the commander in Denmark, was 

placed directly under the Armed Forces 

High Command (OKW). This extended a process begun earlier of splitting the theaters of operation between 

OKW and OKH, as though they were 

coequal commands. By the beginning of 

1943 OKW had become directly responsible for all western theaters (France and 

the Low Countries, North Africa and 

Italy, the Balkans, and Scandinavia) 

while OKH devoted exclusive attention 

to the east. The division recognized, in 

the first place, that OKH had its hands 

full with the increasing difficulties of the 

war in Russia. It also, in par~, reflected 

the fact that the defense of the west particularly called for co-ordination between 

the three services.23 

Co-ordination was effected, however, 

in name only. OKW, headed by Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel, was no 

true joint staff. Naval and air force members were relatively junior officers.24 

22 Translation of Fuehrer Directive No. 40 is reproduced below as Appendix C. 

23 OKW /WFSt, KTB 1.1.-31.lll.43, 2-3 Jan 43; Recapitulation of Fuehrer Directives establishing OKW 

Theaters, 28 May 42, OKW /WFSt, Quartiermeister 

im WFSt. Wehrmachtbefehlshaber Suedost (A.O.K. 

12) Taetigkeitsbericht and Anlagen, VI.42. See also 

The German High Command, a study by German 

Military Documents Section, WD G-2, 1946, MS. Hist 

Div files. 

24 See the Navy's complaint to Hitler on 13 April 

1942 that there was no high-ranking naval officer on 

the Armed Forces High Command (OKW) and that 

Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering and 

Admiral Raeder, furthermore, remained 

outside and above it in personal relationship with Hitler. Goering as Reichsmarschall outranked Keitel who, as chief 

of all the armed services, should have 

been his superior. In addition, Goering 

held a top Cabinet post as Minister of 

Aviation which further set him out of 

reach of OKW. Finally, the Army, wedded to the notion of Germany as a Continental power, had long opposed unification of the services on the basis of equal 

representation and authority.25 The 

effect of the Army view together with the 

independence of Goering and Raeder 

was to reduce OKW to the position of a 

second Army staff. As long as it had no 

direct responsibility for anyone theater 

of operations OKW retained a certain 

perspective and capacity to co-ordinate 

the German war effort, even though the 

bulk of its co-ordination had to pass 

through Hitler himself. With the splitting of the western and eastern theaters, 

OKW, for all practical purposes, lost 

strategy was suffering thereby. Annex 8, Conf, 13 

Apr 42, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1942. What the 

Navy asked for (and apparently got) was not representation on OKW but a flag officer to provide liaison 

at the Fuehrer Headquarters. This underlined the 

fact that such co-ordination between the services as 

existed operated on a personal basis through Hitler 

and not through any formal joint organization. Part 

of the Navy's protest was directed at the very efficient liaison which Goering had established at the 

Fuehrer Headquarters for the Luftwaffe, although 

the Luftwaffe was actually no better represented on 

OKW than the Navy .. 

25 Memo, Standpunkt Heer und OKW, betrefJend 

Denkschrift des Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres ueber 

Organisation der Wehrmachtfuehrung (7 .Ill.38), 22 

Mar 38. OKW file 1866; d. MS # C-045 (Natzmer 

et al.) , a postwar study of the historical evolution of 

OKH, which clearly describes the German Army's 

opposition to any unification of the services as coequal participants. 
GERMAN HIGH COMMAND. Left to right: Admiral Raeder, Navy; Field 

Marshal Keitel, chief of OKW; Hitler; and Reich Marshal Goering, Air Force. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 135 

even that limited power to co-ordinate. 

Henceforth the only unity of command 

in Germany rested in the person of 

Hitler, who no longer had adequate machinery through which to exercise it. 26 

In the various theaters of operations 

after 1940 no effective machinery was 

ever established to exercise unified command. 27 In the west, during an actual 

enemy invasion, the army commanders 

in the battle areas were to have tactical 

control over the air force and naval units 

in their sectors. But the failure to give 

DB WEST a supreme command meant 

that co-ordination of the defense rested 

largely on such informal co-operation 

and liaison as the local commanders 

might choose to establish. The divided 

command would gravely handicap German preparedness. In the meantime, the 

chief positive result of the new top-level 

command organization was to free the 

OKW operational staff (the Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab, WFSt, under General der 

Artillerie Alfred JodI) from responsibility for the war in Russia and so permit 

it to concentrate on the operational needs 

of the west, Italy, the Balkans, and Norway and Denmark. 

Hitler's basic order sketched out the 

tactical doctrine that henceforth governed all planning for the defense of 

26 The organizational structure and evolution of 

OKW and OKH have been described in great detail 

by committees of German officers working under the 

auspices of the Historical Division between 1946 and 

1948. See MSS # T-lOI, The German Armed Forces 

High Command (Winter et at.) and # T -Ill, The 

German Army High Command (Halder et at.) . 

21 The only instance of a joint staff was Gruppe 

XXI, formed in early 1940 by upgrading [he XXI 

Corps. Under the command of General der Infanterie 

Nikolaus von Falkenhorst, it was charged with the 

preparation and conduct of the Scandinavian campaign in 1940. Gruppe XXI, KTB 20.11.~.IV.40. 

France. He decreed that the coast defenses should be so organized and troops 

so deployed that any invasion attempted 

could be smashed before the landing or 

immediately thereafter. The main defensive preparations were to be made in 

the places most suitable for large enemy 

landings. Beaches where only small surprise landings were possible were to be 

defended by strong points tied in, if 

possible, with the coastal batteries. The 

rest of the coast would be patrolled. All 

positions were to be designed for defense to the last man of the garrison. All 

should be equipped with weapons and 

supplies so that even if overrun by the 

enemy they would not be forced to surrender for lack of means to continue the 

fight. 28 

Five days after the issuance of this 

order, Hitler was profoundly shocked by 

the successful British raid on St. Nazaire. 

The spectacle of British ships, including 

a destroyer, sailing with impunity up the 

mouth of the Loire reputedly made him 

furious and focused his attention on the 

inadequacies of the French coastal defenses. The only immediate outcome, 

however, was the relief of Generalleutnant Karl Hilpert, DB WEST Chief of 

Staff. Hilpert was replaced by Generalmajor Kurt Zeitzler, who was close to 

Hitler, and who afterward became Chief 

of the General Staff of OKH.29 

Later more sober study of the St. Nazaire experience showed even to Hitler 

that the responsible commanders in 

France did not have the resources to deal 

28 Fuehrer Directive No. 40. See below, Appendix C. 

29 Officer's Personnel Files, Generaloberst Kurt 

Zeitzler. OKH I Heeres-Personatamt, Personalakten. 

Still later Zeitzler was implicated in the 20 July 1944 

conspiracy against Hitler and dismissed. 
136 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

with determined enemy forays. While 

Allied strength was increasing, German 

strength had been gradually weakened to 

nourish the operations against Russia. 

Admiral Raeder told Hitler bluntly: 

“We have no means of repulsing an 

enemy attempt.” Even better defenses at 

St. Nazaire, in the opinion of Raeder, 

would not have stopped a determined 

Allied attack: the only thing that could 

have helped would have been strong 

naval forces and adequate air reconnaissance. Then he ventured a prophecy: “In 

view of the shortages everywhere and the 

necessity of using numerous makeshift defense measures, experience will show that 

there will constantly be new shortcomings 

in our defenses and new demands made 

upon them.” 30 Despite this accurate forecast of things to come, Hitler was not 

then, and never would be, convinced that 

defense could not be made invulnerable 

if enough concrete and resolution could 

be poured into it. His retort to the St. 

Nazaire raid was to direct that submarine 

bases be so well protected that successful 

raids on them thenceforth would be impossible. 

In August 1942 he expanded his notions of a concrete coastal wall. In a conference with Field Marshal Keitel and 

other high-ranking Army officers he proposed that fortress construction in France 

should proceed with “fanatic energy [Funatismus]” during the coming winter. 

The object must be to build many small 

strong points to house from thirty to seventy men each, armed with machine guns 

and “a few other weapons,” chiefly antitank guns. A continuous belt of interlocking fire must be created emanating from 

concrete structures designed to be proof 

against Allied bombing and naval shellfire.31 Behind this emphasis on fixed defenses lay the realization of a grave shortage of troops. Already in the summer of 

1942 Hitler estimated that ten to twelve 

more divisions were needed to establish a 

solid defense along the OB WEST coast 

line, but reserves to make up this deficit 

were not available. 

As the summer came to an end, prospects of victory in Russia were again 

clouded by the north winds. In the meantime the large-scale raid by Canadian 

troops at Dieppe in the latter part of August, though considered an absolute failure by the Germans, nevertheless forcibly 

called attention to the increasing threat 

of full-scale invasion by the Western 

Powers. On 29 September, Hitler called 

in Goering, Reich Minister Albert Speer 

(Chief of Organization Todt), Rundstedt, Generalleutnant Guenther Blumentritt (who had relieved Zeitzler as Chief 

of Staff OB WEST only a few days before), General der Pioniere Alfred Jacob 

(Chief Engineer of OKH), Generalleutnant Rudolf Schmetzer (Inspector of 

Land Fortresses for OB WEST), and certain other staff officers for a three-hour 

conference in the small Cabinet sitting 

room of the Reich Chancellery.32 The 

Fuehrer began by expressing his confidence that Russia would be defeated in 

1943 by a German push in the spring toward Mesopotamia in the south. He then 

31 Memo, Aktennotiz ueber Fuehrerbesprechung 

am 2.VIII.42 im Fuehrerhauptquartier, 3 Aug 42, 

General der Pioniere und Festungen b.0b.d.H. 

OKH/Op. Abt., Kuestenschutz Kanalkueste 2O.VI.42- 

18.V.44. 

32 Fuehrerrede zum Ausbau des Atlantik-Walles 

am 29.1X.42, 3 Oct 42. OKH/Op. Abt., Kuesten30Conf, 13 Apr 42, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1942. schutz Kanalkueste 2O.VI.42-18.V.44. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 137 

admitted grave concern over the possibility of the creation of a second front in 

the west. There was no question of capitulation, he said, "but I must freely admit 

... that a major landing of the enemy in 

the west would bring us to a generally 

critical position." The gravest present 

threat was to Norway, he believed, but 

ultimately it was France that would be invaded because such an operation would 

require the least amount of shipping tonnage. 

Hitler then went on to analyze the 

Dieppe experience. Even though the 

British field order for the raid, clearly 

specifying a withdrawal of forces after 

nine hours, was captured and studied by 

the Germans, apparently the German 

generals involved reported and Hitler believed that Dieppe was actually a major 

landing attempt that failed. On that 

premise he compared the introduction of 

large-scale amphibious operations at 

Dieppe to the introduction of the tank at 

Cambrai in World War 1. In both cases, 

he pointed out, the British had failed 

through having planned only the meeting 

engagement, leaving the follow-up to the 

initiative of the field commanders who 

were too timid to exploit their advantage. 

After Cambrai both British and Germans 

drew the false lesson that the tank was 

technically a failure and so "they poured 

out the baby with the bath." He warned 

now against a false deduction on the German side that amphibious operations 

against the coast of France were proved 

impossible by Dieppe. This time, he said, 

the British cannot arrive at a similar conclusion, simply because they have no alternative but to try again. 

The Germans must prepare the strongest possible defenses. The defenses must 

be prepared, furthermore, on the assumption that the Allies would enjoy air and 

naval supremacy. The crushing weight of 

Allied bombs and shells, he believed, 

could be withstood only by concrete. Not 

only that, but massive concrete works, he 

believed, had a psychological as well as a 

physical strength. Hitler pointed out that 

the very existence of the West Wall had deterred Daladier in 1938 from threatening 

military action during the Czechoslovak~a 

crisis. The West Wall repeated along the 

coast would have the same deterrent effect on the Western Allies. Hitler asked 

for 15,000 concrete strong points for the 

new "Atlantic Wall" to be defended by 

300,000 men. The goal was an impervious, permanent defense ring. Since the 

amount of time available to build it was 

uncertain, construction was to follow a 

strict priority. In Hitler's view, the most 

important job was to protect the U-boat 

bases. He listed for defense thereafter: 

harbors for coastal traffic, harbors suitable 

for enemy landings (a reflection of the 

Dieppe experience), the Channel Islands, 

and finally landing places on the open 

coast. Beaches deemed most likely to be 

used in a major invasion attempt were to 

be fortified first. But, as Hitler pointed 

out, since the Navy could not guarantee 

that any portion of the coast was safe, the 

whole would have to be walled up eventually. 

It was an ambitious program. Hitler ordered that it be completed by 1 May 1943; 

Organization Todt thought it would be 

lucky to get 40 percent finished by that 

time. At such a rate the defense of the 

coast proper, having the lowest priority, 

became a very long-range program which 

would probably not be completed before 

the Allies struck. In any case it was fan-
138 

tastic to su ppose that even a first-class military power could be strong everywhere 

along the entire coast line from the Mediterranean to Norway. It followed that defense preparations would be concentrated 

in accordance with estimates of Allied intentions. But German intelligence services notably failed to supply reliable information about the Western Allies. The 

sparseness of accurate intelligence, the 

plethora of rumors, and the natural 

jitteriness of being on the strategic defensive led to constantly revised guesses 

that at one time or another pointed out 

grave threats to virtually every section of 

the coast. Division commanders, corps 

commanders, army commanders freely 

contributed predictions that their own 

sectors had been selected for the enemy 

landings. They were moved sometimes by 

logic, more often by desire to compete for 

the limited supplies of troops and materiel. They seldom had any sure knowledge of what was being brewed across the 

Channel. Hitler's intuition was no less 

erratic: at various times he picked the 

Gironde, Brittany, the Cotentin, the Pasde-Calais, and Norway. In late 1943 a captured British agent indicated that the 

Allies intended to strike in the N etherlands. 33 He was not believed, and the 

Netherlands actually remained about the 

only sector in the west exempt from special attention as a threatened area. 

Although the Germans could never be 

sure that any sector of the coast was safe, 

the necessity for concentrating their own 

forces led them to categorize roughly the 

degrees of danger. It was common consensus from the beginning that the sector 

of the Fifteenth Army from the Seine to 

330KW/WFSt, KTB l.IX.-31.XII.43, 31 Oct 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the Schelde was most gravely if not 

uniquely threatened. This estimate, however, was based on reasoning, not on intelligence. It was thought the Allies would 

strike here because it was close to Germany and the Ruhr, and because the short 

Channel crossing would simplify the 

problems of air support and sea reinforcement. Strategically Allied success in this 

sector would cut off the whole of the German forces to the south. 

The conclusion that the Kanalkueste 34 

was the most likely place for a major landing, arrived at in the early days of planning the Atlantic \Vall, was never seriously shaken by any later information. 

Even when other sectors appeared threatened, the threats were deemed diversionary. Rationalization had a persuasiveness 

that the meager reports of fact never had. 

Furthermore, once the concrete was 

poured, the original estimate hecame peculiarly difficult to alter. During 1942, 

for instance, four times as much concrete 

was allotted the left corps of Fifteenth 

Army as to the LXXXIV CorjJs in Normandy and Brittany.35 By May 1943 the 

concentration of troops along the Fifteenth Army coast was almost three times 

as heavy as in Seventh A rmy-the army 

that would oppose the invasion. 30 

In the summer of that year a new importance was given to the Pas-de-Calais 

area. It was here that Hitler planned to 

install his Vergellungs (vengeance) weapons, the long-range rockets and pilotless 

34 Term generally coinciding with the sector of 

Fifteenth Army. It includes the Pas-de-Calais area 

and the Somme-Seine coast. 

35 MS # B-234 (Generalleutnant Max Pemsel, 

CofS Seventh Army) . 

36 Schematische Kriegsgliederung, 1 May 43_ 

OKH/Op.Abt.; see also Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 

43. 
ENEMY COAST ARTILLERY in the Pas-de-Calais area. Heavy concrete casemate 

under construction (above), and (below) laborers at work on casemate. 
140 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

aircraft from which he expected a complete reversal of the course of the war. He 

believed that the V-weapons would prove 

so dangerous to England that the Allies, 

whatever their previous plans might have 

been, would be forced to attack directly to 

overrun the launching sites. This estimate, of course, entailed the further conclusion that the bulk of the German defenses should be emplaced to defend the 

rocket sites. In June 1943 Hitler assigned 

construction priority to those portions 

of the Atlantic Wall defending rocketlaunching areas.37

Although by far the strongest fortified 

portion of the French coast, even the 

Kanalkueste never became anything like 

the impregnable fortress that German 

propaganda advertised. Hitler, having 

ordered the creation of a wall of concrete 

and fire which could stop any invasion at 

the water’s edge, apparently believed that 

such a wall would be built and paid little 

further attention to it. He never saw any 

portion of the western fortifications. After 

leaving Paris in triumph in the summer 

of 1940 he did not set foot on French soil 

again until a week after the Allied invasion in June 1944. 38 Absorbed with the 

struggle against Russia, he scarcely heeded 

the stream of memoranda in which the 

Commander in Chief West pointed out 

37 OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.VII-31.VIII.43, 14 Jul 43,

referring to conference of 28 June. The term, “V-l,” 

recommended by Reich Minister Josef Paul Goebbels 

and approved by Hitler, was adopted as “an instrument of uronaeanda” by directive of OKW: “The V I ” 

used in this designation is . . . to counteract the 

enemy’s usage of this letter (Victory), and the 

numeral 1 is to point toward other possible means of 

stepping up this type of warfare by remote control 

against England.” Seekriegsleitung/1.Abt., KTB 

I.-30.VI.44, 25 Jun 44. 

38 MS # T-121 (Zimmermann et al.). See below, 

Ch. X. 

and reiterated the entire inadequacy of 

German preparations for the defense of 

France. 

In the spring of 1943 Rundstedt went 

to Berchtesgaden to present his case in 

person. But Hitler was still not interested 

in bad news from the west. He was looking forward to great victories in the east. 

He talked of how two thousand German 

tanks would annihilate at least ninety 

Russian divisions in the new spring offensive. Rundstedt, after abrupt dismissal, returned to France and embarked 

on a comprehensive survey of the state of 

his defenses. It was this survey which resulted in the detailed report of 25 October. This he forwarded to OKW with a 

special request that it be brought to the 

personal attention of Hitler.39

Impact of the Russian 

and Mediterranean Fronts 

Rundstedt said little about the Atlantic 

Wall. He mentioned delays in naval construction due to a faulty priority system 

which had only just been straightened 

out. But for the most part he was less interested in the state of the permanent defenses than in the combat value of his 

troops. The wall, he said, was valuable 

for fighting as well as for propaganda, 

“but it must not be believed that this wall 

cannot be overcome.” Strongly defended 

fortifications might be a more or less efficient means of weakening the attacking 

enemy by splitting his forces, but victory 

in the west could be achieved only by 

rapidly mounted, strong counterattacks.40 

In the light of this basic requirement, 

Rundstedt pointed out how thin his line 

39 MS # T-121. 

40 Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 43. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 141 

of defense really was. The average coastal 

sector of a single division ranged from 50 

miles in the Fifteenth Army sector to 120 

miles in the Seventh Army sector and 217 

miles along the Atlantic coastY The 

coastal divisions, moreover, were almost 

all understrength-a good many had only 

two regiments. Their armament, particularly in antitank weapons and artillery, 

was often inadequate for a maximum defense of their positions. Most serious of 

all, in Rundstedt's eyes, was their almost 

total lack of transport. 

All these deficiencies were the direct result of the drain on the German war economy to maintain the Russian and Mediterranean fronts. The opening of the Russian front in 1941 had turned the west 

into a kind of replacement center. Toward the end of that year the Commander 

in Chief West was already complaining 

that his troops were being siphoned off 

at a dangerous rate.42 The complaint was 

futile; the process, in fact, had only just 

begun. From 1942 "the hard-pressed 

Eastern Front always short of forces 

looked with envy at the apparently sleeping army in the west, and at every crisis 

the higher commanders in the east ... demanded that the reservoir be tapped. In 

the need of the moment these troops were 

usually conceded." 43 

In 1942 the process of east-west troop 

H Note that this compared to an average sector on 

the Russian front of 32.5 miles to a corps. OKH, 

Generalstab des Heeres (cited hereafter as OKH, 

Gen.St.d.H.) /Organisationsabteilung, KTB Anlagen, 

1943. 

42 Ltr, OB WEST to OKHjOp.Abt., 19 Dec 41, 

OKH/OP.Abt., Gliederung West, Bd. IV, 9.vIII.4I4.1.42. 

43 MS # B-672 (Generalmajor Horst Freiherr 

Treusch v. Buttlar-Brandenfels (OKW)). This is a 

commentary on Zimmermann's preliminary narrative of OB WEST (MS # B-30B) , 

exchanges was regularized. In May the 

Commander in Chief West issued an 

order concerning the reconstitution of 

divisions shifted from the Russian front 

to France emphasizing speed in re-equipping these divisions and the importance 

of maintaining the special toughness 

(Ost-Haerte) of the troops. In the same 

order Rundstedt warned against allowing 

the troops who had returned from the 

east to patronize those troops permanently stationed in the west. The latter, 

he pointed out, had done their duty and 

it was not their fault that they could not 

be used for fighting in the east. 44 In short, 

it was made a matter of policy that the 

west should be permanently garrisoned 

only by troops who because of various 

disabilities could not be used in the hard 

fighting in Russia. OKH, in October, proposed a regular monthly exchange of two 

divisions between Army Group Center 

and OB WEST and one division between 

Army Group North and the Norway garrison. OKH listed ten infantry divisions 

under OB WEST command which were 

immediately suitable for exchange with 

the east. At the same time it was proposed 

not to transfer any mobile divisions (armored and motorized) until spring to 

avoid using them up in winter fighting in 

Russia. But that was like trying to hold 

on to a parasol in a hurricane. A month 

later, Hitler ordered the immediate transfer of the 6th Panzer Division from the 

west to the sector of Stalino-Volchansk. 

In the first eleven months after October 

1942 the east-west exchange system took 

44 Grundlegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers 

West NT. 3, Aufgaben der Ost-Divisionen, 10 May 

42. OKW /WFSt, 1. Generalstabso{fizier Heer (referred to hereafter as OKW /WFSt, Op. (H)), Grundlegende Befehle West 22.X.42-7.V.44. 
142 

twenty-two infantry and six armored or 

motorized divisions out of the west. This 

was in addition to a constant weeding out 

of the best personnel and equipment from 

divisions considered unsuitable as a whole 

for east duty.45 

Thus in 1943, a year of increasing 

threats of attack from the west, the German armies in France had not even held 

their own. General Blumentritt, the OB 

WEST chief of staff, in September summarized the deterioration for the high 

command. A year ago, he pointed out, the 

Atlantic Wall h~d been garrisoned with 

twenty-two infantry divisions most of 

which had three regiments. In reserve 

were six infantry and seven fully mobile, 

first-class armored or motorized divisions. 

Now, he continued, in a much more dangerous situation, the garrison infantry divisions had increased to twenty-seven, but 

this increase was largely nullified by the 

reduction of most of the divisions to two 

regiments. In reserve were six armored or 

motorized divisions and seven infantry 

divisions, of which three were new organizations. In other words, though the holding strength remained about constant in 

numbers the quality had certainly declined; the striking power had decreased 

slightly in numbers and very substantially 

in mobility.46 

"Various papers in Austausch Ost-West, 1.IX.42-

28.11.44, OKH/Op.Abt. A total of 28 infantry divisions, 4 armored divisions, 2 motorized divisions, and 

4 smaller units were alerted for service in the east 

after I October 1942. 

4GOKW/WFSt, KTB I.IX.-31.XII.43. For figures 

as of I Sep 42, d. Memo, West-Divisionen, die ab 

1.10.42 zur Verlegung in den Osten geeignet sind, 

I Sep 42. OKH/Op.Abt., Austausch Ost-West I.IX.-

42-2S.II.44. The panzer and panzer grenadier divisions contained substantially more men than the 

two-regiment infantry divisions. See below, Ch. VII. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

There was no appeasing the hunger of 

the Eastern Front. The continual protests 

of the Commander in Chief West and 

even Hitler's own resolution toward the 

end of 1943 to halt the weakening of the 

west were alike swept aside by the demands for more and more men to halt the 

tide of Russian victories. The German 

Army went into Russia in June 1941 with 

3,300,000 menY By the spring of 1943, 

despite every effort to get replacements, 

the eastern army had been reduced by 

600,000. Built back up to three million 

for the summer offensive, it suffered another net reduction of a half million by 

September.48 In 1943 alone, the Germans 

estimated that they had a total of 2,086,-

000 casualties in the east, of which 677,-

000 were permanent losses (that is, the 

killed and missing, unfit, and one-third of 

all wounded).49 The net losses continued 

to mount so that in the year from July 

1943 through June 1944 the gap between 

47 This is approximately the same strength as the 

maximum build-up of the U.S. Army on the Continent in 1945. 

480KH, Gen.St.d.H./Organisationsabteilung (referred to hereafter as OKH/Org. Abt.) , KTB Anlagen, 1943. 

49 Memo, Berechnungsunterlagen luer Schaubild 

"Zugaenge und Abgaenge des Ostheeres vom November 42 bis Oktober 43" (Stand 5.XII.43), 14 Dec 

43. OKH/Org.Abt., KTB Anlagen 1.XII.-I0.XII.43. 

German losses (killed, missing, and wounded) from 

June 1941 to December 1943 totaled 3,726,000, of 

which 3,513,000 were lost on the Eastern Front. Rpt, 

Personelle blutige Verluste vom 22.Juni 1941 bis 

31.Dezember 1943, 4 Jan 44. OKH/Generalquartiermeister, der Heeresarzt, OKH/Org.Abt., Ant Meldungen, Monatsmeldungen ab 1.VII.43. The proportions of wounded to total casualties and of seriously 

wounded to those returnable to duty were almost 

identical in the U.S. Army. See [John E. Henderson] 

The Procurement and Use of Manpower in the European Theater (The Administrative and Logistical 

History of the ETa: Part IX) , MS, pp. 84-85. Hist 

Div files. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 143 

losses and replacements amounted to 

535,000. 50 

Even these figures do not truly reflect 

the exhaustion of the German Army. Of 

151 German Army divisions listed in the 

OKH order of battle for the Russian front 

in December 1943, ten panzer and fifty 

infantry divisions were "fought out" 

(abgekaempft) or, in other words, of 

negligible combat value. Eleven of the 

named infantry "divisions" were actually 

only Kampfgruppen. At the same time 

there were twelve full divisions in Italy, 

while OB WEST had forty-six divisions 

plus two regiments that were operational 

and another seven divisions in process of 

formation. These figures strikingly reveal the strain exerted by the Russian war: 

the number of divisions in the east which 

needed replacement and reconstitution 

was greater than the total number of divisinns in the two western theaters. 51 

The war in Russia was always the principal vacuum into which German resources 

were sucked and destroyed, but Allied attacks on North Africa in November 1942 

and subsequent Allied Mediterranean operations superimposed an additional 

strain which contributed substantially to 

the weakening of the west. General der 

Artillerie Walter Warlimont of OKW 52 

concluded after the war that the invasion 

of North Africa, which came as a complete surprise to Hitler, was actually "decisive for the whole conduct of the war" 

50 Chart, Gesamt Zu- u. Abgaenge des Feldheeres 

in der Zeit vom 1.Vll.4J-JO.vI.44, 3 Jul 44. OKH/-

Org.Abt., KTB Anlagen, 1944. 

51 OKH/Org.Abt., KTB Anlagen, 1.Xll.-1O.Xll.4J; 

OKWjWFSt, KTB 1.IX-J.Xll.4J, 3 Nov 43. To this 

Russian pressure U. S. lend· lease contributed enormously. See Pogue, The Supreme Command. 

52 Warlimont was deputy chief of the Armed 

Forces Operations Staff (WFSt). 

for it established a "springboard for a 

thrust into the groin of Fortress Europe, 

the naturally weak and practically unprepared south flank." 53 One immediate result of Allied landings in North Africa on 

8 November 1942 was to force German occupation of the whole of France and add 

some four hundred miles of Mediterranean coast line to OB WEST's responsibilities. 

Plans for the occupation of Vichy 

France were completed in July 1942. 

Troops were alerted on 7 November, the 

day before the Allied landings in North 

Africa. Ten divisions under two armies 

(the First and Army Felber) moved across 

the Demarcation Line on 11 November 

and, without opposition from the French, 

occupied the Spanish border and the 

Mediterranean coast as far as Toulon. The 

area from there east and as far north as a 

line between Lyon and the Swiss border 

was taken over at the same time by the 

Italian Fourth Army, which moved in 

with six divisions and three corps headquarters. In December the units under 

the German First Army withdrew and 

First A rmy responsibility was thereafter 

limited to the Atlantic coast line as far 

north as the Loire River. The Mediterranean became the responsibility of Army 

Felber.54 

These arrangements lasted about six 

months. In June 1943 Rundstedt notified 

General der Infanterie Hans-Gustav Felber that Italian collapse seemed possible 

and he was therefore to prepare to relieve 

53 MS # T -121 (Zimmermann et al.) . 

54 Armeeoberkommando 7 (referred to hereafter 

as Seventh Army), KTB IX.-Xll.42 and Anlagen; 

Armeeoberkommando 1 (referred to hereafter as 

First Army), KTB lO.VIl.-31.Xll.42 and Anlagen; 

Hoeheres Kommando XXXXV (Armee Felber), 

Korpsbefehle, la 22.111.40-29.IX.42. 
144 

the Fourth Army. His local commanders 

were to try to get the Italians to continue 

fighting on the side of the Germans, but 

those who could not be persuaded were 

to be disarmed. Labor troops were to be 

formed of those willing to work, and the 

rest were to be regarded as prisoners of 

war. 

During the campaign in Sicily and 

through the fall of Mussolini the Fourth 

Army held on in France. But on 10 Au· 

gust the Italian supreme command proposed withdrawal of the army to defend 

Italy against the expected Allied invasion 

of the mainland.55 Two days later Felber 

was relieved by General der Infanterie 

Georg von Sodenstern. During the next 

few weeks the command in the south was 

renamed the Nineteenth Army and preparations were completed to relieve the 

Italians. The relief, which absorbed four 

German divisions, was carried out early 

in September. Except for a brief fight at 

the Mount Cenis tunnel by units of the 

Italian 5 th A lpini Division the relief was 

peaceful. But in the course of it about 40,-

000 Italian troops were made prisoner 

and sent into the interior of France as 

labor troops. No more than a handful 

volunteered to fight beside the Germans.56 

Southern France was only one of the 

vacuums created by Italian collapse. As 

soon as collapse seemed imminent the 

Germans made plans to shift troops into 

the Italian peninsula and into the Bal55 A more likely reason was to get troops for the 

defense of Italy against the Germans and particularly 

to defend Rome. See Mario Roatta, Otto Milioni di 

Baionette (Milan, 1943), p. 287. 

56 OKWjWFSt, KTB 1.VII.-3IYlII.43, 23-28 Aug 

43; First Army, KTB 1.VIl.-30.IX.43 and Anlagen; 

Armeeoberkommando 19 (referred to hereafter as 

Nineteenth Army), KTB 20YI.-31.XII.43 and An· 

lagen. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

kans. The total number required was not 

large, but the added strain was severe. The 

planned 1943 summer offensive in Russia (Operation ZIT ADELLE), becoming 

an exhausting defensive action, drew off 

so many troops that OKW in July could 

find only twelve divisions available for 

occupying ltaly.57 All of these were already either in northern Italy or under 

OB WEST command. Impoverished by 

contributions to the Russian war, OB 

WEST was now to be beggared to nOUTish the Mediterranean. Before 1 September, Rundstedt had given up eight infantry and nine panzer divisions to Africa 

and Italy and one infantry and one panzer 

division to the Balkans. These comprised, 

moreover, some of the best-quality troops 

remaining in the west after earlier withdrawals for Russia. 58 

Besides forcing direct contributions of 

troops, Allied attacks in Italy weakened 

the whole defense system of the west by 

creating invasion threats to southern 

France. Although Rundstedt never reckoned with a major landing on his Mediterranean coast, he did count as probable 

a diversionary attack tied in with a largescale invasion in the northwest. In his October report he pointed out that the 

Rhone Valley was a natural invasion route 

to the north and that the ports of Toulon 

and Marseille would undoubtedly be 

tempting to the Allies. General Sodenstern in August 1943 noted the clear strategic connection between thrusts from the 

north and south and recalled that the 

51 OKW jWFSt, KTB 1.VII.-31.VllI.43, 14 Jul 43. 

58 OKW j WFSt, KT B l.lX.-3I .XII.43, 11 Sep 43. 

Total withdrawals for Russia and the Mediterranean 

up to I September 1943 were thus 31 infantry and 

16 mobile divisions. The figures given by Rundstedt 

in his report as of I October 1943 were 36 infantry 

and 17 mobile divisions. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 145 

Rhone Valley had been a historic route 

to the upper Rhine for invading armies 

since the wars of Caesar.59 

The "three-front" war all but exhausted the normal German manpower 

reservoirs. The Germans then turned to 

extraordinary sources to fill up the decimated ranks of the west army. The principal last-ditch sources were foreign personnel (chiefly Russian), young recruits 

of the classes of 1925 and 1926, convalescents often with physical disabilities, organizational overhead, and troops in occupied areas comparatively safe from invasion threats, like Norway and Denmark. 

Divisions that remained in the west but 

had their rosters combed out for replacements for eastern service were replenished with men rated less fit for combat. 

Divisions transferred to the east were replaced with new formations, sometimes 

with good personnel, more often with a 

mixture of fit and unfit, experienced and 

green, German and foreign. 

In June 1941 the German Army was entirely German and prided itself on its 

"racial purity." With the opening of the 

Russian campaign, German propaganda 

began to internationalize German war 

aims as a crusade against Bolshevism. At 

the same time the requirements for men 

to administer and defend vast occupied 

territories while well over two million 

men fought in the Russian battlefields 

made imperative the opening of almost 

any conceivable additional source of 

manpower. "Racial Germans" (Volksdeutsche), especially from Poland, were 

given conditional German citizenship 

and under this fiction made subject to the 

draft. As time went on the fiction was ex59 Notes written in August 1943, appended to MS 

# B-276 (Sodenstern). 

tended often to persons who could not 

even speak German. Recruiting was begun also in the occupied territories of 

Russia and units formed of the so-called 

Freiwilligen (volunteers). As the pressure for more and more men developed, 

the Freiwilligen) too, lost more and more 

of their volunteer character. In the late 

fall of 1941 Hitler authorized the employment of Russian prisoners in the German 

Army, formalizing a procedure already 

applied by field commanders. The majority of the Hilfswillige (auxiliaries) 

were employed as labor troops in war 

areas. Through increasing admixture 

with these three categories, Volksdeutsche) 

Freiwillige) and Hilfswillige) the "racial 

purity" of the German Army became 

more and more dilute.GO In 1944 the Army 

included as "volunteers" from occupied 

and allied territories: French, Italians, 

Croatians, Hungarians, Romanians, Poles, 

Finns, Estonians, Letts, Lithuanians, 

North Africans, Negroes, Asiatics, Russians, Ukrainians, Ruthenians, Kazaks, 

North-Caucasians, Georgians, Azerbaijani, Armenians, Turkomans, VolgaTatars, Volga-Finns, Kalmucks, Crimean 

Tatars, and even Indians. 

The Volksdeutschen)drawnchieflyfrom 

territories which Germany intended to 

integrate with the Reich, were originally 

classified in four categories according to 

the degree of their overt sympathy with 

the Nazi party. The majority were placed 

in the third category (Volksliste drei )comprising racial Germans who despite previous integration in the Polish national culture were deemed amenable to Germanization.61 Volksliste drei persons were 

60 German Manpower. MS cited n. 12. 

61 Category I included the active Nazis; II. the 

passive Nazis who had, however, preserved their 
146 

given a ten-year probationary citizenship 

and drafted if of military age. Although 

integrated for the most part in the Army 

they were forbidden to rise above the rank 

of private first class.62 

Rundstedt, in October 1943, commented on the lower morale of the Volksdeutschen, due, he thought, not to ill will 

on their part but to the fact that their families were not being treated like the families of front-line German soldiers. But the 

reliability of the Volksdeutschen concerned him much less than that of the 

volunteer Russian combat battalions 

which his command had been forced to 

accept in the latter part of the year.63 The 

original idea back of the formation of the 

Ost (east) battalions was to employ antiRed Russian peoples (generally prisoners 

of war) in the crusade against the Soviet 

Union. When the third great German 

summer offensive soured in 1943 and the 

German armies began a retrograde movement that had all the earmarks of final retreat, the anti-Bolshevik recruits became 

increasingly unreliable and it was decided 

to transfer them to the west in exchange 

for German troops. In September OKW 

ordered the exchange on the basis of two 

Ost battalions for one German battalion.64 At that time OKH reported that 

15,800 Osttruppen were trained and that 

25,000 more would be trained in November and December. During September 

and October, about forty-five Cossack, 

Georgian, North-Caucausian, Turkoman, 

Germanic spirit; and IV, those hostile to integration 

into the German state. See Der Prozess gegen die 

Hauptkriegsverbrecher vor dem lnternationalen Mi/itaergerichtshof (Nuremberg, 1947), III, 653. 

62 WD TM-E # 30-451, Military Intelligence Division, The German Replacement Army (Ersatzheer). 

63 Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 43. 

64 OKW jWFSt, KTB I.IX.-3I.Xll.43, 25 Sep 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Armenian, Volga-Tatar, Azerbaijanian, 

Volga-Finn, and miscellaneous Ost battalions were brought into the OB WEST 

sector.65 The original ratio of one German for two Ost battalions was considerably modified to the advantage of the Russian theater. Plans at the end of October 

were to exchange thirty-two more Ost 

battalions for twenty-six German battalions of which OB WEST would furnish 

twenty and Norway and Denmark the remaining six. By May 1944 Seventh Army 

alone had twenty-three Ost battalions of 

infantry.66 This represented about onesixth of the total number of rifle battalions in the Army. In the LXXXIV Corps 

sector in Normandy and Brittany, out of 

forty-two rifle battalions, eight were composed of Osttruppen. 

Besides recruiting prisoners of war, the 

Germans added to their military manpower by relaxing physical standards. At 

the end of 1943 the physical fitness categories were cut down from four to three. 

The limited service classification was 

abolished and men were to be graded as 

fit for service at the front, fit for service 

in Germany, or totally unfit. Those with 

relatively minor ear, stomach, and lung 

ailments were to be sent to the front. Convalescence time was ordered cut down.67 

No accurate picture of the physical state 

of the German Army in the west is possible. Physical standards were unquestionably much lower than in Allied armies. 

But although the majority of troops in the 

west were considered unfit for combat in 

66 OKHjop.Abt., Kraefte Westen. Allgemein, Band 

III, 24.VII.42-I.XI.43. 

66 Kriegsgliederung, 18 May 44. Seventh Army, 

KTB Anlagen 1.l.-30YI.44. 

67 OKW jWFSt, KTB I.lX.-31.XII.43, 5 Dec 43. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 147 

Russia, the cause of unfitness was often inadequate training, lack of transport, and 

lack of equipment rather than the physical condition of the men. 

In tlie whole German Army the average 

age in 1944 was 31.5 years, four and a half 

years older than the average age of the 

German 'Western Front Army in 1917 and 

more than six years older than the U. 5. 

Army in 1943. Of an Army of 4,270,000 

in December 1943 more than a million 

and a half were over 34 years 01d. 68 In the 

west the older-age classes as well as a large 

proportion of the rela tivel y unfit were assigned to the static coastal divisions. Even 

so, repeated raids were made on the static 

divisions to sort out their best men for 

east duty. Eventually these divisions acquired a substantial number of the overage, the very young (classes of 1925 and 

1926), men with third-degree frostbite, 

Volksdeutsclze (which were used up to 8 

percent of division strength), and OsttrujJjJen. The average age of the 709th 

Division which held the east coast of the 

Cotentin was thirty-six. 69 The fact that 

one whole division was almost entirely 

composed of men suffering from stomach 

ailments is dramatic, if somewhat misleading, evidence of the lengths to which 

German leaders went to fill up the ranks 

of the Army. It is misleading because, in 

contrast to the static coastal divisions, the 

offensive divisions (infantry, parachute, 

68 OKHjOrgAbt., KTB Anlagen, 1943. 

69 Oberstleutnant Hoffmann, Bericht Kampfgruppe 

von Schlieben 6.-22.VI.44, cited hereafter as Hoffmann 

Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.I.-30.VI.44. 

Hoffmann was the commander of the 3d Battalion, 

919th Regiment, of the 709th Division. After von 

Schlieben's forces had been bottled up in Cherbourg 

in June 1944, Hoffmann escaped by E-boat with 

orders to report to the Seventh Army. See below, Ch. 

X. 

armored, and 55) contained excellent 

personnel. Though relatively new organizations, most seem to have been adequately trained and equipped by the time 

of the invasion.70 

Many of the deficiencies of the German 

Army in the west at the end of 1943 were 

substantially made up in the first six 

months of 1944; others were chronic and 

could at best only be patched over with 

makeshift measures. The most serious of 

the latter was the lack of manpower and 

especially of first-class combat soldiers. It 

should be remembered, however, that this 

constituted primarily a strategic weakness. 'Vhile it affected the strength of the 

Atlantic 'Vall defenses both in reducing 

the numbers and quality of the coastal 

garrisons, its real importance was not for 

the battle of the beaches but for the campaign to follow. In naturally strong coastal 

defenses even a relative handful of second-class troops could give good account 

of themselves. The drain of the threefront war meant above all that there were 

no strategic reserves. Lusses could not be 

made up. The divisions in the west could 

not hope for replacement when they were 

fought out. The defensive crust could be 

thickened and spiked and made very formidable indeed, but only at the expense 

of putting everything forward. The 

70 MS # C-024 (Kraemer). This manuscript by 

Generalmajor der Waffen-SS Fritz Kraemer, I SS 

Panzer Corps chief of staff, represents a minority 

judgment among the views of the German generals 

reporting after the war on their difficulties. It is accepted here because as an admission contrary to interest it seems to carry more weight than the generally unspecific assertions of other commanders. 

The gist of the opposing view was that the troops 

were not so thoroughly trained as they might have 

been. But this is a relative judgment and it is seldom 

clear what standards the commanders had in mind. 

For a discussion of certain deficiencies in training 

and equipment, see below, Ch. VII. 
148 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

enemy was hollow and he would be shown 

so in the later phases of OVERLORD. 

Rebuilding the Western Defenses

Rundstedt’s report of 25 October on 

the weakness of the western defenses was 

read by Hitler; his reply was the issuance 

on 3 November of Fuehrer Directive No. 

51, the second basic order dealing with the 

west.71 The order was, in fact, elicited not 

only by Rundstedt’s bill of particulars but 

by the military reverses that the German 

armies suffered in the east and south in 

the course of the year and the growing 

conviction that the Allies would soon 

seek a decision in the west. The bitter and 

costly fighting of the last two and half 

years against Bolshevism, Hitler wrote, 

had strained to the utmost German military capacities. That strain had to be 

borne, but now while the danger in the 

east remained it was outweighed by the 

threat from the west where enemy success 

would strike immediately at the heart of 

the German war economy. Therefore, 

there should be no more weakening of the 

west in favor of other theaters. Threatened portions of the coast line were to be 

strengthened by the maximum emplacement of coastal artillery, fixed antitank 

weapons, dug-in tanks, mines, and so on. 

At the same time, as security against the 

possibility of any enemy eruption through 

the coastal crust, the maximum mobile 

reserves should be created for rapid 

counterattack. 

The Army would submit a plan to 

equip every panzer and panzer grenadier 

division with ninety-three Mark IV tanks 

or assault guns and with strong antitank 

71 Translation reproduced below as Appendix D. 

defenses by the end of December 1943. 

Reserve panzer divisions should be fully 

equipped;72 antitank guns and machine 

guns were to be delivered in quantity to 

OB WEST units. It was forbidden to 

transfer armored units out of the west 

without Hitler’s specific approval. OB 

WEST would conduct exercises to plan 

the shift of partly mobile units from portions of the coast not threatened by attack. The Luftwaffe and Navy were ordered to strengthen their defenses. Hitler 

concluded with an exhortation to maximum effort in preparing for the expected 

“decisive struggle in the west.” 

The order against weakening the west 

could not, or at least would not, be strictly 

carried out. On 23 November OB WEST 

was directed to speed up the reorganization of the 60th Panzer Grenadier Division for immediate transfer to the east. On 

3 December, 10,000 men of the class of 

1925 were ordered pruned from divisions 

in the west to be replaced with men who 

had been previously deferred for occupational reasons. At about the same time 

the number of heavy weapons allotted to 

the west was reduced in favor of the east. 

During 1944 the troop transfers would 

continue.73 

These continued transfers, however, 

were in the course of the first half of 1944 

more than made up. The failure to adhere to the letter of Directive 51 revealed 

the continuing pressure of the war in the 

east, but more striking was the vigor and 

success with which the rebuilding of the 

west was undertaken despite that pressure. November 1943 thus marked an im72 See below, Ch. VII, for discussion of various 

types of German divisions. 

73 OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.IX.-31.XII.43, 23 Nov, 3

and 11 Dec 43. 

148 

enemy was hollow and he would be shown 

so in the la ter phases of OVERLORD. 

Rebuilding the Western Defenses 

Rundstedt's report of 25 October on 

the weakness of the western defenses was 

read by Hitler; his reply was the issuance 

on 3 November of Fuehrer Directive No. 

51, the second basic order dealing wi th the 

west.71 The order was, in fact, elicited not 

only by Rundstedt's bill of particulars but 

by the military reverses that the German 

armies suffered in the east and south in 

the course of the year and the growing 

conviction that the Allies would soon 

seek a decision in the west. The bitter and 

costly fighting of the last two and half 

years against Bolshevism, Hitler wrote, 

had strained to the utmost German military capacities. That strain had to be 

borne, but now while the danger in the 

east remained it was outweighed by the 

threat from the west where enemy success 

would strike immediately at the heart of 

the German war economy. Therefore, 

there should be no more weakening of the 

west in favor of other theaters. Threatened portions of the coast line were to be 

strengthened by the maximum emplacement of coastal artillery. fixed antitank 

weapons, dug-in tanks, mines. and so on. 

At the same time, as security against the 

possibility of any enemy eruption through 

the coastal crust, the maximum mobile 

reserves should be created for rapid 

counterattack. 

The Army would submit a plan to 

equip every panzer and panzer grenadier 

division with ninety-three Mark IV tanks 

or assault guns and with strong antitank 

71 Translation reproduced below as Appendix D. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

defenses by the end of December 1943. 

Reserve panzer divisions should be fully 

equipped;72 antitank guns and machine 

guns were to be delivered in quantity to 

OB WEST units. It was forbidden to 

transfer armored units out of tHe west 

without Hitler's specific approval. OB 

WEST would conduct exercises to plan 

the shift of partly mobile units from portions of the coast not threatened by attack. The Luftwaffe and Navy were ordered to strengthen their defenses. Hitler 

concluded with an exhortation to maximum effort in preparing for the expected 

"decisive struggle in the west." 

The order against weakening the west 

could not, or at least would not, be strictly 

carried out. On 23 November OB WEST 

was directed to speed up the reorganization of the 60th Panzer Grenadier Division for immediate transfer to the east. On 

3 December, 10,000 men of the class of 

1925 were ordered pruned from divisions 

in the west to be replaced with men who 

had been previously deferred for occupational reasons. At about the same time 

the number of heavy weapons allotted to 

the west was reduced in favor of the east. 

During 1944 the troop transfers would 

continue.73 

These continued transfers, however, 

were in the course of the first half of 1944 

more than made up. The failure to adhere to the letter of Directive 51 revealed 

the continuing pressure of the war in the 

east, but more striking was the vigor and 

success with which the rebuilding of the 

west was undertaken despite that pressure. November 1943 thus marked an im72 See below, Ch. VII, for discussion of various 

types of German divisions. 

730KW/WFSt, KTB 1.IX.-31.XII.43, 23 Nov, 3 

and 11 Dec 43. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 149 

portant new beginning in German defense preparations in the west. The new 

beginning was signalized in the same 

month by the introduction of Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel, the famed 

desert tactician, into the western scene. 

The circumstances of Rommel’s selection are somewhat confused. Since the 

summer of 1943 Rommel had been in 

northern Italy at the head of Army Group 

B-the force that moved in when it became clear that the Mussolini partnership 

was on the point of collapse. Meanwhile, 

operations in Sicily and against the Allied 

landings in the south were directed by 

Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring 

(OB SUED). At Hitler’s wish, plans had 

been worked out and orders issued as 

early as August 1943 for the eventual assumption of command by Rommel over 

all German forces in Italy. The intention 

of making Rommel the theater commander in Italy was adhered to until the 

latter part of October, when, for reasons 

unknown, Hitler changed his mind and 

on the 25th appointed Kesselring instead.74 This choice in effect left Rommel 

and his staff surplus at a time when Hitler 

and OKW were seeking new means to 

strengthen the west against Allied invasion threats. Hitler himself had long been 

convinced of the desirability of having a 

high command in reserve and he seized 

this opportunity. 75 Three days after Kesselring’s appointment OKW had entered 

74 With the new title of OB SUEDWEST and 

Commander, Army Group C. Details of the changes 

in German command in Italy will be found in H. M. 

Smyth, The Sicilian Campaign and the Surrender 

of Italy, a volume now under preparation in this 

series. 

75 MS # C069a (Blumentritt); MS # CO69c 

(Buttlar-Brandenfels); and MS # C-069d (Zimmermann) . 

formal proposals for the constitution of a 

reserve army group headquarters under 

Rommel earmarked for commitment 

wherever the main Allied invasion should 

come. The new headquarters was formed 

from the staff of Army Group B less various special staff officers and about half of 

the enlisted personnel. The reduced headquarters thus formed was redesignated 

Army Group for Special Employment, 

subordinated directly to OKW and transferred temporarily to Munich pending 

the commencement of its new duties.76 

These were outlined in orders of 6 November. In preparation for his ultimate 

combat task Rommel was ordered to make 

tours of inspection of the coastal defenses 

of the west. He was to inspect first the defenses of Denmark and then those of 

Artois (roughly the Kanalkueste); thereafter he would on order examine the defense preparations in the Cotentin, the 

Netherlands, and Brittany. In each case 

he was directed to prepare operational 

studies for the employment of forces in 

defense and counterattack. He would examine the mobility, concentration, and 

combat readiness of all troops, but especially of the reserves. He would determine 

what units might be drawn from unthreatened portions of the coast, from reserve or school troops, and from home 

units to build a counterattacking force. 

He would make recommendations on the 

employment of armor in the operational 

zones.77

76OKW/WFSt, KTB l.IX.31.XII.43, 17 Oct 43 

et seq. Rommel actually turned over comand in 

Italy on 21 November. See Karteiblatt, Heeresgruppe 

B. OKH/Org. Abt. 

77 Rad, Hitler to OKH, Gen.St.d.H., 6 Nov 43. 

OKH/Org.Abt., Bd. Chefsache 7.V.43-4.11.44; cf. 

OKW/ WFSt, KTB l.IX.-31.X11.43, 28 Oct and 6 

Nov 43. 

THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 149 

portant new beginning in German defense preparations in the west. The new 

beginning was signalized in the same 

month by the introduction of Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel, the famed 

desert tactician, into the western scene. 

The circumstances of Rommel's selection are somewhat confused. Since the 

summer of 1943 Rommel had been in 

northern Italy at the head of Army Group 

B-the force that moved in when it became clear that the Mussolini partnership 

was on the point of collapse. Meanwhile, 

operations in Sicily and against the Allied 

landings in the south were directed by 

Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring 

(OB SUED). At Hitler's wish, plans had 

been worked out and orders issued as 

early as August 1943 for the eventual assumption of command by Rommel over 

all German forces in Italy. The intention 

of making Rommel the theater commander in Italy was adhered to until the 

latter part of October, when, for reasons 

unknown, Hitler changed his mind and 

on the 25th appointed Kesselring instead. 74 This choice in effect left Rommel 

and his staff surplus at a time when Hitler 

and OK\\! were seeking new means to 

strengthen the west against Allied invasion threats. Hitler himself had long been 

convinced of the desirability of having a 

high command in reserve and he seized 

this opp01:tunity.75 Three days after Kesselring's appointment OKW had entered 

74 With the new title of OB SUEDWEST and 

Commander, Army Group C. Details of the changes 

in German command in Italy will be found in H. M. 

Smyth, The Sicilian Campaign and the Surrender 

of Italy, a volume now under preparation in this 

series. 

75 MS # G-069a (Blumentritt); MS # G-069c 

(Buttlar·Brandenfels); and MS # C-069d (Zimmermann). 

formal proposals for the constitution of a 

reserve army group headquarters under 

Rommel earmarked for commitment 

wherever the main Allied invasion should 

come. The new headquarters was formed 

from the staff of A rmy Group B less various special staff officers and about half of 

the enlisted personnel. The reduced headquarters thus formed was redesignated 

A rmy Group for Special Employment, 

subordinated directly to OKW and transferred temporarily to Munich pending 

the commencement of its new duties.76 

These were outlined in orders of 6 November. In preparation for his ultimate 

combat task Rommel was ordered to make 

tours of inspection of the coastal defenses 

of the west. He was to inspect first the defenses of Denmark and then those of 

Artois (roughly the Kanalkueste); thereafter he would on order examine the defense preparations in the Cotentin, the 

Netherlands, and Brittany. In each case 

he was directed to prepare operational 

studies for the employment of forces in 

defense and counterattack. He would examine the mobility, concentration, and 

combat readiness of all troops, but especially of the reserves. He would determine 

what units might be drawn from unthreatened portions of the coast, from reserve or school troops, and from home 

units to build a counterattacking force. 

He would make recommendations on the 

employment of armor in the operational 

zones.77 

760KW/WFSt, KTB l.lX.-31.XIl.43, 17 Oct 4~ 

et seq. Rommel actually turned over comand in 

Italy on 21 November. See Karteiblatt, Heeresgruppe 

B. OKH/Org. Abt. 

77 Rad, Hitler to OKH, Gen.St.d.H., 6 Nov 43. 

OKH/Org.Abt., Bd. Chefsache 7.V.43-4.Il.44; cf. 

OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.IX.-31.Xll.43, 28 Oct and 6 

Nov 43. 
150 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

FIELD MARSHAL ROMMEL (left) inspecting coastal defenses. 

Hitler seems to have had a number of 

reasons for assigning this mission to the 

Rommel staff. He saw it as a means of securing effective personal control of the 

all-important battle with the main forces 

of the Western Allies, and probably was 

responsible for the suggestion that the 

Rommel staff be committed directly 

under OKvV, bypassing the theater command. 78 Although OK W successfully 

argued that the proposal was not feasible 

in view of the smallness of Rommel's staff 

and the rank and importance of the theater commanders involved, the later his78 OKW /WFSt, KTB l.lX.-31 .XIl.43 , 28 Oct 43. 

tory of the Rommel command in France 

suggests that the idea was only scotched, 

not killed. When Rundstedt was informed 

of the new command, 0 K W was careful 

to point out that it was not intended in 

any way as an abridgment of Rundstedt's 

authority. On the other hand, it was a 

recognition of the increasing burden of 

operational, training, and administrative 

responsibilities that were heaped on OB 

WEST in its multiple role as a defense 

command, an occupying force, a training 

command, and the base for the V-weapon 

war on England. The particular selection 

of Rommel undoubtedly had an additional morale motive. For the long-neg-
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 151 

lee ted west garrison troops the appointment of a commander with Rommel's 

reputation in combat was a stimulant and 

a dramatization of the new importance 

assigned to the west. Finally, the reserve 

command, considered in context with Directive 51, expressed a shift in Hitler's 

tactical thinking away from exclusive dependence on an impregnable wall defense 

toward the traditional German reliance 

on mobile operations.79 Just how far 

Hitler intended to depart from his earlier 

insistence on a pure fortress defense, in 

which each inch of occupied ground was 

to be held to the last man and the last bullet, is not clear. It is clear and of considerable importance that this directive tended 

in that direction and that it was so interpreted by Rundstedt. Rundstedt was 

thereby encouraged to re-examine ways 

and means of shaking his army loose 

from the concrete of the Atlantic Wall, 

and the question of how the battle for 

France was to be fought was posed again 

with a new urgency. 

German defense preparations in the 

west and the German conduct of operations in France can be understood only 

against the background of disagreement 

over tactics among the various commanders involved. In terms of abstract doctrine 

the disagreement was basic and clear-cut: 

it opposed the notion of linear defense to 

defense in depth, static warfare to mobile 

operations, the holding of ground to 

battles of annihilation, the primary dependence on concrete fortifications to the 

primary dependence on armored striking 

power. In practice, however, disagreements were blurred without being reconciled by the fact that few commanders be79 MS # B-672 (Buttlar-Brandenfels). 

lieved in simple dependence on either alternative and that, since doctrine was at 

the mercy of limited means, it tended to 

shift in response to the expected availability of resources. It is extremely difficult therefore to line up the commanders 

on either side of the argument. But, although the line was neither clear nor 

fixed, it was nonetheless real and significant. Since Hitler and Rundstedt at the 

top of the hierarchy never arrived at 

clear-cut decisions themselves as to the 

basic tactics, shifting and relatively minor 

differences of emphasis in the lower command resulted in confusion and unworkable compromises particularly in the disposition and training of troops. The discussion of the varying points of view that 

follows can do no more than suggest the 

bases of that confusion without attempting to describe in full the stand of anyone 

commander. 

The problem of the defense of the west 

was immensely complex and perhaps insoluble. Hitler, at least after the possibility of defeating Russia had faded in 

1943, looked forward to the forthcoming 

struggle in the west as his last chance to 

gain a decisive victory. On the other hand, 

his obsession with political prestige and 

his consequent reluctance to surrender 

ground voluntarily in order to gain strategic or tactical advantage committed him 

to a policy of rigid terrain defense not 

only in France but throughout the occupied territories. This basic conflict over 

the purpose of defense, whether it was to 

hold ground in perpetuum or gain military advantage for victory at arms was 

never decided. Plans were made, for instance, to evacuate Norway and Denmark 

in case of an invasion of France. OK\V 

recommended in late 1943 that the troops 
152 

in Italy be withdrawn to the north to save 

divisions for the main battles to be fought 

in Russia and France. 8o Hitler himself, as 

already noted, talked in his Directive 51 

of the ruthless evacuation of coastal areas 

not under threat of attack to feed the 

main battle area when the time came. But 

when the time did come the evacuation 

was not carried out, probably both because Hitler no longer believed it possible 

and because he could not reconcile himself to the surrender of any portion of his 

conquests. The policy of rigid defense, 

meant, in the first instance, an impossible 

policy of defense for its own sake. 

A certain rigidity of defense in the west, 

however, was required by purely military 

considerations. It was essential to hold the 

Allies at arm's length from the critical industrial areas of Germany, and it was 

highly desirable to take advantage of the 

strong position afforded by the sea barrier. These military arguments in favor 

of a stand at the coast line, however, were 

subject to interpretation, and the rigidity 

they seemed to dictate was only relative. 

The decision to build an Atlantic Wall 

was the initial admission that the elastic 

defense principles applied so successfully 

by the Russians in their vast territories 

could not be adopted in the west and that 

basically the German armies in the west 

must stand on a line. There was never any 

debate over the need for making this line 

as strong as possible through the construction of a system of permanent and field 

fortifications. The debate concerned only 

how the line was to be held: what de8°OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.IX.-31.XII.43, 4 Oct 43. 

This reversed the opinion of a month earlier that, 

even if the line in Italy were shortened, the troops 

thereby relieved would have to be used in the Balkans. Ibid., 8 Sep 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

pendence was to be placed on stopping 

the enemy at the line itself, and where reserves should be located and how employed. 

Hitler believed in 1942 and probably 

again in 1944 81 that the line could be 

made so strong that the enemy landing attempt could be smashed at the water's 

edge within the first twenty-four hours. 

Rundstedt concurred that this was the 

ideal. He pointed out that the experiences 

of Dieppe and Sicily both confirmed that 

the enemy's weakest moment was at the 

time of landing. While still afloat he 

would be without cover and have reduced 

fire power. 82 Later reports on the Salerno 

landings led to the same conclusion 

through the observation that any other defensive course was foredoomed to failure. 

Generalmajor Viktor Marnitz reported 

that at Salerno the German reserves, although located near the coast (from three 

to five kilometers inland), had been unable to counterattack across the open terrain under heavy Allied naval artillery 

fire. 83 Allied air attacks contributed to the 

difficulties of forming counterattacks. 

Strong points along the coast had held 

out well but for the most part the Allies 

had avoided them, landing between them 

and infiltrating inland to seize transportation junctions. Allied troops had not been 

81 He did not long hold to the principles of counterattack outlined in Directive 51. See MS # B-672 

(Buttlar-Brandenfels) and below, eh. VII. 

82 Grundlegende Bemerkungen des Oberbefehlshabers West Nr. 27, Auswertung weiterer Erfahrungen, 24 Jul 43, and Nr. 28 Erfahrungen und 

Folgerungen aus den Landungskaempfen uon Salerno, 

25 Dec 43. OKW/WFSt, op. (H), Westen, Grundlegende Bemerkungen 4.V.42-27.XII.43. 

83 Rpt, Auszug aus Bericht Generalmajor u. Marnitz, appended to Grundlegende Bemerkungen des 

Oberbefehlshabers West Nr. 28, cited n. 82. Marnitz 

was director of fortress engineer courses at Engineer 

School I. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 153 

held up by any kind of natural obstacles; 

on the contrary they had seemed able to 

take advantage of all kinds of unfavorable 

terrain. General Marnitz's recommendations were to smash the Allied attack before landing by holding the reserves close 

up and withholding coastal artillery fire 

to the last moment. If some troops got 

ashore they would be forced to spread out 

by stubborn resistance in a number of 

small resistance nests. Any of the enemy 

forces that pierced the coastal defenses 

should be counterattacked by local reserves after they were beyond the range of 

naval guns. 

Rundstedt in forwarding this report 

concurred in its contents, but in a later 

communication he made one significant 

addition. Smash the enemy in his boats, 

if possible. If he lands, counterattack immediately with local reserves. But if) despite everything) he still succeeds in getting through the first line of defense, then 

hold him by fire from positions echeloned 

in depth long enough to permit counterattack by corps and army reserves. Counterattack by purely local reserves could 

be considered part of the concept of static 

defense. Riposte by corps and army reserves introduced the concept of flexible, 

mobile war, particularly when limited 

means made it impossible to achieve both 

an optimum strength on the first line and 

an adequate pool of reserves. 

General der Panzertruppen Leo Freiherr Geyr von Schweppenburg, the armored expert in the west, wanted to push 

the mobile tactics thus adumbrated to the 

point of falling back entirely from the 

coast with all mobile units, leaving only 

the static defenses to stave off the enemy 

as long as possible and inflict maximum 

losses, He wanted to seek a decision in the 

interior with a massed armored counterattack. The Luftwaffe, he felt, should not 

be committed in the battle for the 

beaches but saved to cover the counterattack. 84 Sodenstern agreed, with an interesting variation which he described in reflections jotted down in the summer of 

1943.85 The relative weakness of German 

forces, he felt, required that they defend 

the coast only long enough to determine 

the center of gravity of the enemy attack. 

Strategic reserves should be assembled on 

both sides of the Seine northwest of Paris 

and on the upper Loire. The area between the Seine and Loire would be the 

battlefield. Since Allied air superiority 

would make extensive German troop 

movements impossible, the Allies should 

be compelled to maneuver into the area 

chosen for the battle by means of switch 

lines contrived to canalize the Allied attack. 

The notion of gambling everything on 

fully mobile defense with massed counterattacks mounted inland was never seriously entertained. Rundstedt seems generally to have conceived of the main battle 

as taking place in the coastal area. He 

vacillated chiefly in the reliance which he 

wanted to put on mobile counterattack 

within that area. To make such an attack 

possible, German forces, of course, had to 

be able to maneuver freely. Salerno and 

Sicily had shown that armor could not 

fight successfully within the range of naval 

artillery. Rundstedt pointed out to OKW 

that armor therefore could not influence 

the battle unless German aircraft, especially torpedo planes, could interfere with 

84 MS # B-466 (Geyr von Schweppenburg). Cf. 

below, Ch, X, 

85 MS # B-276 (Sodenstem). 
154 

the firing of Allied warships.86 In addition, German mobility obviously depended on the quality and quantity of 

equipment and personnel. In his October 

report, Rundstedt admitted that the German divisions in the west had neither the 

men nor the machines to fight in open 

terrain against an enemy so materially 

strong as the Allies were sure to be. The 

conclusion was thus forced that the only 

hope of redressing Allied superiority lay 

in taking the maximum advantage of the 

water barrier. That was how the situation 

looked in October. After the Hitler directive in the next month, Rundstedt 

modified his view. If the promise to 

strengthen the west meant the provision 

of new troops and more mobile divisions, 

it might be possible to return to the idea 

of mass counterattack. He therefore proposed the formation, partly on paper, 

partly on the ground, of a central reserve. 

Specifically he suggested earmarking six 

infantry divisions to be withdrawn after 

the Allied landings from coastal zones not 

threatened by attack. Made mobile by vehicles contributed by each of the armies, 

these divisions would be organized under 

two corps controlled by an army headquarters. Existing panzer and panzer 

grenadier reserves would be commanded 

by a reserve panzer corps and the entire 

force put under the special army group 

headquarters that was being formed 

under Rommel. 87 

"eLtr, OB WEST (Ia Nr. 696/43) to OKW/WFSt, 

26 Nov 43. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 

2.III.43-1.VIII.44. 

87 Rad. OB WEST to OKW /WFSt, 14 Nov. 43. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 2.III.43-

Z,VIII.44. At the time Rundstedt made this proposal 

he was not sure of getting the reserve army group 

headquarters. If he did not, he expected to employ 

simply an army command. See Order, OB WEST Lo 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

There is no question that the Rundstedt plan considerably extended the ideas 

underlying Directive 51. OKW at once 

objected to the proposal to withdraw entire divisions from the unthreatened portions of the coast and suggested instead 

that only regimental Kampfgruppen be 

pulled out in order not to denude any 

section of its defenses.88 More basic objections were raised by Generaloberst 

Hans von Salmuth, who as commander 

of the Fifteenth A rmy defending the coast 

which the Germans thought most likely to 

be the scene of the major Allied invasion 

attempt occupied a key position in the 

command hierarchy. Salmuth criticized 

Rundstedt's suggestion as contravening 

all the hitherto accepted principles of defense in the west. It assumed, he said, that 

the Allies would break through the cordon defense and would succeed in establishing a bridgehead. If that happened, he 

believed the Allies pouring ashore unhindered would soon establish a superiority of force that would be tantamount to 

victory. The central reserves would take 

too long to assemble; it would be delayed 

and partially destroyed by Allied air attack. It was probable therefore that it 

could never be committed in mass and 

that late and piecemeal commitment 

would be ineffective. All reserves, Salmuth believed, should be held as close as 

possible to the coast and should be under 

army control. 89 The main objection to Salmuth's argument, as Rundstedt pointed 

army commanders, Vorbereitung fuer den Kampf, 18 

Nov 43. OKH/Org.Abt., Bd. Chefsachen 7.V.43-

4.II.44. In place of the reserve panzer corps a special 

armored staff was later created. See below, Ch. VII. 

88 OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.IX.-31.XII.43, 15 Nov 43. 

89 Ltr, Salmuth to OB WEST with personal covering letter to Rundstedt, 25 Dec 43. Fifteenth Army, 

KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 26.X.-27.XII,43. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 155 

out in reply, was that it relied too much 

on a correct guess as to where the Allies 

would strike. For Salmuth this was not a 

very grave objection since he was convinced that the Allies would make their 

main attack in his sector. Rundstedt 

agreed that the likelihood existed, but 

pointed out that it was by no means a certainty.90 

To Salmuth's argument that the central reserves could not be assembled and 

committed fast enough to be of use in a 

decisive mass counterattack, Rundstedt 

made no reply. His continued advocacy of 

such a reserve implied a belief that if victory was to be won the difficulties had to 

be overcome, though precisely how was 

never quite clear. Rundstedt's conviction, 

shared by most of the commanders in the 

west, was that no matter how strong the 

Atlantic Wall was made it could be 

broken. The only relevant questions were 

what dependence to put on the wall and 

how to divide the available forces between 

local and central reserves. The Nineteenth Army commander, Sodenstern, 

argued that the impossibility of establishing an unbreakable cordon defense vitiated the whole concept of the Atlantic 

Wall since a break-through anywhere 

would make all the fortifications useless.91 

Rundstedt maintained that a rigid defense in a series of strong points held to 

the last could so splinter and weaken the 

enemy that his penetratio(Is could easily 

be cleaned up and the whole invasion attempt thus be defeated before the enemy's 

superior material force could be concentrated and gain momentum. As far as the 

troops defending the coastal strong points 

90 Ltr. Rundstedt to Salmuth. 27 Dec 43. Fifteenth 

Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 26.X.-27.XII.43. 

91 MS # B-276 (Sodenstern). 

were concerned, there should be no withdrawal. Each strong point should be 

fought separately. But this kind of resistance would only soften up the enemy for 

the decisive counterattacks. To be decisive they must be mounted in force. "No 

dispersion," said Rundstedt, "no piecemeal commitment and no thin water 

soup!" Divisions should be committed intact to hi t the flanks of the enemy penetrations. 92 

General der Artillerie Erich Marcks, 

commander of LXXXIV Corps in Normandy, was persuaded by the weakness of 

his forces to embrace the same tactics. He 

told an inspecting officer from OKW in 

January 1944 that even a doubling of his 

present troop strength would make possible only a thin screen at the coast which 

could still be torn at any point by the 

enemy. Instead of a wall defense, he therefore proposed the construction of numerous small field fortifications with some 

depth whose mission was not to stop the 

enemy but to split the attacking forces 

and gain time for the bringing up of German reserves. He felt that a corps reserve 

of armor and mobile infantry could be 

built up behind the coast but near enough 

to be committed within twenty-four 

hours.93 

OKW generally remained skeptical 

whether, in view of Allied superiority in 

the air and the limited mobility of German units, large-scale counterattacks 

could be mounted. But, on the whole, 

Jodi and his staff concurred that depth of 

defense was desirable. In response to re92 Grundlegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers 

West Nr. 20, Grundsaetze fuer die Fuehrung der 

Kuestenverteidigung, 18 Dec 42. OKW /WFSt, Op. 

(H), Westen, Grundlegende Befehle 22.X.42-7.V.44. 

93 MS # B-672 (Buttlar-Brandenfels). 
156 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

peated pleas by Rundstedt in the summer 

of 1943 OKW authorized the construction, if practicable, of a secondary position still within the coastal zone.94 In June 

1943 the Commander in Chief West ordered local commanders to reconnoiter 

rear areas for suitable locations for heavy 

weapons in accordance with their own estimate of the situation and enemy intentions. He also suggested that prepared 

positions for antitank guns and machine 

guns would be of considerable importance in delaying the enemy troops that 

might break through the first line of defense. At the moment there was little possibility of actually starting construction.95 

Nothing was started until the end of October, when Rundstedt ordered further 

reconnaissance by corps and armies and 

the beginning of field construction. The 

secondary position was to be built with 

maximum flexibility to include prepared 

switch lines and to take in already established airfields, ammunition dumps, and 

shelters for reserves and staffs. Antiaircraft guns would be emplaced for ground 

firing and all-around defense. Some 31,- 

000 French laborers were initially used 

on the job. 

At the end of 1943 the discussion of defense tactics had produced no unequivocal decision. Rundstedt’s own orders with 

their dual emphasis on holding coastal 

positions to the last and at the same time 

building mobile reserves, while in one 

sense perfectly consistent, were neverthe94 Ltrs, OB WEST to OKW/ WFSt, 2 Apr 43 and 

27 Jun 43. OKH/Op.Abt., Kuestenschutz Kanalkueste 20.VI.42-18.V.44; OKW/WFSt, KTB l.VII.- 

31.VIII.43, 11 Jul 43. 

95 Grundlegende Bemerkungen des OberbefehlsIralw,-s West Nr. 26, 6 Jun 43. OKW/ WFSt, Op. (H), 

Westen, Grundlegende Bemerkungen 4.V.42-27.XII.- 

43. 

less subject to interpretation as supporting either primarily static or primarily 

mobile defense.96 Since the practical problem was the allocation of limited time and 

resources, insufficient for the full development of both fortifications and troop 

build-up and training, Rundstedt’s pronouncements actually straddled the issue. 

In the closing months of the year the 

doctrine of decision by counterattack in 

force, though qualified and not unchallenged, seemed to have achieved general 

acceptance in OB WEST and the apparent endorsement of OKW and Hitler. The 

outline of the battle as sketched by the 

chief of staff of OB WEST, General Blumentritt, envisaged the fighting in four 

main stages: first, the fire fight while the 

Allies were still on the water; second, the 

struggle on the beaches; third, the battles 

in the coastal zone between German local 

reserves and Allied units that had penetrated the main line of resistance; and, 

finally, the decisive beachhead battle in 

which OB WEST would commit large 

motorized units to throw the Allies back 

into the sea.97 

In accord with this outline, Rundstedt 

ordered a winter construction program to 

step up work on the fortifications with 

special attention to casemating coastal artillery and antitank guns; at the same 

time, as already noted, he began planning 

for the formation of the central reserve. 

But the latter plans would go awry chiefly 

96 Rundstedt could thus find himself in nearly perfect agreement with both Salmuth and Geyr, whose 

respective tactical concepts were wholly opposed. See 

MS # B-466 (Geyr von Schweppenburg); cf. MS 

# B-720 (Generalleutnant Dr. Hans Speidel, CofS, 

Army Group B) 

97 Ltr, CofS, OB WEST, to subordinate armies, 

10 Jan 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 

2.111.43-l .VII1.44. 

156 

pea ted pleas by Rundstedt in the summer 

of 1943 OKW authorized the construction, if practicable, of a secondary position still within the coastal zone. 94 In June 

1943 the Commander in Chief West ordered local commanders to reconnoiter 

rear areas for suitable locations for heavy 

weapons in accordance with their own estimate of the situation and enemy intentions. He also suggested that prepared 

positions for antitank guns and machine 

guns would be of considerable importance in delaying the enemy troops that 

might break through the first line of defense. At the moment there was little possibility of actually starting construction.95 

Nothing was started un til the end of October, when Rundstedt ordered further 

reconnaissance by corps and armies and 

the beginning of field construction. The 

secondary position was to be built with 

maximum flexibility to include prepared 

switch lines and to take in already established airfields, ammunition dumps, and 

shelters for reserves and staffs. Antiaircraft guns would be emplaced for ground 

firing and all-around defense. Some 31,-

000 French laborers were initially used 

on the job. 

At the end of 1943 the discussion of defense tactics had produced no unequivocal decision. Rundstedt's own orders with 

their dual emphasis on holding coastal 

positions to the last and at the same time 

building mobile reserves, while in one 

sense perfectly consistent, were neverthe04 Ltrs, OB WEST to OKW /WFSt, 2 Apr 43 and 

27 Jun 43. OKH/Op.Abt., Kuestenschutz Kanalkueste 20.Vl.42-IS.V.44; OKW/WFSt, KTB 1.Vll.-

3IYIII.43, II Jul 43. 

or, Gnmdlegende Bemerkungen des Oberbefehlsl!alias West Nr. 26, 6 Jun 43. OKW /WFSt, Op. (H), 

Westen, Grundlegende Bemerkungen 4.v.42-27.XIl.-

43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

less subject to interpretation as supporting either primarily static or primarily 

mobile defense.96 Since the practical problem was the allocation of limited time and 

resources, insufficient for the full development of both fortifications and troop 

build-up and training, Rundstedt's pronouncements actually straddled the issue. 

In the closing months of the year the 

doctrine of decision by counterattack in 

force, though qualified and not unchallenged, seemed to have achieved general 

acceptance in DB WEST and the apparen t endorsement of 0 K Wand Hitler. The 

outline of the battle as sketched by the 

chief of staff of DB WEST, General Blumentritt, envisaged the fighting in four 

main stages: first, the fire fight while the 

Allies were still on the water; second, the 

struggle on the beaches; third, the battles 

in the coastal zone between German local 

reserves and Allied units that had penetrated the main line of resistance; and, 

finally, the decisive beachhead battle in 

which DB WEST would commit large 

motorized units to throw the Allies back 

in to the sea. 97 

In accord with this outline, Rundstedt 

ordered a winter construction program to 

step up work on the fortifications with 

special attention to case mating coastal artillery and antitank guns; at the same 

time, as already noted, he began planning 

for the formation of the central reserve. 

But the latter plans would go awry chiefly 

96 Rundstedt could thus find himself in nearly perfect agreement with both Salmuth and Geyr, whose 

respective tactical concepts were wholly opposed. See 

MS # B-466 (Geyr von Schweppenburg); d. MS 

# B-720 (Generalleutnant Dr. Hans Speidel, CofS, 

A rmy Group B) . 

97 Ltr, CofS, OB WEST, to subordinate armies, 

10 Jan 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 

2.1II.43-1.vlII.44. 
THE GERMAN ARMY IN FRANCE, 1940-1943 157 

because the man slated to command the 

reserves and conduct the battle against 

the invaders was to be Field Marshal 

Rommel. There was scarcely a general in 

the German Army less in sympathy with 

the grandiose scheme of massed counterattacks under the bomb sights of virtually 

unopposed Allied air fleets. Thus at the 

moment when the concept of mobile defense in the west seemed to enjoy highest 

favor, it was in reality on the point of most 

complete repudiation by a commander 

convinced that it was a dangerous 

fantasy.98 

98 See below, Ch. VII. 
CHAPTER V 

Overlord Revised 

U.S. Organization and Training 

for the Assault, January 1944 

General Eisenhower arrived in London 

on 14 January 1944 to take up his new 

duties as Supreme Commander, Allied 

Expeditionary Force. With his arrival, the 

whole character and tempo of planning 

and preparing for OVERLORD changed. 

Gone was the basic uncertainty-the sense 

of planning for a more or less probable 

contingency in a more or less indefinite 

future. OVERLORD was now a definite commitment. A commander at last was 

charged with responsibility for its success 

and authority to make his arrangements 

to insure that Sllccess. The twenty weeks 

that remained before the troops were 

loaded in ships for the fateful thrust 

across the Channel were weeks of decision 

when the plans, studies, suggestions, and 

acquired experience of the past three 

years were transformed into the working 

blueprints of action. 

It was a task of complexity and disturbing size which at times made commanders 

despair that it could be accomplished in 

time. But for the most part the groundwork had been solidly laid. By January 

there could be no concern over the availability of troops to do the job. Already 

about half of the required U.S. combat 

divisions were in the United Kingdom 

and the arrival in time of the remainder 

was assured. The flow of combat divisions, 

which had been delayed to permit an intensive build-up of the air forces and service troops, began in the fall of 1943 and 

continued from then until D Day at the 

average rate of about two divisions a 

month.l 

U.S. corps and army headquarters for 

the control of the initial phases of the invasion were already established in the 

United Kingdom and the chain of command was settled. On 23 October 1943, 

First U.S. Army under Lt. Gen. Omar N. 

Bradley took over operational command 

of American ground forces in the United 

Kingdom.2 At the same time VII Corps, 

which arrived during the month, was assigned to First Army. Over-all ground 

command for the assault phase had been 

given to 21 Army Group. Early in January General Paget was replaced as commanding general by Gen. Sir Bernard L. 

Montgomery.3 General Montgomery ar1 As of I January there were 749,298 U.S. troops 

in the United Kingdom induding most of eleven 

divisions. The divisions, in order of arrival, were: 

29th, 5th, IOlst Airborne, 3d Armored, 28th, 2d, 1st, 

2d Armored, 9th, 82d Airborne, and 8th. The 1st, 2d 

Armored, 9th, and 82d Airborne Divisions had been 

in combat in the Mediterranean. 

2 [Robert W. Coakley] Organization and Com· 

mand in the ETO (The Administrative and Lo· 

gistical History of the ETO: Part II) , MS, I, 276-77. 

Hist Div files. 

3 General Montgomery came to this post with a 

brilliant record that dated back to World War I, in 

which he had been awarded the DSO and been mentioned six times in dispatches. At the beginning of 

World War II he commanded the 3d Division in 

France and, after escaping from Dunkerque, took 

over the 5 Corps. In 1942 and 1943 as commanding 

general of the British Eighth Army in Africa, Egypt, 

Sicily, and Italy, he achieved renown as the man who 

mastered Rommel. 
GENERAL EISENHOWER, Supreme Allied Commander. 
160 

rived in England on 2 January 1944. He 

had stopped off at Algiers to receive General Eisenhower's instructions and then at 

Marrakesh to see the Prime Minister, who 

was convalescing there from an attack of 

influenza. His chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Sir 

Francis de Guingand, went ahead and on 

his arrival at once tackled the problem of 

reorganizing the army group staff and replacing most of its key personnel with officers from the British Eighth Army. In addition he undertook to establish parallel 

U.S. staffs to convert the British army 

group into a temporary combined headquarters which would function as such as 

long as U.S. troops were under its command.4 

U. S. naval organization had also become pretty well set by the first of the year, 

after passing through many complicated 

command patterns from the time the first 

U.S. naval officers arrived in England as 

observers in 1940.5 The end product-the 

command for combat-reflected some of 

these past complications. In January Admiral Harold R. Stark was still the senior 

U.S. naval commander in Europe, with 

the title of Commander of Naval Forces 

in Europe (ComNavEu). Until the fall of 

1943 he exercised administrative command over various task forces sent by the 

Commander in Chief of the U.S. Fleet to 

operate in European waters. In addition, 

he commanded certain naval administrative units in the United Kingdom. On 9 

September 1943 Admiral King ordered 

consolidation of all U.S. naval forces in 

Europe under a new command, the 

Twelfth Fleet, to be headed by Admiral 

4Interv with de Guingand, 1947. Hist Div files. 

5 Material on naval organization is found in Ad· 

ministrative History of U.S. Naval Forces in Europe, 

1940-1946, MS, pp. 237-47. Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Stark. But, although this simplified the 

appearance of the command, the fact remained complicated. At the same time, 

Admiral King directed that a task force 

be formed to control operations and training for the cross-Channel assault. This became Task Force 122 under command of 

Rear Adm. Alan G. Kirk.6 Operational 

and administrative command thus remained divided. Two other important 

subordinate commands were formed 

under Twelfth Fleet: the Eleventh Amphibious Force under Rear Adm. John 

L. Hall, and Landing Craft and Bases, 

Europe, which was created in the summer 

of 1943 to receive and control the buildup of landing craft for the invasion. The 

commander was Rear Adm. John Wilkes.7 

Admiral Stark, as ComNavEu, was responsible for co-ordinating with ETOUSA and COSSAC all U.S. naval preparations for the invasion; as commander of 

Twelfth Fleet he was the administrative 

chief responsible for providing the task 

forces under him with facilities for training and operations. Admiral Kirk's Task 

Force 122 controlled the training, preparation, and operations of all U.S. naval 

forces. Under him, Admiral Hall's 

Eleventh Amphibious Force commanded 

U.S. amphibious forces afloat. Command 

of bases and responsibility for support and 

maintenance of forces afloat rested with 

Admiral Wilkes. 

The Allied naval command had been 

established for planning purposes on 5 

May 1943. On 25 October Admiral Little 

was replaced as Commander-in-Chief A1-

6 Admiral Kirk had been commander of Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet. 

7 Hall was former commander of the Eighth Amphibious Force in the Mediterranean. Wilkes from 

December 1942 to August 1943 had commanded the 

U.S. cruiser Birmingham. 
INVASION TRAINING IN ENGLAND. AmphibIOus exercise off beach (above), 

and troops coming ashore from a beached LeI (L) (below). 
162 

lied Naval Expeditionary Force (AN CXF) 

by Admiral Sir Bertram H. Ramsay.8 It 

was not until I April, however, that Admiral Ramsay assumed operational control of U.S. naval forces and even then his 

command remained formal until the eve 

of the invasion. 9 The principal duty of 

ANCXF in January was still the preparation of an Allied naval plan. 

Air force organization was settled in 

January except for the control of strategic 

air. Air Marshal Leigh-Mallory's AEAF 

headq uarters, in addition to directing 

preliminary opera tions against the enemy, 

was working on an over-all air plan for 

the assault. 

The training of troops for the assault 

was never a primary responsibility of the 

theater. It was assumed that divisions 

would arrive in the United Kingdom 

fully schooled in their tasks. The crossChannel attack, however, posed many 

special technical problems for which solutions could not be worked out at a distance. The British had been experimenting with assault tactics and equipment 

since 1940 through the Combined Operations Headquarters. After April 1942 

American officers shared in this work and 

an attempt was made to work out a com8 Ltr, H. N. Morrison to Admiral Ramsay, 4 Nov 

43. SHAEF SGS file 322 (ANCXF). Admiral Ramsay 

had retired in 1938 after forty-two years in the Royal 

Navy, the last three of which he had served as Chief 

of Staff, Horne Fleet. At the outbreak of World War 

II'in 1939 he was recalled to active duty as Flag 

Officer Commanding, Dover. While serving in this 

post he organized the naval forces for the withdrawal 

from Dunkerque. Later he helped plan the TORCH 

operation, commanded a task force in the Sicilian 

invasion, and became British naval commander in 

the Mediterranean. 

9 Ltr, Smith to CinC 21 A Gp, FUSAG, and AEAF, 

6 Apr 43. SHAEF SGS file 322 (ANCXF). The naval 

command set up was analogous to that of the Allied 

Expeditionary Air Force. See above, Ch. III. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

bined amphibious doctrine specially 

adapted to the conditions of the Channel 

assault.10 As doctrine and planning developed and the American Army grew in 

the United Kingdom, it became imperative to set up an American training center 

that would both test the new tactical ideas 

and techniques and apply them in the 

training of troops. Negotiations to establish such a center had begun in late 1942, 

but the problems in the way were considerable. During the first six months of 

1943 there were few trainees and fewer 

facilities, as the bulk of U.S. ground 

troops and landing craft continued to be 

absorbed by the Mediterranean theater. 

Moreover, it took time to locate suitable 

training grounds in the crowded island of 

England and to iron out the legal difficulties of taking over hundreds of pieces 

of private property, including farmlands 

and villages. (The area finally selected, in 

fact, was so small that firing exercises were 

narrowly limited.) In April 1943 the Assault Training Center was activated with 

Lt. Col. Paul W. Thompson in command. 

But it was September before it opened its 

first training courses at WoolacombeY 

Nearly all the U.S. troops earmarked 

for the OVERLORD assault underwent some 

training at Colonel Thompson's center, 

although the amount and intensity varied. 

The 29th and 4th Divisions sent all their 

regiments through the course. One regiment of the 29th, the 116th Infantry, returned for a refresher course. Out of the 

1st Division only the 16th Infantry took 

the training. But the 1st Division arrived 

10 Rpt, History of American Section, Combined 

Operations Headquarters, 23 Sep 43. Pre·Inv file 289. 

11 [Clifford Jones] NEPTUNE: Training, Mounting, 

the Artificial Ports (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: Part VI), MS, I, 165. 

168ff. Hist Div files. 
ASSAULT TRAINING. Hitting the beach (above), and training with live am· 

munition (below). 
164 

in England fully battle-tested through 

participation in both the North African 

and Sicilian assaults. The 82d Airborne 

Division, similarly experienced in combat 

in Sicily and Italy, did not attend the center. The lOlst Airborne Division, however, despite intensive training in the 

United States did send two groups (two 

thousand men in all) for special short 

courses in the technique of assaulting 

fortified positions.12 

Besides carrying out its primary mission of preparing troops for the assaults, 

the Assault Training Center made a vital 

contribution to amphibious doctrine. 

Through experimentation with new 

equipment, combined exercises, close 

liaison with the British, and conferences 

on tactics, Colonel Thompson's staff 

learned as well as taught, and their new 

wisdom not only improved tactical methods but in many important ways modified 

tactical concepts.13 In January 1944, when 

Eisenhower took command, the specialized program of the Assault Training 

Center was in full swing; one division was 

already graduated, another was in training. Tactical methods, though still not 

firm in all respects, had at least been extensively reviewed and tested. 

All the major problems attendant on 

the assembling, grouping, and training of 

invasion forces had thus been settled. It 

required only time and a few minor rearrangements to ready the troops for the 

attack. The status of planning, however, 

was much less satisfactory. Despite nearly 

three years of study and ten months of 

more or less intensive and specific planning for OVERLORD, many of the basic 

12 Ibid., I, 193-96. 

13 For discussion, see below, The NEPTUNE Plans: 

Organization and Tactics of the Assault Forces. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

problems still remained to be settled-the 

strength of the assault, for instance, and 

whether it should take place by day or 

by night. 

I t was recognized at least as early as 

Casablanca that the only plan worth work. 

ing on was one drawn by the people who 

would ultimately execute it. Hence the 

decision to constitute COSSAC as an 

embryo of a supreme headquarters. Various attempts were then made to confer on 

General Morgan a kind of substitute commander's authority. But the device did 

not work. After the publication of the 

OVERLORD outline plan in July 1943, 

COSSAC found it impossible to make any 

further substantial contribution to OVERLORD tactical planning for reasons that 

have been described. General Eisenhower, 

General Montgomery, and their staffs, as 

well as the Allied naval and air commanders, found in January that as far as plans 

were concerned they had to go back and 

pick up where COSSAC left off in July. 

They had, however, an accumulated mass 

of special studies which greatly facilitated 

the problems of revising the master plan 

and preparing detailed uni t field orders. 

The Anvil-Overlord Debate 

I t was clear to planners after the 

Quebec Conference that the OVERLORD 

plan, as written by COSSAC in July 1943, 

would have to be revised to strengthen the 

assault. Although COSSAC examined 

some of the implications both of adding 

to the weight of the attack and of broadening the front, the planners came to no 

conclusion. General Morgan could not 

have rewritten the plan in any case, since 

he still functioned under the May directive of the Combined Chiefs of Staff which 
OVERLORD REVISED 

limited his resources in men and shipping. He could not secure additional resources primarily because he could not 

exercise the necessary command authority. 

When COSSAC received the Supreme 

Commander and emerged from its planning staff chrysalis to become the Supreme 

Allied Headquarters, its formal written 

plan for the invasion was still the July outline plan. But informally the staff had 

long been thinking in terms of a larger 

assault. If landing craft were available, 

planners hoped to be able to attack with 

four divisions and have one more division 

in floating reserve. Still this was only a 

hope-not a plan. The process of producing a new plan to realize the hope for a 

strong assault began with the arrival in 

London of General Montgomery and 

General Eisenhower's chief of staff, Maj. 

Gen. Walter Bedell Smith.a 

On 3 January 1944 Generals Montgomery and Smith were formally briefed 

on the COSSAC OVERLORD plan by Brig. 

Kenneth McLean, the chief COSSAC 

Army planner. After the presentation, 

General Montgomery criticized the narrow front of the assault and spoke of carrying out simultaneous assaults in Brittany, 

around Dieppe, and on the west coast of 

the Cotentin. He also criticized planning 

figures on the capacity of available land14 General Smith at the outbreak of war was serving as Secretary, General Staff of the War Department. In February 1942 he became secretary to the 

U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff as well as American secretary of the Combined Chiefs of Staff. Appointed as 

General Eisenhower's chief of staff in September 

1942, he served in this position in Allied Force Headquarters until the end of 1943. At that time he became SHAEF chief of staff, replacing General Morgan who became deputy chief of staff. General 

Eisenhower had been ordered to the United States 

for consultations and had sent Smith to London. 

165 

ing craft. The meeting broke up without 

decision. In the days following General 

Montgomery's first sweeping protest 

against the narrow restrictions placed on 

the original plan, discussion settled down 

to suggestions that the planned invasion 

front be extended from twenty-five miles 

to about forty miles and that five divisions 

be used in the assault.15 The extended 

front was to run from les Dunes de Varreville on the east coast of the Cotentin to 

Cabourg (east of the Orne River). Two 

armies should be employed: the First 

U.S. Army on the right and the Second 

British Army on the left with an interarmy boundary approximately at Bayeux.16 

General Montgomery insisted that it 

was essential in order to avoid confusion 

of administration and supply that armies 

and corps go in on their own fronts and 

not through bridgeheads established by 

other units,17 Other reasons for broadening the front were that it would be harder 

for the enemy to define and locate the 

limits of the attack and conversely easier 

15lnterv, F. C. Pogue with Maj Cen Kenneth R. 

McLean, 11-13 Mar 47. McLean said flatly that 

Montgomery's decision was to use a five-division 

front. Compare, however, notes by Lt. Col. H. Mainward (military assistant to Montgomery) on a meeting of Army commanders, 7 January 1944, where 

the decision reported was to try for an eight-brigade 

assault for four divisions each on a two-brigade 

front. Naval representatives said that, although eight 

brigades were the maximum that could be landed, 

they could be drawn from five divisions rather than 

four, if the Army preferred. Documents in Hist Div 

files. 

16 Mainward, notes cited n. 15. Bayeux was to be 

inclusive to the U.S. Army. 

17 This had been pointed out much earlier as one 

of the important lessons from TORCH. The Eastern 

Assault Force G-4 wrote: "It was fundamental to 

avoid intermingling of British and American Supply 

systems." See Lessons from Operation TORCH, 16 Dec 

42. Pre-Inv file 465. 
166 

for the Allies to break out of the initial 

bridgehead. A wider frontage would give 

the Allies a larger number of vehicle exits 

from the beachhead and so facilitate the 

penetration inland and subsequent buildup. Finally a landing west of the Vire 

estuary would facilitate the early capture 

of Cherbourg, on which General Montgomery placed even greater stress than 

COSSAC, principally because he was suspicious of the value of the untried artificial ports.1S 

Details of tactical dispositions and objectives were not examined at this point. 

Even the question of whether to assault 

the beaches of the east Cotentin was apparently unsettled. 'Yhat General Montgomery did achieve-and what was most 

important at that time to achieve-was to 

press, as a commander, for a decision that 

the assault be strengthened. He said in 

effect, "Give me five divisions or get someone else to command." 19 Of the COSSAC 

principal staff officers none agreed entirely 

with Montgomery's proposals. General 

Morgan, General McLean, and General 

Barker had always wanted the greater 

weight in the assault, but still questioned 

the soundness of expanding the front. 

Maj. Gen. Charles A. West, G-3, opposed 

any expansion, because he believed it 

would only spread thin the available 

forces. 2o The naval and air staffs had evi1" ;\late; for the Commander-in-Chiefs Meeting 

with the Supreme Commander on Friday 21st January 1944. Copy furnished by British Cabinet Office 

Hist Sec. Hist Div files. 

19 Gen McLean's interpretation. See Interv cited 

n. 15. Eisenhower has said that in December 1943, 

he instructed both General Montgomery and General Smith to "seek for an intensification of effort to 

increase troop lift in Overlord .... " Cbl, Eisenhower 

to Marshall, 8 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil) . 

20Interv with McLean; Interv, F. C. Pogue with 

Gen West, 19 Feb 47. Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

dent technical objections since the effectiveness of their support and preparation was directly proportionate to the concentration of the ground attack. M'ost of 

the COSSAC staff, whether or not they 

agreed with General Montgomery, felt 

immense relief that the matter was at last 

being brought to a head. 21 Planning was 

on solid ground again and now could 

move forward. Planners were ordered 

to go ahead with the revised plan to employ one airborne and five seaborne 

divisions in the assault on the assumption 

that the necessary additional resources in 

shipping and air transport would be forthcom mg. 

Montgomery and Smith then tackled 

the problem of getting the required landing craft. The most obvious source was the 

Mediterranean theater. But withdrawal 

from the Mediterranean would necessitate the cancellation of the ANVIL assault 

on southern France. One of General 

Eisenhower's last jobs as Commander in 

Chief of the Mediterranean theater had 

been the drafting of a plan for a two- or 

three-division ANVIL to coincide with 

OVERLORD and so constitute a concentric 

offensive against the enemy forces in 

France. 22 That plan, it will be remembered, was developed during December in 

compliance with the directive of the Combined Chiefs of Staff issued at Cairo after 

the meeting with the Russians. 

On 5 1 anuary General Smith cabled 

General Eisenhower in Washington to 

report Montgomery's argument for a 

21 Interv with McLean. 

22 Eisenhower preferred a three-division assaUlt, 

but made alternative plans to employ only two divisions in case the additional resources were not 

available. The three-division plan, actually not feasible, was dropped from reckoning in the later debate. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

stronger and broad.er OVERLORD assault.23 

"Additional lift," he said, "can only be 

obtained at the expense of ANVIL •••• 

Montgomery is insistent on the immediate recommendation to abandon ANVIL 

except as a threat previously agreed upon 

by the COSSAC and AFHQ staffs before 

the reinforcement in landing craft was decided upon at the Cairo Conference." 

Smith added that, although he had refused to make such a recommendation 

without General Eisenhower's "personal 

approval," he nevertheless agreed with it. 

He felt that ANVIL as a one-division threat 

would be just as effective as the contemplated three-division assault. In this General Morgan and the bulk of the planners 

in England concurred.24 Morgan, like 

most of the planners, believed the ANVIL 

assault, as planned, was so remote from 

the OVERLORD area and from any military 

objectives vital to the Germans that the 

enemy would not find it worth while to 

divert more than two or three divisions 

from the main battle in the north in order 

to cope with it. The same diversion, he 

thought, could be achieved by a threat requiring amphibious lifdor only one division. Eisenhower agreed that "OVERLORD 

must be more broadly based" but he did 

not think ANVIL as a threat would be as effective as the operation itself.25 

Pending the outcome of the debate thus 

initiated, planners proceeded with an examination of the additional resources 

23 Cbl, Smith to Eisenhower, 5 Jan 44. Eisenhower 

Personal Files. See Bibliographical Note. Montgomery added his personal appeal when he cabled on 10 

January, "Will you hurl yourself into the contest 

and what we want, get for us." SHAEF SGS file 560 

II. 

24 COSSAC (44) 5, Operation 'ANVIL,' 6 Jan 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 370.2/2 I. 

25 Cbl, Eisenhower to Smith, 6 Jan 44. Eisenhower 

Personal Files. 

167 

needed for the "Montgomery plan" and 

the implications of finding them.26 To get 

the landing craft they estimated it would 

be necessary to return half of the two-division ANVIL lift to the United Kingdom. 

In addition the OVERLORD target date 

would have to be postponed from 1 May 

to 1 June in order to secure an additional 

month's production, and the number of 

vehicles per assault division would need 

to be cut to 2,500.27 The broadened assault front would also increase the fighter 

plane commitment by eight squadrons. 

To lift a complete airborne division instead of the two-thirds originally planned 

would necessitate finding 200 more transport aircraft.28 

The bill for the principal types of landing craft-as always the critical commodity-included an additional 72 LCI (L) 's, 

47 LST's, and 144 LCT's.29 The bill was 

submitted to the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff by General Eisenhower a week after 

he arrived in London. He was anxious 

that it be met, if possible, without interfering with ANVIL and indicated his willingness to postpone OVERLORD until after 

1 .June even though that meant the loss 

26 The "Montgomery plan" was a convenient appellation used by General Morgan and others at the 

time. See Ltr, Morgan to COSSAC G-4, 13 Jan 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 800.1 I. It should not be taken to 

indicate, however, that the idea of an expanded assault was uniquely Montgomery's. 

27 Former calculations had varied, but all exceeded 

3,000. See above, Ch. 11. 

28 COSSAC (44) 9, Reply to Joint Planning Staff 

Questionnaire (COS (44) II (0» On Implications 

of Proposed Modification of Operation 'Anvil,' 8 

Jan 44. SHAEF SGS file 370.2/2 I. 

29 The other requirements: I LSH (headquarters 

ship), 6 LSI (L)'s or APA's, all carrying a full complement of LCA's or LCVP's (British and U.S. shipto·shore ferrying craft respectively), and 64 motol' 

vehicle cargo ships. These requirements could all 

be met with relative ease and therefore do not figure 

in the struggle for adequate assault lift. 
168 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of a month of good campaigning weather. 

The postponement was seconded by the 

British Chiefs of Staff, and agreed to by 

the U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff on 31 January. Besides insuring extra landing craft, 

the later date would increase the chances 

of favorable weather on the Russian front 

and thus make it possible for more closely 

co-ordinated action between the Allies.30 

The ANVIL question was not to be resolved so easily. On the contrary the issue 

sharpened and the differences of opinion 

intensified. In early January 1944 when 

the British Chiefs of Staff first debated the 

cancellation of ANVIL, both Air Marshal 

Portal, Chief of Air Staff, and Admiral 

Sir Andrew B. Cunningham, First Sea 

Lord, recommended the mounting of a 

two-division ANVIL as a useful diversion 

to OVERLORD..31 On 4 February, the Prime 

Minister bluntly stated that ANVIL and 

OVERLORD were not strategically interwoven because of the great distance (500 

miles) of rugged country between them 

and the defensive power of modern weapons. He therefore doubted the value of a 

diversionary landing in southern France, 

regardless of the available resources. The 

Chiefs of Staff had then come to share his 

doubts.32 Less than two weeks later a War 

30Various cables in SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil) . 

31 COS (44) 5th Mtg (0), 7 Jan 44. SHAEF SGS 

file 370.2/2 I. Admiral Cunningham, who replaced 

Admiral Pound as First Sea Lord in October 1943, 

had entered the Royal Navy in 1898 and participated 

in World War I. As Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean, between 1939 and 1942, he directed operations against the Italian Fleet at Taranto and Matapan and evacuated the British Army from Greece. 

After heading the Admiralty delegation in Washington in 1942, Cunningham was made Naval Commander-in-chief, Expeditionary Force, North Africa. 

32 COS (44) 35th Mtg (0), 4 Feb 44 with Annex, 

Minute to the Prime Minister from Gen Ismay. 

Department representative in London 

could say, in reference to the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate, that he had met the “customary attitude on the part of British 

planners.” He found them maintaining 

that OVERLORD was the only operation 

“that will pay us dividends,” and that 

“ANVIL might be an operation in the Marshalls” for all the connection it had with 

OVERLORD.33

As the British thus developed increasing hostility to the southern France invasion, the U.S. Chiefs of Staff reaffirmed 

an uncompromising stand that ANVIL was 

required “to make effective use” of the 

French and U.S. divisions in the Mediterranean and to draw German divisions 

away from northern France.34 The most 

a threat could do, they thought, would be 

to contain the enemy divisions already 

deployed in the ANVIL area. Furthermore, 

they recalled that they were committed to 

the southern France assault by agreement 

with Marshal Stalin at Tehran. In brief, 

the U.S. point of view (shared by General 

Eisenhower) was that ANVIL and OVERLORD were parts of a single operation, and 

that it was unsound to cancel one part for 

the ostensible purpose of strengthening 

the other. 

“Judging from the discussion and differences of opinion at the present time,” 

General Marshall wrote to Eisenhower in 

February, “the British and American 

Chiefs of Staff seemed to have completely 

reversed themselves and we have become 

Mediterraneanites and they heavily proSHAEF SGS file 370.2/2 I; cf. CCS 465/4, Firm 

Recommendations with Regard to Operations “Anvil” and “Overlord,” 4 Feb 44. 

33 Cbl, Hull (OPD) to Handy, 15 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 II. 

34 CCS 465/3,31 Jan 44. 

168 

of a month of good campaigning weather. 

The postponement was seconded by the 

British Chiefs of Staff, and agreed to by 

the U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff on 31 J anuary. Besides insuring extra landing craft, 

the later date would increase the chances 

of favorable weather on the Russian front 

and thus make it possible for more closely 

co-ordinated action between the Allies.so 

The ANVIL question was not to be resolved so easily. On the contrary the issue 

sharpened and the differences of opinion 

intensified. In early January 1944 when 

the British Chiefs of Staff first debated the 

cancellation of ANVIL, both Air Marshal 

Portal, Chief of Air Staff, and Admiral 

Sir Andrew B. Cunningham, First Sea 

Lord, recommended the mounting of a 

two-division ANVIL as a useful diversion 

to OVERLORD. 31 On 4 February, the Prime 

Minister bluntly stated that ANVIL and 

OVERLORD were not strategically interwoven because of the great distance (500 

miles) of rugged country between them 

and the defensive power of modern weapons. He therefore doubted the value of a 

diversionary landing in southern France, 

regardless of the available resources. The 

Chiefs of Staff had then come to share his 

doubts. 32 Less than two weeks later a War 

80 Various cables in SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil) . 

31 COS (44) 5th Mtg (0), 7 Jan 44. SHAEF SGS 

file 370.2/2 1. Admiral Cunningham, who replaced 

Admiral Pound as First Sea Lord in October 1943, 

had entered the Royal Navy in 1898 and participated 

in World War I. As Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean. between 1939 and 1942, he directed operations against the Italian Fleet at Taranto and Matapan and evacuated the British Army from Greece. 

After heading the Admiralty delegation in Washington in 1942, Cunningham was made Naval Com· 

mander-in-Chief, Expeditionary Force, North Africa. 

32 COS (44) 35th Mtg (0), 4 Feb 44 with Annex, 

Minute to the Prime Minister from Gen Ismay. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

Department representative in London 

could say, in reference to the ANVIL-DVERLORD debate, that he had met the "customary attitude on the part of British 

planners." He found them maintaining 

that OVERLORD was the only operation 

"that will pay us dividends," and that 

"ANVIL might be an operation in the Marshalls" for all the connection it had with 

OVERLORD.33 

As the British thus developed increasing hostility to the southern France invasion, the U.S. Chiefs of Staff reaffirmed 

an uncompromising stand that ANVIL was 

required "to make effective use" of the 

French and U.S. divisions in the Mediterranean and to draw German divisions 

away from northern France.34 The most 

a threat could do, they thought, would be 

to contain the enemy divisions already 

deployed in the ANVIL area. Furthermore, 

they recalled that they were committed to 

the southern France assault by agreement 

with Marshal Stalin at Tehran. In brief, 

the U.S. point of view (shared by General 

Eisenhower) was that ANVIL and OVERLORD were parts of a single operation, and 

that it was unsound to cancel one part for 

the ostensible purpose of strengthening 

the other. 

"Judging from the discussion and differences of opinion at the present time," 

General Marshall wrote to Eisenhower in 

February, "the British and American 

Chiefs of Staff seemed to have completely 

reversed themselves and we have become 

Mediterraneanites and they heavily proSHAEF SGS file 370.2/2 I; d. CCS 465/4, Firm 

Recommendations with Regard to Operations "Anvil" and "Overlord," 4 Feb 44. 

8S Cbl, Hull (OPD) to Handy, 15 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 560 II. 

34 CCS 465/3, 31 Jan 44. 
OVERLORD REVISED 169 

OVERLORD. ” 35 As Marshall was well aware, 

no reversal in opinion had in fact occurred. What had happened was that Allied plans for the battle in Italy had once 

again bogged down before unexpectedly 

heavy enemy opposition. The British, in 

asking the cancellation of ANVIL, were 

thinking at least as much of the need for 

additional resources with which to prosecute the Italian campaign as they were of 

diverting landing craft to strengthen 

OVERLORD. On 22 January, U.S. VI Corps 

units had landed at Anzio. The landing 

behind the enemy lines facing the Fifth 

Army was designed to force the Germans 

to pull out and leave the road to Rome 

open. Instead of pulling out, the Germans 

held the Fifth Army attack at the Gustav 

Line and counterattacked the beachhead. 

The beachhead was successfully defended 

but it soon became apparent that no quick 

link-up with the main armies was going to 

be possible.36 The British had concluded 

early in February that the Germans meant 

to fight it out in central Italy and they saw 

this development as altering the Allied 

strategic decisions made at Tehran. They 

thought General Alexander, commander 

of 15 Army Group, controlling the 

ground forces in Italy, would need at 

least some of the troops earmarked for 

ANVIL and that the amphibious lift for one 

division should be reserved for his use for 

possible new operations similar to the 

Anzio “end run.” The British Chiefs of 

Staff declared: “Germany . . . is now apparently playing our game [of tying up 

German forces in the Mediterranean] 

and we must do all we can to pin down her 

forces and commit them still further. . . . 

We have no choice but to prosecute the 

Italian Campaign with vigor. .. .” 37

The U.S. Joint Chiefs had no quarrel 

with the determination to prosecute the 

Italian campaign. Again the issue was to 

what extent strategic decisions and planning should be suspended to await battle 

developments. General Marshall’s view 

was that planning and preparations 

should proceed for ANVIL but that, if by 

April the Allies had still not been able to 

establish themselves north of Rome, then 

ANVIL should be abandoned. If, on the 

other hand, ANVIL were called off at once, 

then there would be no possibility of 

mounting it in the spring.38 

Early in February it became apparent 

to the Combined Chiefs of Staff that their 

differences could not be resolved by exchange of cables. The U.S. Chiefs of Staff 

therefore delegated their authority to 

General Eisenhower to carry on discussions with the British and sent to London 

Maj. Gen. John E. Hull and Rear Adm. 

Charles M. Cooke, Jr., with planners from 

the War Department to act as advisers. 

Eisenhower found himself actually on a 

middle ground between the War Department and British staff views. He agreed 

with the War Department’s estimate of 

the importance of the southern France diversion, but he was closer to the planning 

difficulties of OVERLORD and therefore 

more dubious as to the feasibility of 

ANVIL.39

35Cbl, Marshall to Eisenhower, 7 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

36 The attack toward Cisterna on 28-29 January 

failed. Thereafter the Allied forces at Anzio remained 

37 CCS 465/4; Minute, Ismay for the Prime Minister, cited n. 32. 

38 Cbl, Hull to Handy, cited n. 33; CCS 465/10, 21 

Feb 44. 

39See, for instance, Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

on the defensive until May. 6 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

OVERLORD REVISED 

OVERLORD." 35 As Marshall was well aware, 

no reversal in opinion had in fact occurred. What had happened was that Allied plans for the battle in Italy had once 

again bogged down before unexpectedly 

heavy enemy opposition. The British, in 

asking the cancellation of ANVIL, were 

thinking at least as much of the need for 

additional resources with which to prosecute the Italian campaign as they were of 

diverting landing craft to strengthen 

OVERLORD. On 22 January, U.S. VI Corps 

units had landed at Anzio. The landing 

behind the enemy lines facing the Fifth 

Army was designed to force the Germans 

to pull out and leave the road to Rome 

open. Instead of pulling out, the Germans 

held the Fifth Army attack at the Gustav 

Line and counterattacked the beachhead. 

The beachhead was successfull y defended 

but it soon became apparent that no quick 

link-up with the main armies was going to 

be possible.36 The British had concluded 

early in February that the Germans meant 

to fight it out in central Italy and they saw 

this development as altering the Allied 

strategic decisions made at Tehran. They 

thought General Alexander, commander 

of 15 Army Group, controlling the 

ground forces in Italy, would need at 

least some of the troops earmarked for 

ANVIL and that the amphibious lift for one 

division should be reserved for his use for 

possible new operations similar to the 

Anzio "end run." The British Chiefs of 

Staff declared: "Germany ... is now apparently playing our game [of tying up 

German forces in the Mediterranean] 

S5 Cbl, Marshall to Eisenhower, 7 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

36 The attack toward Cisterna on 28-29 January 

failed. Thereafter the Allied forces at Anzio remained 

on the defensive until May. 

169 

and we must do all we can to pin down her 

forces and commit them still further. ... 

We have no choice but to prosecute the 

Italian Campaign with vigor. ... " 37 

The U.S. Joint Chiefs had no quarrel 

with the determination to prosecute the 

Italian campaign. Again the issue was to 

what extent strategic decisions and planning should be suspended to await battle 

developments. General Marshall's view 

was that planning and preparations 

should proceed for ANVIL but that, if by 

April the Allies had still not been able to 

establish themselves north of Rome, then 

ANVIL should be abandoned. If, on the 

other hand, ANVIL were called off at once, 

then there would be no possibility of 

mounting it in the spring.38 

Early in February it became apparent 

to the Combined Chiefs of Staff that their 

differences could not be resolved by exchange of cables. The U.S. Chiefs of Staff 

therefore delegated their authority to 

General Eisenhower to carryon discussions with the British and sent to London 

Maj. Gen. John E. H u11 and Rear Adm. 

Charles M. Cooke, Jr., with planners from 

the War Department to act as advisers. 

Eisenhower found himself actually on a 

middle ground between the War Department and British staff views. He agreed 

with the War Department's estimate of 

the importance of the southern France diversion, but he was closer to the planning 

difficulties of OVERLORD and therefore 

more dubious as to the feasibility of 

ANVIL.39 

37 CCS 465/4; Minute, Ismay for the Prime Minister, cited n. 32. 

38 Cbl, Hull to Handy, cited n. 33; CCS 465/10, 21 

Feb 44. 

39 See, for instance, Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

6 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 
170 

During February the SHAEF staff 

struggled to devise an acceptable compromise. The possibility of compromise 

hinged, in the first instance, on finding 

enough landing craft for a five-division 

OVERLORD assault. Lift for four seaborne 

divisions and one airborne was promised 

by the War Department. The problem 

was to get additional lift not only for the 

fifth assault division but also for four armored brigades (or the equivalent), five 

regiments of self-propelled field artillery, 

shore groups, air force units, naval personnel, and two-thirds of a follow-up division which planners figured had to be 

carried in landing craft, tactically loaded, 

for immediate employment on landing. 

The rest of the follow-up (one and onethird divisions) would be carried in shipping and would therefore not be operationally available until D plus 2. Assault 

forces requiring simultaneous loading 

consisted of a total of 174,320 men and 

20,018 vehicles. These figures included a 

large number of nondivisional troops 

equivalent in personnel and vehicular 

strength to between two and three divisions.40 

As the result of conferences at Norfolk 

House (SHEAF headquarters) during 

the week of 13 February, a compromise 

shipping plan was worked out. SHAEF 

first proposed to reduce the current planning allocation by one LSI(H), 48 LST's, 

and 51 LCI(L)'s with a resulting loss of 

lift for 21,560 men and 2,520 vehicles. 

This loss would then be made up by overloading transports (AP A's), carrying ve40 Various cables between SHAEF and WD 5-9 

Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 560 II. A divisional slice for 

the assault at this time was figured at 24,000 men and 

2,500 vehicles (of which 1,450 were organic). See 

CCS 465/7, 8 Feb 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

hicles in the APA's, using AKA's (cargo 

ships) in the initial lift, and finding (presumably from new production) an additional 27 LCT's. This plan was subsequently revised to exchange the 6 AKA's 

with the Mediterranean theater for 20 

LST's and 21 LCI (L)'s, on the grounds 

that the large cargo vessels could more 

easily be used in the calmer southern 

waters. The exchange would still leave an 

estimated two-division lift for ANVIL although it was doubtful whether Gen. Sir 

Henry Maitland Wilson (Commander-inChief Mediterranean) would accept the 

loss of tactical flexibility which use of the 

AKA's involved. 41 The SHAEF compromise still left a shortage of about fifteen 

LST's. General Eisenhower requested allocation of at least seven more LST's from 

U.S. production. The remainder of the 

deficit would have to be made up by increased loading of LST's on the third tide 

(morning of D plus I) and increased 

sevicea bili ty. 

The serviceability rate of landing craft 

-or, in other words, the percentage of 

craft on hand which at any given date 

would be operationally available-was always a planning figure to conjure with. So 

narrow were the planning margins that a 

difference of 5 percent in the estimates of 

serviceability might mean the difference 

between adequate and inadequate lift for 

the assault. The serviceability rate was 

contingent chiefly on repair facilities and 

the stock of spare parts-both of which 

were critically limited in the United 

Kingdom.42 COSSAC in Outline OVER41 Memo by First Sea Lord, Landing Ships and 

Craft for "Overlord," incl to Ltr, Hollis to COSSAC, 

21 Feb 44. SHAEF G-3 file GCT 451-94-1 Ops A. 

42 See, for instance, Cbl, McCloy to Forrestal, 20 

Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 560 II. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

LORD had planned on an average serviceability rate of 85 percent for all craft and 

90 percent for ships.43 These figures were 

substantially approved at the Quebec 

Conference. On advice of U.S. naval planners, however, the rate for U.S. craft was 

raised in January to 95 percent for LST's 

and 90 percent for LCT's. The British insisted on retention of the lower COSSAC 

figures. SHAEF accepted both estimates 

and distinguished in planning between 

U.S. and Bri tish craft, allowing the serviceability rate set by each country.44 

The SHAEF shipping compromise was 

severely criticized by planners of 21 Army 

Group, mainly on the grounds that 

SHAEF considered the problem of providing lift only from a logistical and not 

from a tactical point of view. For example, 

they pointed out that SHAEF had not 

shown separately the Commando-Ranger 

lift for special assault missions against fortified positions. This separation was important, the army group planners argued, 

because there could be no question of 

loading to full capacity the LSI's carrying 

Commandos, and of course the excess capacity could not be used for lift of other 

assault troops. The SHAEF proposals, by 

pushing the loading of shipping toward 

the full theoretical capacity of the vessels, 

sacrificed flexibility, particularly in that 

they prevented the preloading in craft of 

adequate reserves. Army group thought it 

43 Ltr, Gen Brownjohn to Morgan, 29 Jul 43. 

SHAEF SGS file 800.1 I. 

"Special Meeting Held in Room 126, Norfolk 

House, 17 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 381 I (OverlordAnvil) . Both figures actually proved pessimistic. The 

assault forces used 4,266 landing ships and craft, 

which represented 99.3 percent of all U.S. vessels on 

hand and 97.6 percent of all English vessels. See 

Report by A llied Naval Commander-in-Chief Expeditionary Force on Operation NEPTUNE (London, 

1944) , I, 8, 128. 

171 

extremely important that reserve units for 

the assault waves be tactically loaded in 

craft so that their employment would not 

be affected by losses or time delays of the 

LCA (ship-to-shore) craft used in the 

initial assault. By increasing the personnel lift on the first tide of the assault 

without any corresponding vehicle increase, the SHAEF proposal either would 

land men who could not proceed with 

their task until their vehicles arrived, thus 

causing congestion on the beaches, or 

would compel half-loaded personnel ships 

to wait offshore, thus exposing both ships 

and men to unjustifiable risks.45 

The validity of these objections was 

fully conceded by General Eisenhower, 

but he considered the sacrifices and risks 

worth accepting in order to permit the 

simultaneous diversionary attack on 

southern France. Although at first 

strongly opposed, General Montgomery 

at last agreed and the proposals were submitted to the British Chiefs of Staff.46 The 

Chiefs of Staff disapproved the compromise on the grounds, first, that it skimped 

both ANVIL and OVERLORD and, second, 

that the slow progress of the Italian campaign made the possibility of providing 

the necessary build-up forces for ANVIL "so 

remote as to be negligible." 47 Employment, as planned, of ten divisions in 

southern France, General Brooke pointed 

out, would leave only twenty divisions to 

45 Memorandum on Implications of the SHAEF 

Proposal to Reduce the Allocation of Landing Ships 

and Landing Craft, 17 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 381 I 

(Overlord-Anvil) . 

46 Montgomery's opposition was voiced in a letter 

inclosing staff comments on the 17 February memo 

cited in note 45. He reversed himself at SCAEF 5th 

Mtg, 18 Feb 44. SHAEF SGC file 381 I (OverlordAnvil) . 

47 Minute, Ismay to Prime Minister, 19 Feb 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 
172 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

fight the critical battle of Italy and to meet 

“other commitments which might arise 

in the Mediterranean.” 48

Eisenhower left the meeting at which 

this discussion took place, feeling that the 

chances of carrying out ANVIL were slim.49 

Nevertheless he continued to argue for a 

compromise that would save the southern 

France assault as long as there was any 

reasonable prospect that it might be 

feasible. On 22 February he reached 

agreement with the British that Italy must 

have overriding priority over all present 

and future operations in the Mediterranean, but, subject to that priority, alternative plans would be prepared for amphibious operations to assist OVERLORD, 

the first alternative being ANVIL on the approximate scale and date originally 

planned. The Commander in Chief Mediterranean was to release 20 LST’s and 21 

LCI(L)‘s to OVERLORD in exchange for 6 

AKA’s, the craft to sail for the United 

Kingdom in April. All these arrangements, finally, would be reviewed on 20 

March. If at that time it was decided that 

ANVIL could not be mounted, the lift in 

the Mediterranean in excess of that 

needed for one division would be withdrawn for use in OVERLORD.50 This compromise was agreed to by the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff, the President, and the Prime Minister.51 

The decision held only about long 

enough to be written down. Eisenhower, 

more and more convinced that ANVIL 

48 COS (44) 53d Mtg (0) , 19 Feb 44. 

49Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 19 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

50Cbl, 23 Feb 44, reproduced as CCS 465/ 11,24 Feb 

44. 

51 Cbl, CCS to SHAEF, 26 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 I (Overlord-Anvil) ; cf. CCS 465/11 and CCS 

147th Mtg, 27 Feb 44. 

would not take place, became equally convinced that it would be dangerous to allow planning for OVERLORD to continue 

unsettled because of the uncertainty of 

getting enough landing craft. On 26 February, he considered cabling General 

Marshall “his view that ANVIL was impossible” in order to force a decision to release ANVIL landing craft for OVERLORD.52

Two days later, Generals Wilson and 

Alexander in the Mediterranean cabled 

their concern over the difficulties at 

Anzio, stressed the general shortage of 

LST’s in the theater, and specifically 

asked that certain proposed transfers of 

craft to the United Kingdom be held up.53 

The British Chiefs of Staff reacted to the 

appeal with a blanket recommendation 

that all LST’s then in the Mediterranean 

be retained there and that 26 LST’s (with 

26 LCT’s as deck loads) scheduled for 

shipment to the Mediterranean be diverted to the United Kingdom.54 This proposal was rejected both by General Wilson and by the U.S. Chiefs of Staff. 

The debate cbntinued; the uncertainty 

continued; and the danger of stinting the 

OVERLORD allocation of landing craft became daily more threatening. General 

Eisenhower pressed for a decision. Landing craft for OvERLoRD were so closely 

figured that the Supreme Commander 

52 SCAEF 6th Mtg, 26 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

387/11 (Supreme Commander’s Conferences). General Smith demurred despite his previous advocacy 

that ANVIL be abandoned. Smith said he “felt that 

there was little necessity for sending this message 

[suggested by Eisenhower], and feared that it woulu 

give the impression of changing our minds too 

quickly.” Cf. below, n. 55. 

53 Cbls in SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

54Cbl, COS to JSM, 29 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 I (Overlord-Anvil). These were craft which by 

decision at Cairo were allocated to the Mediterranean from production previously earmarked for 

the Pacific. See above, Ch. III. 

172 

fight the critical battle of Italy and to meet 

"other commitments which might arise 

in the Mediterranean." 48 

Eisenhower left the meeting at which 

this discussion took place, feeling that the 

chances of carrying out ANVIL were slim.49 

Nevertheless he continued to argue for a 

compromise that would save the southern 

France assault as long as there was any 

reasonable prospect that it might be 

feasible. On 22 February he reached 

agreement with the British that Italy must 

have overriding priority over all present 

and future operations in the Mediterranean, but, subject to that priority, alternative plans would be prepared for amphibious operations to assist OVERLORD, 

the first alternative being ANVIL on the approximate scale and date originally 

planned. The Commander in Chief Mediterranean was to release 20 LST's and 21 

LCI(L)'s to OVERLORD in exchange for 6 

AKA's, the craft to sail for the United 

Kingdom in April. All these arrangements, finally, would be reviewed on 20 

March. If at that time it was decided that 

ANVIL could not be mounted, the lift in 

the Mediterranean in excess of that 

needed for one division would be withdrawn for use in OVERLORD.50 This compromise was agreed to by the J oint Chiefs 

of Staff, the President, and the Prime MinisterY 

The decision held only about long 

enough to be written down. Eisenhower, 

more and more convinced that ANVIL 

48 COS (44) 53d Mtg (0),19 Feb 44. 

'9 Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 19 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

50 Cbl, 23 Feb 44, reproduced as CCS 465/11, 24 Feb 

44. 

H Cbl, CCS to SHAEF, 26 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 I (Overlord-Anvil); d. CCS 465/11 and CCS 

147th Mtg, 27 Feb 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

would not take place, became equally convinced that it would be dangerous to allow planning for OVERLORD to continue 

unsettled because of the uncertainty of 

getting enough landing craft. On 26 February, he considered cabling General 

Marshall "his view that ANVIL was impossible" in order to force a decision to release ANVIL landing craft for OVERLORD.1>2 

Two days later, Generals Wilson and 

Alexander in the Mediterranean cabled 

their concern over the difficulties at 

Anzio, stressed the general shortage of 

LST's in the theater, and specifically 

asked that certain proposed transfers of 

craft to the United Kingdom be held up.I>S 

The British Chiefs of Staff reacted to the 

appeal with a blanket recommendation 

that all LST's then in the Mediterranean 

be retained there and that 26 LST's (with 

26 LCT's as deck loads) scheduled for 

shipment to the Mediterranean be diverted to the U ni ted Kingdom. 54 This proposal was rejected both by General Wilson and by the U.S. Chiefs of Staff. 

The debate cbntinued; the uncertainty 

continued; and the danger of stinting the 

OVERLORD allocation of landing craft became daily more threatening. General 

Eisenhower pressed for a decision. Landing craft for OVERLORD were so closely 

figured that the Supreme Commander 

52 SCAEF 6th Mtg, 26 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

387/11 (Supreme Commander's Conferences). General Smith demurred despite his previous advocacy 

that ANVIL be abandoned. Smith said he "felt thaI 

there was little necessity for sending this message 

[suggested by Eisenhower], and feared that it woulu 

give the impression of changing our minds too 

quickly." Cf. below, n. 55. 

53 Cbls in SHAEF SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). 

G4 Cbl, COS to ISM, 29 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS file 

381 I (Overlord-Anvil). These were craft which by 

decision at Cairo were allocated to the Mediter· 

ranean from production previously earmarked for 

the Pacific. See above, Ch. III. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

viewed with deep concern the loss of four 

or five LST's in the United Kingdom and 

Mediterranean during the first few days 

of March. He pointed out to General 

Marshall that SHAEF had not only established minimum landing craft requirements but "went short 15 LST's in the 

interest of keeping ANVIL alive." Now it 

had even less than its minimum requirements. "The uncertainty," he added, "is 

having a marked effect on everyone responsible for planning and executing operation OVERLORD." 55 

To the Joint Chiefs of Staff it became 

increasingly apparent during March that 

there would be no break in the battle for 

Italy that would permit an advance on 

Rome before the end of the month. 

ANVIL was dying. Still there seemed sound 

strategic reasons for trying to keep it 

alive. General Marshall did not agree with 

the British that involvement in Italy 

would necessarily serve the purpose of 

holding enemy divisions away from the 

OVERLORD battle. He quoted General 

Alexander's opinion that the Germans, 

using only six to eight divisions in the 

peninsula, could materially delay him. 

The enemy would still have some ten to 

fifteen divisions in Italy which he could 

shift to meet the Allied attack in northern France, "not to mention those [divisions] from Southern France and elsewhere." 56 

55 Cbl. Eisenhower to· Marshall, 9 Mar 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). He added that the 

Italian situation was not developing in a way to increase the likelihood of ANVIL and that the demands 

of OVERLORD on the other hand were making it inevitable to draw on ANVIL resources. "This being the 

case, I think it is the gravest possible mistake to 

allow demands for ANVIL to militate against the main 

effort even in the matter of time and certainty of 

planning." 

56 Cbl, Marshall to Eisenhower, 16 Mar 44. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

173 

On 21 March General Eisenhower recommended the cancellation of ANVIL as an 

attack timed to coincide with OVERLORD. 57 

This recommendation was accepted and 

the reallocation of landing craft from the 

Mediterranean was ordered. The Gordian knot, as far as OVERLORD planning 

was concerned, was cut. OVERLORD was at 

last assured landing craft in numbers at 

least adequate for the job to be done, although there would still be few to spare.58 

The Neptune Plans 

The firm decision to expand the assault resulted in the drafting of a new outline plan: the NEPTUNE Initial Joint Plan, 

published on 1 February 1944 by General Montgomery, Admiral Ramsay, and 

Air Marshall Leigh-Mallory. The Initial 

57 Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 21 Mar 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 381 I (Overlord-Anvil). Eisenhower said 

nothing in this message about a later mounting of 

ANVIL. He recommended pressing offensive operations in the Mediterranean "initially in Italy and 

extending from there into France as rapidly as we 

can." Specifically he suggested that the Supreme 

Allied Commander in the Mediterranean theater be 

directed to assist OVERLORD by containing the maximum number of enemy forces and to do this by "the 

highest possible tempo of offensive action." Mediterranean plans, he suggested, should include "the 

mounting of a positive threat against the south of 

France or the Ligurian coast with provision for taking immediate advantage of RANKIN [enemy collapse] 

conditions shOUld they occur." 

58 The ANVIL problem, however, was far from settled. The U.S. Chiefs of Staff had yielded only on 

the timing; they still wanted the assault mounted 

at a later date. The British were equally insistent 

on outright cancellation. The debate continued untill July when the Prime Minister at last conceded 

the U.S. argument (though he remained unconvinced). The southern France invasion, schedUled 

at that time for 15 July, was subsequently postponed 

and at last mounted on 15 August under the code 

name DRAGOON. Details of the later ANVIL debate will 

be found in F. C. Pogue, The Supreme Command, 

and Major J. D. T. Hamilton, Southern France and 

Alsace, volumes now under preparation in this series. 
174 

Joint Plan called itself an "executive instrument" directing "subordinate planning and its implementation." Extremely 

detailed at some points and sketchy at 

others, it reflected its dependence on the 

original Outline OVERLORD as well as on 

subsequent planning by lower tactical 

headquarters for armies and their associated naval task forces and tactical air 

forces. It threw the whole burden of detailed ground planning to the armies, 

which were directed to submit outline assault plans before 15 February. These 

plans were to show regimental frontage 

with objectives, Ranger (Commando) 

and airborne tasks, provisional lists of 

beach defense targets with timing for fire 

support, and the approximate number of 

men and vehicles to be landed in each 

regiment (or brigade) on the first four 

tides, with the number and types of landing craft required. They were also to furnish lists, by types of units, of the number 

of men and vehicles to be carried in the 

initial lift, a forecast of operations and 

tentative build-up priorities from D plus 

1 to D pI us 14, and proposals for achieving 

the airfield construction program. 59 

The First U.S. Army plan, issued on 25 

February, and_ the Second British Army 

plan, issued on 20 March, together constituted the over-all ground forces plan 

for OVERLORD> inasmuch as 21 Army 

Group never drew up an army group 

pla"n.60 Both the naval and air commanders in chief published over-all plans. The 

naval plan in particular was in exhaustive 

detail and was subject, of course, to con59 NEPTUNE Initial Joint Plan by ANCXF, CinC 21 

A Gp, and CinC AEAF, pars. 103-104. Pre-Inv file 

247. 

60 FUSA Operations Plan NEPTUNE, 25 Feb 44. 12th 

A Gp file 370.2; Second British Army, Outline Plan, 

4 Feb 44. Pre-Inv file 631A. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tinual amendment as changes occurred 

at lower levels and as allocations of landing craft and naval vessels were shifted. 

Planning proceeded almost simultaneously on all levels. Outline plans for 

armies, corps, and naval task forces were 

prepared early and used as a framework 

for the planning of lower echelons. The 

lower echelon plans in turn filled in and 

modified the army, corps, and task force 

plans, which were generally (though not 

always) issued in final form as field or operation orders. 

In the sections following, no one plan 

is described. The attempt rather has been 

to distill out of the' scores of relevant documents-plans, memoranda, minutes of 

meetings, amendments, and similar 

sources-the salient points of the tactical 

plan at about army level and to discuss 

the principal problems that arose in the 

course of the planning from the time of 

General Eisenhower's assumption of command. Detailed plans of divisions and 

lower units will be found in appropriate 

places in the narrative of operations. 

The Enemy 61 

Planning during the winter and early 

spring proceeded on the assumption that 

enemy strength and dispositions would 

remain substantially unchanged before 

the target date. The assumption was necessary in order to have a firm basis for 

planning, but actually it was already clear 

in February that the enemy was busy 

6llt should be observed that this whole section 

represents the enemy dispositions and preparations 

only as known by Allied commanders. It should be 

compared with Chapters IV and VII and with the 

operational chapters, VIII through X. Allied intelligence, on the whole, however, was accurate and 

complete before the invasion. 
OVERLORD REVISED 175 

strengthening his defenses in the west. It 

was noted that the rotation of offensive 

divisions from rest areas in France to the 

Eastern Front, which had been normal 

German practice throughout 1943, had 

now stopped, although the flow of battleworn divisions into the west from Russia 

continued. The total German strength in 

France and the Low Countries was estimated to have climbed from forty to fiftythree divisions by February, and indications were that it might reach sixty by 

spring. Estimates in May seemed to confirm this prediction.62 But despite the 

enemy build-up of divisional units he still 

had only about twelve reserve divisions, 

and this was precisely the figure set by 

COSSAC in July 1943 as the maximum 

number of offensive divisions that the 

Allies could safely take on. Thus the estimated addition to Rundstedt’s troop list 

of some twenty divisions between the 

summer of 1943 and spring of 1944 did 

not in itself force any revision of Allied 

plans or cause any grave Allied concern. 

The May estimates of German capacity to 

build up against the Allied bridgehead 

did not greatly exceed COSSAC’s maximum figures. COSSAC had set as a condition for the attack that the enemy 

should not be able to withdraw more than 

fifteen divisions from Russia. In May it 

seemed unlikely that any more divisions 

would be moved from the Eastern Front, 

at least in the first few months of OVERLORD, or that more than thirteen divisions 

could be diverted from other fronts. 

COSSAC’s conditions further included 

a maximum enemy build-up in the invasion area of three divisions on D Day, five 

62See e.g., 4th Div FO 1, Annex 2a, 15 May 44. 

Division field orders are in the collection of European theater operational records. 

by D plus 2, and nine by D plus 8, in addition to the coastal divisions. Allied intelligence in May reckoned the enemy 

capable of the same maximum build-up 

on D Day, of six to seven divisions by D 

plus 2, and eleven to fourteen divisions by 

D plus 8. The latter calculations were in 

equivalent first-class divisions as it was 

estimated that the majority of the enemy’s 

mobile reserves were neither fully mobile 

nor up to authorized strength.63 

More than half the German divisions 

were known to be static or limited employment-that is, either immobile defense divisions or divisions capable only of 

limited offensive action.64 It was considered likely that troops of the static divisions would resist only so long as they 

could fire from protected positions with 

minimum risk to themselves.65 Although 

in May all divisions were believed in the 

process of being strengthened for offensive use, it was felt that this upgrading 

could not be completed in time.66 Furthermore it was believed that any improvement of the static divisions would 

be at the expense of at least an equal number of nominal attack divisions which were 

understrength and underequipped.67 The

conclusion, in short, was that the enemy, 

suffering from materiel shortages and 

transportation difficulties, could not 

63 JIC (44) 210 (0) (Final), Opposition to OVERLORD, 20 May 44. SHAEF SGS files (JIC Papers). 

64 See Ch. VII for discussion of types of German 

divisions. “Limited employment” was a G-2 term for 

which there was no German equivalent. It meant 

simply a unit which in the opinion of the G-2 had 

less than full combat value. For classification by the 

Germans of their own divisions, see below, Ch. VII, 

n. 66. 

65 Annex I to FUSA plan cited n. 60. 

664th Div FO 1, 15 May 44. 

67 JIC (44) 215 (0)) Periodic Review of Conditions in Europe and Scale of Opposition to ‘OVERLORD,’ 25 May 44. 
176 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

greatly increase the total offensive striking power of his troops in France although he might choose either to concentrate it or to spread it thin. 

The German tactics of all-out defense 

of the coast line were well known. It was 

assumed, however, that this did not mean 

literally a main line of resistance at the 

water’s edge but rather a short stubborn 

stand in the fortified coastal zone of long 

enough duration to permit attack divisions in immediate tactical reserve to 

launch holding counterattacks. These in 

turn would give time for the massing of 

armored reserves for a full-scale counterattack designed to drive the Allies back 

into the sea. If this were the German defense plan, then the location and quality 

of reserves were the critical factors in any 

estimate of enemy capabilities. 

Reserves available to Rundstedt were 

estimated at ten panzer and panzer grenadier divisions and fourteen to seventeen attack infantry or parachute divisions.ss But of these only about three to 

four panzer and two infantry divisions 

were considered first quality. It was expected that the enemy would be able to 

move one panzer and two infantry divisions into the invasion area on D Day to 

reinforce the defense and mount local 

counterattacks. Further reinforcements 

would trickle in during the next two days 

and would probably be committed piecemeal. By D plus 3 the enemy might have 

a total of three panzer, two parachute, 

and four attack infantry divisions in addition to his coastal defense troops. These 

reinforcements could be organized for 

large-scale counterattack by D plus 7. Estimates did not agree, however, as to 

68 CCS 454/6, Review of Conditions in Europe (10 

May 44)) 17 May 44; cf. JIC paper cited n. 67. 

either the likelihood of such an attack or 

the probable timing.69 What was clear 

was that at any time after D plus 3 considerable enemy pressure in the form 

either of a large co-ordinated counterattack or of a multiplication of piecemeal 

attacks could be expected. The Navy was 

therefore directed to land the maximum 

number of operational troops before that 

date. 

The German Army in the west awaited 

attack behind the much-advertised “Atlancic Wall” into which the enemy since 

1943 had been pouring a new rumor of 

impregnability with each bucket of concrete. But despite both rumors and concrete it was clear to Allied planners that 

the Atlantic Wall had few of the characteristics of a wall and was probably not 

impregnable, provided a sufficient weight 

of fire could be directed against it.70 Of 

prime concern to the Allies were the 

coastal batteries. Four batteries of 155- 

mm. guns were identified in First U.S. 

Army zone (a total of twenty-two guns), 

the most formidable of which was the sixgun battery at Pointe du Hoe. The Germans had two heavy (240-mm.) coastal 

batteries within range of Allied sea lanes 

and assault areas, one at Le Havre and one 

(batterie Hamburg) 71 at Fermanville 

east of Cherbourg. The latter, however, 

was little cause for concern. In May 

Allied reconnaissance ascertained that the 

enemy was busy casemating the Fermanville guns in such a way as to prohibit 

their being brought to bear against the 

OVERLORD assault. Last-minute intelli69Q See, e.g., CCS 454/5, 14 Apr 44. 

70 Naval Expeditionary Force Planning Memoranda-section I, 26 Dec 43. SHAEF AG file 045.93-Z. 

71This battery figured in the ground fighting 

later. See below, Ch. X. 

176 

greatly increase the total offensive striking power of his troops in France although he might choose either to concentrate it or to spread it thin. 

The German tactics of all-out defense 

of the coast line were well known. I twas 

assumed, however, that this did not mean 

literally a main line of resistance at the 

water's edge but rather a short stubborn 

stand in the fortified coastal zone of long 

enough duration to permit attack divisions in immediate tactical reserve to 

launch holding counterattacks. These in 

turn would give time for the massing of 

armored reserves for a full-scale counterattack designed to drive the Allies back 

into the sea. If this were the German defense plan, then the location and quality 

of reserves were the critical factors in any 

estimate of enemy capabilities. 

Reserves available to Rundstedt were 

estimated at ten panzer and panzer grenadier divisions and fourteen to seventeen attack infantry or parachute divisions.tls But of these only about three to 

four panzer and two infantry divisions 

were considered first quality. It was expected that the enemy would be able to 

move one panzer and two infantry divisions into the invasion area on D Day to 

reinforce the defense and mount local 

counterattacks. Further reinforcements 

would trickle in during the next two days 

and would probably be committed piecemeal. By D plus 3 the enemy might have 

a total of three panzer, two parachute, 

and four attack infantry divisions in addition to his coastal defense troops. These 

reinforcem~nts could be organized for 

large-scale counterattack by D plus 7. Estimates did not agree, however, as to 

68 ccs 454/6, Review of Conditions in Europe (10 

May 44). 17 May 44; d. JIC paper cited n. 67. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

either the likelihood of such an attack or 

the probable timing. 69 What was clear 

was that at any time after D plus 3 considerable enemy pressure in the form 

either of a large co-ordinated counterattack or of a multiplication of piecemeal 

attacks could be expected. The Navy was 

therefore directed to land the maximum 

number of operational troops before that 

date. 

The German Army in the west awaited 

attack behind the much-advertised "Atlamic Wall" into which the enemy since 

1943 had been pouring a new rumor of 

impregnability with each bucket of concrete. But despite both rumors and concrete it was clear to Allied planners that 

the Atlantic Wall had few of the characteristics of a wall and was probably not 

impregnable, provided a sufficient weight 

of fire could be directed against it. 70 Of 

prime concern to the Allies were the 

coastal batteries. Four batteries of 155-

mm. guns were identified in First U.S. 

Army zone (a total of twenty-two guns), 

the most formidable of which was the sixgun battery at Pointe du Hoe. The Germans had two heavy (240-mm.) coastal 

batteries within range of Allied sea lanes 

and assault areas, one at Le Havre and one 

(batterie Hamburg) 71 at Fermanville 

east of Cherbourg. The latter, however, 

was little cause for concern. In May 

Allied reconnaissance ascertained that the 

enemy was busy casemating the Fermanville guns in such a way as to prohibit 

their being brought to bear against the 

OVERLORD assault. Last-minute intelli69 See. e.g., CCS 454/5. 14 Apr 44. 

70 Naval Expeditionary Force Planning Memoranda-Section I. 26 Dec 43. SHAEF AG file 045.93-2. 

71 This battery figured in the ground fighting 

later. See below. Ch. X. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

gence reports cheered the enemy on, 

noting that "construction activity [was] 

continuing at good pace." 72 

In fixed emplacements it was estimated 

that the enemy had a maximum total of 

seventy-three guns that could fire on the 

American attack. It was believed, however, that he also had mobile artillery behind the coast. Allied intelligence especially warned of the enemy's highly 

mobile 170-mm. gun, which had a range 

of 32,370 yards. 73 The gun could be so 

easily handled that German practice was 

to fire not more than two rounds from the 

same pOSItiOn. Frequent displacement 

would, of course, make effective counterbattery fire almost impossible. All eight 

of the 170-mm. guns known to be in the 

U.S. invasion zone were bombed out of 

positions on the Cotentin during air raids 

in the middle of May and were thereafter 

unlocated.74 

In the early months of 1944, the Germans were observed to be working hard 

at strengthening their defenses along the 

invasion coast. On 20 February air photographs for the first time revealed antilanding obstacles below the high-water mark 

on certain French beaches. The discovery was no surprise but it was a cause for 

concern. German experimentation with 

beach obstacles had been reported in the 

early months of 1943. At about that time 

the British Combined Operations Headquarters had begun counterexperimentation in clearing such obstacles, chiefly in 

the expectation that they might be faced 

in Mediterranean operations. Allied 

naval planning for OVERLORD in late 1943 

72 NCWTF 1m Bull 2. 29 May 44. 

73 As compared to an estimated maximum range 

of 25.000 yards for the 155-mm. guns. 

74 NCWTF Int Bull 1.21 May 44. 

177 

gave prominent, if necessarily vague, consideration to the problem. But detailed 

provisions and training for coping with 

the obstacles had to wait until their full 

nature and extent became apparent. Allied reconnaissance watched with special 

interest the growth of the enemy's works 

in the tidal flats during the late winter 

and early spring.75 The growth was rapid. 

For example, at Quineville (east coast of 

the Cotentin) a double row of tetrahedra 

or hedgehogs 2,300 yards long, with 

twenty-six feet between obstacles, was laid 

in four days.76 

The enemy began placing his obstacles 

near the high-water mark and then thickened the bands seaward. There was then 

some talk among Allied planners of shifting H Hour to coincide with low tide so 

as to allow engineers as much time as 

possible to clear the obstacles before the 

tide covered them. 77 By the middle of 

May, however, the obstacles on the invasion beaches still did not extend below 

the eight-foot mark above low water. 

Planners calculated that, if in the remaining days before D Day they were not set 

any lower, the planned touchdown time 

three hours before high water would still 

permit Allied engineers to deal with the 

obstacles dry shod. Breaching the obstacles under these conditions was considered feasible, although V Corps had 

75 COS (44) 393 (0). Clearance of Underwater 

Obstacles. 3 May 44. SHAEF SCS file 800.8; cf. Ltr, 

Eisenhower to Marshall. 6 May 44. in which he lists 

first among the "worst problems of these days" the 

problem of how to remove underwater obstacles. 

Eisenhower Personal Files. 

76 FUSA Int Note No. 18. 24 Apr 44. Pre-Inv file 

631A. 

77 Memo. Cen Kean (FUSA CofS) • for Cen Bradley. 20 Apr 44. Pre-Inv file 631A. H Hour had been 

fixed in February at about half-flood. 
~ . , 

( . . . .' , 

. ." " '. '. I ...... 

. . 

" 

" 

-. . , 

J 

# " . 

" 

'\ 

, 

I . 

.. 

~ 

. 

~ 

~ 

~ 

. .. . ... ~ 

• .... -~ . 

. ' 

, 

. 

.. 

, 

• -. 

. 

VAUVILLE BEACH, SPRING 1944, Cotentin Peninsula west coast. 
OVERLORD REVISED 179 

soberly commented in March that it 

might be “expensive.” 78 

The enemy on the ground, though less 

formidable than his own propaganda reported, seemed formidable enough. On 

the sea and in the air there was little 

question of the Allies’ overwhelming 

superiority. The relatively insignificant 

German Navy was not expected to risk 

any of its large surface warships in attacks 

on Allied convoys in the Channel, though 

they might attempt diversionary sorties 

in the Atlantic against Allied shipping 

there. The enemy’s fifty to sixty E-boats 

(German S-Boote) carrying both mines 

and torpedoes were expected to be the 

greatest surface menace to the invasion 

fleet.79 But even these boats would probably attack only at night. The estimated 

130 ocean-going submarines (over 300 

tons) based in the Bay of Biscay and the 

25 short-range boats in the Baltic had 

never been used in the Channel. It 

seemed unlikely that they would take 

that risk even during the invasion, although they might be concentrated 

against assemblies of Allied shipping, especially in the western Channel approaches. 80The enemy was known to be 

experimenting with midget submarines 

and human torpedoes. These might be 

used close to shore against ships carrying 

the assault troops, but no one could even 

guess how many of these craft might be 

available by D Day. On the whole, the 

Allies predicted that their chief concern 

at sea would be enemy mines. In any 

case, they did not anticipate a determined enemy naval attack in the early 

stages of the assault. 

Estimates of the enemy’s air strength 

varied so widely that they might have 

been drawn from a hat. Certain judgments, however, seem to have been generally accepted. The German Air Force 

had increased slightly in numbers since 

the summer of 1943, but the increase, 

compared to the Allied build-up, was 

negligible. It was generally believed that 

the Luftwaffe would be capable of between 1,000 and 1,800 sorties on D Day 

against OVERLORD, but it was considered 

unlikely that the enemy would make 

anything like the maximum air effort in 

the early stages. Instead, he would probably try to conserve his aircraft for use 

in close support of the expected largescale counterattacks at the end of the first 

week after D Day.81 

Although Goering was credited with 

having more than 5,000 aircraft, the 

effort which that force could exert and 

sustain would certainly be considerably 

less than its size alone suggested. The 

superiority of the Allies would probably 

prevent the enemy from daylight bombing or would make such bombing ineffective and costly if it were attempted. 

The difficulties which the Germans were 

known to be experiencing with replacements in machines and crews would 

mean that the front-line air forces, however impressive, would have little depth. 

Allied bombing of airfields, furthermore, 

78 V Corps Breaching Plan, Underwater and Beach was likely to cause drastic curtailment of 

Obstacles,-17 Mar 42, prepared jointly by CG V 

Corps and Comdr 1 lth Amph Force. Pre-Inv file 647. 

79 NCWTF Int Bull 1, 21 May 44. 81For various estimates see AEAF Over-all Air 

80 NEPTUNE Monograph, prepared by Comdr Task Plan, 15 Apr 44. 12th A Gp file 370.2; JIC (44) 210 

Force 122, Apr 44. Pre-Inv file 252. (0) , 23 May 44; NCWTF Int Bull 1, 21 May 44. 
180 

Luftwaffe efficiency. It was deemed unlikely that the enemy would be able to 

get into the air more than 60 percent of 

his nominal front-line force. 

The German Air Force had been defeated by the Combined Bomber Offensive in the early months of 1944. This 

victory the Allies were sure of. The 

knowledge was the most important ingredient in the final decision to go ahead 

with OVERLORD. It was not certain, however, just how dangerous a death agony 

the Luftwaffe might still be capable of. 

Air Marshal Leigh-Mallory said afterward that he was always "confident that 

the German Air Force would constitute 

no serious threat to our operations on 

land, sea or in the air." He did admit, 

however, the possibility of a major air 

battle on D Day.82 

The basic assumption behind all Allied estimates of German military power 

in the west was that the enemy would 

make his supreme effort to defeat the invasion, hoping thus to achieve a compromise peace despite his hopeless situation 

on the Russian front. The principal 

weakness of the enemy was believed to be 

the depreciation of his reserves in men 

and materiel which would prohibit him 

from a sustained defense. The Allies 

were of the opinion that the Germans 

would stake everything on the initial 

battle of the beach. The decision to go 

ahead with OVERLORD therefore implied 

an estimate that the enemy's maximum 

strength was probably insufficient to win 

the battle for the beachheads. 

82 "Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford 

Leigh-Mallory" (submitted to the Supreme Allied 

Commander in November 1944), Fourth Supplement 

to The London Gazette No. 37838, 31 December 1946, 

pp. 40-41, cited hereafter as Leigh-Mallory, Despatch. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Objectives and Terrain 

The February revision of the OVERLORD 

plan did not affect the final objective of 

the operation in its later phases. The 

analysis of COSSAC and earlier planners 

which had led them to select the lodgment area in northwest France bounded 

by the Seine, Eure, and Loire Rivers was 

accepted, as well as the general timing 

and phasing of operations after the capture of Cherbourg. It was the assault 

phase plan that underwent drastic revision. 

The three beaches selected by COSSAC 83 had capacity only for three assault 

divisions. New beaches were required 

for the expanded attack. Extension of 

the front eastward to include the beach 

between Lion-sur-Mer and Ouistreham 

was readily accepted. (Map II) But the 

revived proposal to land a fifth division 

northwest of the Vire estuary met renewed opposition. The debate turned 

largely on the tactical implications of 

the topography of the NEPTUNE area. 

In the area were five regions with distinguishable topographical characteristics-the north Cotentin (rolling uplands 

north of Valognes), the south Cotentin 

(generally fiat and well watered), the 

Bessin (the coastal strip lying between 

Isigny and Bayeux), the Bocage (hilly 

wooded country extending south of the 

Bessin and Cotentin nearly to the base 

of the Brittany Peninsula), and the relatively open Caen country from Bayeux 

east and southeast.84 The three British 

88 Lion-sur-Mer _ Courseulles _ Arromanches, and 

Colleville-Vierville. 

84 The regional nomenclature here, not entirely 

consistent with current French usage, is derived from 

NEPTUNE Monograph, pp. 26-31. See n. 80. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

beaches all lay in the east portion of the 

Bessin and in the Caen country. There 

was no clear demarcation between the 

Caen country and the Bessin. But whereas the Bessin merged to the south with 

the Bocage, the Caen country spread 

southeastward into open arable land suitable for tank maneuver and, more important, for the development of airfields. 

In both the original COSSAC plan and 

the "Montgomery" plan, the securing of 

the Caen country for airfield development was a critical early objective for the 

assaulting forces. British troops were to 

take Bayeux and Caen on D Day, and 

push the bridgehead gradually south and 

southeast. They would then secure airfield sites and protect the east flank of 

U.S. forces whose primary mission, in 

both plans, was the capture of Cherbourg. COSSAC allotted only two British divisions to the initial tasks of taking 

Bayeux and Caen. For the same tasks the 

Montgomery plan would land three divisions by sea and in addition put .:n airborne division (less one brigade) east of 

the beachheads to secure crossings of the 

Orne River. In all the planning the vital 

importance of the "capture and retention" of Caen and neighboring open 

country was underlined. 85 On the other 

land no pre-D-Day plans called for exploiting the favorable tank terrain at any 

phase of the operation for a direct thrust 

southeast toward Paris. Instead, the British army would push gradually south and 

east of Caen until its left rested approximately on the Touques River and its 

right, pivoting on Falaise, swung toward 

Argentan-Alen<;:on. 86 

80 See, for instance, Second Br Army /83 Group, 2d 

TAF, Plan, 20 Mar 44. Pre-Inv file 631A. 

86 Montgomery, Brief Summary of Operation 

"OVERLORD" as Affecting the Army, 7 Apr 44_ Photo181 

In both the COSSAC and Montgomery 

plans the task of securing the Bessin fell 

to one U.S. corps, with one division in 

the assault. Critical topographical feature of the Bessin was the Aure River, 

which flows out of the Bocage to Bayeux 

and then turns west to parallel the coast 

line to Isigny where it joins the Vire 

near its mouth and empties into the 

Channel. The Aure in its lower reaches 

between Trevieres and Isigny runs 

through a broad, flat, marshy valley 

which can be flooded by damming the 

river. \Vhen flooded, the Aure in effect 

makes a peninsula of the coastal sector 

between Port-en-Bessin and Isigny. The 

"peninsula," varying in width from 

about a mile and a half at the eastern end 

to about five miles at the western, is a 

very gently rolling tableland. Most of it 

is cut up in the typical Norman pattern 

of orchards, hedgerow-enclosed meadows, 

and patches of trees. Only along the 

coast between Vierville-sur-Mer and St. 

Laurent is the country relatively open. 

Through the "peninsula" runs the main 

lateral road in the invasion area: a section of the principal highway from Paris 

to Cherbourg. This was the rope which 

alone could tie the five beachheads into 

one. Early control of it was essential for 

the security of the initial lodgment area, 

In the COSSAC plan the Bessin-Caen 

bridgehead would have been expanded 

south and southwest deep into the Bocage 

during the first week of the operation. 

A force would then have broken out 

northwest to sweep up the Cotentin and 

capture Cherbourg. Although this was 

deemed a feasible operation, the low 

marshy bottom lands of the Douve River 

static copy with Montgomery's penciled corrections 

in Hist Div files. 
182 

and its tributaries, which stretched nearly 

across the base of the peninsula, would 

have made it difficult. Subject to inundation, these almost continuous swamplands, traversed by only three main roads, 

draw an easily defended moat across 

about five-sixths of the peninsula. The 

only dry corridor is on the west coasta strip 5,000 to 6,000 yards wide between 

St. Lo-d'Ourville and St. Sauveur de 

Pierre-Pont, which could easily be held 

by a small enemy force. 

The overriding importance of Cherbourg had therefore led to early consideration of a simultaneous assault in 

the peninsula itself to establish Allied 

forces north of the Douve line. Such an 

attack became practicable only with the 

decision to employ five divisions in the 

assault. But even then it had serious disadvantages, chiefly because, in addition 

to the inundations at the base of the 

peninsula, there was a flooded coastal 

strip behind the best landing beach on 

the east coast. Across this flooded area, 

which was about two miles wide and 

extended from the Banes du Grand Vey 

to Quineville, narrow causeways provided the only exits from the beach. 

Four such exits led from the beach proposed for assault by one U.S. division. 

Again the terrain favored the defense. 

Relatively small German forces could 

hold these causeways, block Allied egress 

from the beaches, and quite possibly defeat the landing at the coast. The proposed solution was to employ an airborne division to be dropped before H 

Hour in the vicinity of Ste. Mere-Eglise 

wi th primary mission of seizing and 

holding the causeways in order to permit 

the seaborne infantry to cross unopposed. 

Even this solution involved risks which 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

some planners felt were not justified. 

The only previous Allied experience 

with large-scale airborne operations, in 

Sicily, had not proved a notable success, 

and these had been launched against an 

enemy relatively weak and unprepared. 

More important, it was pointed out that 

the same water barrier which barred the 

Cotentin from attack from the south 

could also be used by the enemy to maintain a wedge between the Allied bridgeheads on either side of the Vireo It was 

conceivable then that the enemy might 

defeat the landings in detail. Finally it 

was argued that the Bessin-Caen attack 

must be the main Allied effort. If it 

failed, success on the Cotentin could 

never be exploited. The fifth division, 

therefore, should be left in floating reserve to insure the success of the main 

landing and not committed in the longshot Cotentin gamble. 

This argument was presented in a 

SHAEF planning paper as late as 23 

January 1944.87 A week later, with the 

publication of the Initial Joint Plan, the 

decision was made that the risks of the 

Cotentin assault were worth taking in 

view of the need to secure the port of 

Cherbourg as early as possible. First U.S. 

Army was to assault on both sides of the 

Vire estuary with one regiment of VII 

Corps to the north on the beach later 

called UTAH and two regiments of V 

Corps between Vierville and Colleville 

on the beach later called OMAHA.88 First 

87 NEPTUNE-Comparison of Methods of Employ 

ment of Additional Resources. SHAEF G-3 files, 

bundle A-I (Pre-D-Day Planning Papers). 

88 Beaches UTAH and OMAHA were first designated 

X and Y respectively. The final code names were published by First Army in Amendment I to FUSA plan, 

3 Mar 44. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

Army's main task would be "to capture 

Cherbourg as quickly as possible."B9 

For the task of seizing and holding the 

causeways across the flooded strip behind 

UTAH Beach, the Initial J oint Plan allotted to First Army one airborne division. 

Further planning revealed that the force 

was inadequate and raised the larger 

problem of how airborne operations 

could best contribute to the success of 

OVERLORD. 

A irborne Planning 

General Morgan, it will be recalled, 

had been allotted two airborne divisions 

to be used in the assault but was given 

only 632 transport aircraft. His plan was 

to use two-thirds of one division plus 

seven to nine battalions in the initial 

drop on D Day to seize Caen and certain 

river crossings and coastal defenses. But 

even this force, he calculated, required 

372 more planes than he had. 90 The Quebec Conference, considering Outline 

OVERLORD) increased the allotment of air 

transport but found that, even counting 

the problematical availability of four 

U.S. groups, the total would still fall 

short of COSSAC's requirements. It 

appears, however, that the real difficulty 

as the time for OVERLORD approached was 

not in finding the necessary aircraft but 

rather in arriving at a conviction that 

they were needed. In the last weeks be89 Amendment 1,2 March 1944, to NEPTUNE Initial 

Joint Plan (see n. 59) added as a second priority 

task the development of the beachhead south toward 

St. La "in conformity with the advance of Second 

British Army." In the light of Second Army's mission to protect the left flank of First Army, this made 

a kind of circular relationship which amounted to 

telling both armies to keep pushing abreast. 

90 COSSAC (43) 36, 28 Jul 43. 

183 

fore the launching of OVERLORD) highlevel discussions of the use of airborne 

troops in the operation turned not so 

much on the availability of resources as 

on how, tactically, the forces should be 

employed. 

There was some early skepticism about 

the capabilities of airborne operations in 

conjunction with amphibious assault. The 

Dieppe raid commanders recommended 

against dependence on parachutists because they felt it would be almost impossible to secure a coincidence of 

weather and light conditions suitable 

both for air drops and for landing by 

sea.91 The development of navigation 

aids, however, greatly reduced this objection after 1942. On the other hand, 

the difficulties encountered in executing 

the airborne drop in Sicily gave some observers new reason for skepticism. In a 

report circulated among commanders 

planning the OVERLORD assault, Combined Operations observers wrote that 

airborne operations were risky and "undue dependence on airborne effort must 

only too often lead to disappointment or 

even disastrous consequences for land 

forces." 92 

This conclusion was fortunately not 

shared by either General Eisenhower or 

General Marshall. In their view the difficulties of the airborne operations in 

Sicily proved only the error of dispersing 

the effort. Both wanted greater mass in 

future drops. Eisenhower recommended 

that all troops should be landed at once, 

rather than in successive waves, and that 

larger forces should be employed. Gen91 Combined Rpt, The Dieppe Raid, Sep 42, Part 

V. SHAEF G-3 files, bundle A, item 9. 

92 CO Rpt, Lessons Learnt in the Mediterranean. 

14 Oct 43. Pre-Inv file 661. 
184 

era I Marshall agreed and added his 

opinion: "The value of airborne forces 

in OVERLORD would be immense, and 

would enable us to seize quickly and control ports which could not otherwise be 

used." 93 

Airborne commanders were thinking 

along much the same lines. The organization of the airborne division under the 

Army Ground Forces' concept of a light 

infantry division was ill adapted to its 

tactical employment in Europe. Maj. 

Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway (commander 

of the 82d Airborne Division), from his 

experience in Sicily, proposed in December 1943 a new Table of Organization 

which would have added some eight to 

nine thousand men, roughly doubling 

the current size of the division. 94 The 

purpose was to make it capable of sustained ground effort. Although the new 

organization fitted the developing concept of using airborne forces in mass, it 

was rejected first by Lt. Gen. Lesley J. 

McN air, Chief of the Army Ground 

Forces, and later, on re-examination, by 

the Joint Staff Planners.95 These actions 

postponed formal reorganization, but for 

European operations they made little 

practical difference. The two airborne 

divisions scheduled for use in OVERLORD 

were in fact swelled to something like 

the size recommended by General Ridg93 CCS 120th Mtg, 24 Sep 43. Eisenhower's recommendations were made in a letter to Marshall, 17 

Jul 43. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

04 Cbl, Marshall to Devers, R 6441, 1 Dec 43. WD 

Cable log. 

95 App. to CCS 496, 26 Feb 44. The gist of the planners' opinion was simply that it seemed "unwise to 

make any important changes in our airborne organizations until further tests in actual combat have 

been made." See Greenfield et aI., Organization of 

Ground Combat Troops, p. 349. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

way, by the attachment to each of two 

separate parachute regiments. 

The February revision of the OVERLORD 

plan struck out COSSAC's use of airborne forces in dispersed packets for a 

variety of commando objectives. COSSAC's plan to take Caen with airborne 

troops was also eliminated as unnecessary in view of the additional British 

division to be landed by sea. On the 

other hand, expansion of the front to the 

east raised a new tactical requirementthe need to secure crossings over the 

Orne River to cover the British left flank. 

This mission could best be accomplished, 

it was thought, by dropping parachutists 

on the east bank of the river. On 7 February General Eisenhower proposed that 

two divisions be dropped simultaneously 

in the U.S. and British zones "with such 

depth of means including trained crews 

behind the simultaneous lift to enable 

a third airborne division to be dropped 

complete 24 hours later." 96 To this the 

British air staff replied flatly that it was 

impossible because of the lack of trained 

crews. 97 Eisenhower for the moment ac96 COS (44) 140 (0), Airborne Forces for OVERLORD, 

7 Feb 44. 

97 Ibid. The difficulties of training air crews for 

airborne operations were discussed in detail in a 

memorandum by the Chief of Air Staff (COS (44) 

135 (0», 6 Feb 44. An excerpt follows: 

"The crew after passing out of the [Operational 

Training Unit] O.T.U. (3 months' course) and being 'converted' to the handling of heavy aircraft by 

day and night, require some 30 hours' basic training which consists mainly of map reading from low 

altitudes. The crew must also receive instruction on 

the use of radio aids to navigation. 

"When proficient as a crew and familiar with their 

equipment they begin training with troops, first 

dropping a few parachutists, then full 'sticks' and 

thence passing on to tugging gliders. 

"Finally the very highly organized system of assembly, take-off, manoeuvre and approach has to be 

learned and practiced. Some idea of the skill and 
OVERLORD REVISED 

cepted this verdict because he did not 

want to risk interference with the intensity of the bomber offensive. During 

February, however, it became apparent 

that there would be lift and crews enough 

for a simultaneous landing of one and 

two-thirds divisions. It was decided to 

land the lOlst Airborne Division behind 

UTAH Beach and two British airborne 

brigades (regiments) of the 6th Airborne 

Division east of the Orne River. 98 First 

Army in the meantime had asked for a 

second airborne division to block the St. 

Lo-d'Ourville corridor and prevent enemy reinforcement of the Cotentin. This 

requirement was to be met by dropping 

the 82d Airborne Division in the vicinity 

of St. Sauveur-Ie Vicomte on the night of 

D Day, using the aircraft returned from 

the initial operations. 

General Marshall, informed of the airborne plans in February, questioned the 

planners' apparent conservatism. He felt 

that they still contemplated piecemeal 

employment, which he regarded just as 

unsound tactically for airborne as for 

armor. As an alternative he recommended a bold plan outlined by General 

Arnold. Arnold's plan briefly called for 

the establishment on D Day of an airhead 

in the Evreux-Dreux area which would 

directly threaten the Seine River crosspractice required may be gained by realizing that 

one aircraft with fully loaded glider takes off in the 

dark from each airfield every 30 seconds; that over 

800 aircraft and 440 tows have to arrive at the right 

place at the right time after a night flight; and that 

it is intended to land some 440 gliders in 20-30 

minutes at their destination. 

"All this training after the O.T.V. stage at present 

takes 2 months and is then dependent on weather. 

No cut is possible without risking failure." 

98 NEPTUNE Initial Joint Plan, Amendment I, 2 

Mar 44. 

185 

ings and Paris. In recommending this 

scheme, General Marshall called it a true 

vertical envelopment involving a major 

strategic threat which the enemy would 

have to meet by a major revision in his 

defense. In effect it would open a new 

front. He admitted that such an operation had never been done before but 

added: "Frankly that reaction makes me 

tired." 99 He was anxious that full advantage be taken of the Allied airborne 

potential. He therefore sent the plan 

along to Eisenhower and dispatched a 

little War Department mission. of 

"young men" to defend its merits in the 

theater. 

Eisenhower studied the plan and rejected it. He agreed to the conception 

but not to the timing. "Mass in vertical 

envelopments is sound," he wrote, "but 

since this kind of an enveloping force is 

immobile on the ground) the collaborating force must be strategically and tactically mobile. So the time for the mass 

vertical envelopment is after the beachhead has been gained and a striking force 

built up." He went on to draw an analogy between the proposed airhead and 

the Anzio beachhead. The German, he 

reflected, had repeatedly shown that he 

did not fear what used to be called "strategic threat of envelopment." At Anzio 

"the situation was almost a model for the 

classical picture of initiating a battle of 

destruction. But the German decided 

that the thrust could not be immediately 

translated into mobile tactical action) and 

himself began attacking." 100 If the Anzio 

99 Ltr, Marshall to Eisenhower, 10 Feb 44. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

100 Ltr, Eisenhower to Marshall, 19 Feb 44. Eisen· 

hower Personal Files. 
186 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

beachhead could not succeed, though 

nourished from the sea and opposed by 

“inconsequential air resistance and only 

a total of some 19 enemy divisions in the 

whole of Italy,” how much less chance 

would the isolated Dreux airhead have in 

the midst of some sixty enemy divisions 

and dependent on precarious air routes 

for supply and reinforcement! 101

The fact is that even the decision to 

land two U.S. airborne divisions in the 

Cotentin was under severe criticism as 

unduly risky. The “Air people” anticipated heavy losses which they felt might 

result in negligible tactical achievement. 

Toward the end of April, Air Marshal 

Leigh-Mallory objected so strongly to 

the risks involved that a substantial revision of plans was made. There was now 

transport enough for the simultaneous 

dropping of the parachutists of both U.S. 

divisions. Leigh-Mallory agreed to this 

but insisted that most of the glider landings be made at dusk on D Day rather 

than earlier as first planned. He believed 

that they would suffer heavy losses by 

daylight and that large-scale landings 

early on D Day would force dispersion of 

the parachutists for defense of the landing zones. His objections were sustained 

and the changes made.102 

But this was not the end. Late in May, 

when Allied intelligence reported that 

the Germans had moved the 91st.Division into the Cotentin the risks of the air 

borne drops soared. Planners suggested 

moving the 82d Division drop zones to the 

101 Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 10 Mar 44. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

102Memo for SAC, 23 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 

373/2 I; Airborne-Air Planning Committee 9th Mtg, 

28 Apr 44. ET0 file 337 (Conferences (Secret) ) , 

1 AR-16-Dr 1. See Bibliographical Note. 

Merderet River, and shifting the 101st

zones slightly southward so that both divisions would be committed in the relatively small and easily defensible area between the beaches and the Douve and 

Merderet Rivers. This proposal had to be 

modified, however, because the area 

seemed too small for landings by two divisions. The compromise was to drop the 

82d Airborne Division astride the Merderet, two regiments landing west of the 

river with the mission of securing a 

bridgehead for exploitation to the west 

at least as far as the Douve.103 

Even so, the plan did not look promising. The Sicilian experience had convinced the British air staff that airborne 

troops should not be routed over heavily 

defended areas (either enemy or friendly) 

and that they should not be landed where 

they would be immediately faced with 

opposition.104 The proposed Cotentin 

drops violated both of these precautions. 

Air Marshal Leigh-Mallory took an increasingly pessimistic view of what he 

called “this very speculative operation.” 

On 29 May he told General Eisenhower 

that it was unwise to risk his carrier force, 

that casualties were likely to run over 50 

percent, and that the results would be so 

small that the airborne landings could 

not be depended on to insure the success of the UTAH Beach assault. General 

Eisenhower replied that he agreed the 

risks were great but that the airborne 

landings were essential to the whole operation and that therefore, if the invasion 

was to go in, the airborne risks must be 

accepted.105 

103 VII Corps revised FO, 28 May 44. 

104 COS (43) 552 (0) , Airborne Forces, 20 Sep 43. 

105Ltrs, 29 and 30 May. SHAEF SGS file 373/2 I. 

186 

beachhead could not succeed, though 

nourished from the sea and opposed by 

"inconsequential air resistance and only 

a total of some 19 enemy divisions in the 

whole of Italy," how much less chance 

would the isolated Dreux airhead have in 

the midst of some sixty enemy divisions 

and dependent on precarious air routes 

for supply and reinforcement! 101 

The fact is that even the decision to 

land two U.S. airborne divisions in the 

Cotentin was under severe criticism as 

unduly risky. The "Air people" anticipated heavy losses which they felt might 

result in negligible tactical achievement. 

Toward the end of April, Air Marshal 

Leigh-Mallory objected so strongly to 

the risks involved that a substantial revision of plans was made. There was now 

transport enough for the simultaneous 

dropping of the parachutists of both U.S. 

divisions. Leigh-Mallory agreed to this 

but insisted that most of the glider landings be made at dusk on D Day rather 

than earlier as first planned. He believed 

that they would suffer heavy losses by 

daylight and that large-scale landings 

early on D Day would force dispersion of 

the parachutists for defense of the landing zones. His objections were sustained 

and the changes made. 102 

But this was not the end. Late in May, 

when Allied intelligence reported that 

the Germans had moved the 91 st Division into the Cotentin the risks of the air 

borne drops soared. Planners suggested 

moving the 82d Division drop zones to the 

101 Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 10 Mar 44. Eisen· 

hower Personal Files. 

102 Memo for SAC, 23 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 

373/2 I; Airborne-Air Planning Committee 9th Mtg, 

28 Apr 44. ETO file 337 (Conferences (Secret», 

I AR-16-Dr L See Bibliographical Note. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Merderet River, and shifting the lOlst 

zones slightly southward so that both divi· 

sions would be committed in the relatively small and easily defensible area between the beaches and the Douve and 

Merderet Rivers. This proposal had to be 

modified, however, because the area 

seemed too small for landings by two divisions. The compromise was to drop the 

82d Airborne Division astride the Merderet, two regiments landing west of the 

river with the mission of securing a 

bridgehead for exploitation to the west 

at least as far as the Douve.103 

Even so, the plan did not look promising. The Sicilian experience had convinced the British air staff that airborne 

troops should not be routed over heavily 

defended areas (either enemy or friendly) 

and that they should not be landed where 

they would be immediately faced with 

opposition.104 The proposed Cotentin 

drops violated both of these precautions. 

Air Marshal Leigh-Mallory took an increasingly pessimistic view of what he 

called "this very speculative operation." 

On 29 May he told General Eisenhower 

that it was unwise to risk his carrier force, 

that casualties were likely to run over 50 

percent, and that the results would be so 

small that the airborne landings could 

not be depended on to insure the success of the UTAH Beach assault. General 

Eisenhower replied that he agreed the 

risks were great but that the airborne 

landings were essential to the whole operation and that therefore, if the invasion 

was to go in, the airborne risks must be 

accepted. 105 

103 VII Corps revised FO, 28 May 44. 

104 COS (43) 552 (0), Airborne Forces, 20 Sep 43. 

105 Ltrs, 29 and 30 May. SHAEF SGS file 373/2 L 
OVERLORD REVISED 

Development of the Lodgment 

After VII and V Corps secured footholds on either side of the Vire, they were 

to join up in the ground between the 

Vire and Taute Rivers. Originally both 

Carentan and Isigny were listed as D-Day 

objectives for VII and V Corps respectively.106 Detailed planning showed this 

project to be unduly optimistic. Carentan was eliminated, and instead the 101st 

Airborne Division was ordered simply to 

seize crossings of the river and canal 

north and northeast of the city and be 

prepared to take it "as soon as the tactical 

situation permits."lo7 Plans for the capture of Isigny were ambiguous. Although 

the city was clearly excluded from the 

D-Day objectives listed in the 1st Division 

Field Order of 16 April and from subordinate unit orders issued later, the 

29th Division on 29 May published a 

change to its field order which redrew 

the D-Day phase line to include Isigny.lo8 

V Corps always viewed the capture of 

Isigny as belonging to the first phase of 

the operations but apparently issued no 

order that it should be taken on D Day. 

On 3 June, however, in a command conference on board the Force 0 headquarters ship, the V Corps commander, Maj. 

Gen. Leonard T. Gerow, told his subordinate commanders that the 115th In106 NEPTUNE Initial Join t Plan, par. 63. 

107 lOlst Abn Div FO I, 18 May 44. 

108 Change reads that the 116th Infantry will "pre· 

pare to defend the D-day objective from La Cambe 

(excl) west to Isigny (incl) and the eastern banks 

of the Vire River north thereof." This compared to 

the second change, 18 May, which gave the 116th 

Infantry the mission to "prepare to defend the Dday phase line from La Cambe (exclusive) west to 

Isigny (exclusive) ... prepare to cross the Aure 

River west of Isigny for an attack on Isigny from 

the sou theast." 

187 

fan try should get to Isigny the first day if 

possible.lo9 

Whether or not Isigny was taken, the 

principal concern of V Corps initially 

was to secure the tableland north of the 

Aure and be prepared to repel enemy 

counterattacks. It was belieVed that junction of the two First Army beachheads 

would actually not require either corps 

to make a lateral movement in force. 

Southward advance especially by V 

Corps, it was thought, would probably 

force the enemy to pull out of the intercorps zone .110 

At the same time that the two corps 

were joining forces between Carentan 

and Isigny, VII Corps would clear the 

low rolling country of the south Cotentin as far west as the Douve.lll The VII 

Corps line would then be pushed up 

against the high ground of the north 

Cotentin, in some places within ten miles 

of Cherbourg. This line, running just 

north and northwest of the arc St. Vaastla Hougue-Valognes-St. Sauveur-Ie Vicomte, would be reached, it was hoped, 

by D plus 2. The 4th Division, joined 

by the 90th and later, if necessary, by the 

9th, would then make the final push to 

the port. This final phase through rugged country and the fortified hills that 

completely fenced the landward approaches to Cherbourg was first expected 

to take about a week. But after the Germans had reinforced the Cotentin the 

109 1st Div G-3 Jnl. 

110 General Gerow, Notes on V Corps Plan, undtd. 

Pre-Inv file 670. 

111 The revised VII Corps Field Order of 28 May 

makes no mention of cutting the peninsula, but 

contemplates an advance to Cherbourg on the 

Valognes axis with the corps' left flank resting on 

the Douve River. 
188 

date on which the port was expected to 

fall was set back to D plus 15.112 

While VII Corps took Cherbourg, V 

Corps, assisted after D plus 6 by XIX 

Corps, would push deep into the Bocage 

country to establish a line roughly including the Lessay-Periers-St. La road, 

the principal lateral communication 

south of the Carentan-Caen highway. 

VII Corps would then regroup to attack 

south and First U.S. Army would advance with three corps abreast to the line 

Avranches-Domfront, at the base of the 

Brittany peninsula. (Map III) The date 

set for the completion of this advance was 

D plus 20. At that point it was expected 

that the Third U.S. Army would become 

operational and First U.S. Army Group 

would take command over it and First 

Army. The new army group would then 

clear the Brittany peninsula, using First 

Army and such forces from Third Army 

as necessary. Thereafter both armies 

would face east, Third Army on the 

right. The Allied forces together would 

push to the Seine, securing the final lodgment area by about D plus 90 and completing the initial phase of Operation 

OVERLORD. 

The final stages of the operation were 

conceived and stated in these broad 

terms. The outlined scheme of maneuver and the timetables were not designed 

as tactical plans; they were frames of ref112 This was done at the recommendation of Gen· 

eral Bradley. See Ltr, Bradley to 21 A Gp, 26 May 

44, quoted in Memo for SHAEF G-3, 4 Jun 44, Status 

of Planning, 21 Army Group. SHAEF G-3 file GCT, 

Ops A (21 Army Group General). Build-up schedules were then changed to delay the bringing in of 

port repair and operating units and allow additional 

combat troops to land in the early phase. The 79th 

Division was attached from Third Army to VII 

Corps and was ordered to begin landing on D plus 8. 

See VII Corps revised FO, 28 May 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

erence for future planning, set forth primarily so that the men of the beginning 

should have some idea of the shape of the 

end, so that their thinking might be large 

and their preparation adequate. 

The Selection of D Day 

The general timing of the assault was 

determined, as noted, by the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff, in accordance with considerations of weather, availability of resources, and co-ordination with the Russians. The designation of I June as the 

target date meant that the actual assault 

would take place as soon as possible after 

that date. Selection of the day would be 

determined by the conditions required 

for H Hour. H Hour, in turn, would be 

chosen to secure an advantageous coincidence of light and tidal conditions. But 

just what those conditions should be was 

not easily formulated. 

The whole experience of the Mediterranean theater had been with night assaults. A considerable body of Army 

opinion favored continuing the pattern 

of surprise landings under cover of darkness in the attack against the Continent. 

OVERLORD) however, introduced new complications in its unprecedented size and 

the fact that it would go in against a 

heavily defended coast. The possibility 

of achieving tactical surprise seemed 

slight. Enemy radar would certain1y 

pick up the approach of the Allied armada by day or night. A night assault 

would impose uncertainty on the enemy 

as to Allied strength and intentions, 

but in order to attack at night the convoys would have to make the turn toward 

the invasion beaches in daylight. Darkness would interfere with the enemy's 
OVERLORD REVISED 

shooting, reducing risks to the invasion 

fleet and in particular covering the assaulting troops from observed small arms 

fire. It was noted, however, that if the 

enemy chose to use flares extensively this 

cover might evaporate. Furthermore the 

obscurity of night was a double-edged 

weapon-or, better, a twofold shield. It 

would be quite as effective in preventing 

the Allies from laying down artillery fires 

or carrying out aerial bombardment in 

preparation for the landings. This was, 

of course, the crux of the decision on 

daylight or night landing: could the 

Allies engage successfully in a fire fight 

with' enemy coastal defenders? Should 

they attempt a landing by a power plan 

or by stealth? 

COSSAC did not decide the question. 

Although noting that the requirements 

of the Navy for light in which to maneuver and to deliver observed fire support 

were likely to be decisive, the July OVERLORD plan did not outline a naval bombardment scheme. There was some 

doubt whether the ships for adequate 

fire support would be available. There 

was still more doubt whether naval fire 

could neutralize enemy defenses to an 

extent that would "reasonably assure the 

success of an assault without the cover of 

darkness." 115 

Resolution of the problem was to assault soon after first light so that, while 

maximum use could be made of darkness 

in covering the approach, the preparatory bombing and naval fire could be 

113 Memo, Col Partridge and Lt Col Bonesteel for 

Cen Bradley, IS Dec 43. 12th A Cp file 370.03 (Invasion) . Similar doubts had been expressed at the 

RATTLE Conference, held from 28 June to 2 July to 

discuss tactics of the assault. See discussion of Mountbatten's Memo on the RATTLE Conference at COS 

(43) 155th Mtg (0), 12 Jul 43. 

189 

delivered in daylight. The argument ultimately accepted in the determination of 

H Hour in the Initial Joint Plan was 

admirably set out in an analysis by Lt. 

Gen. John T. Crocker, Commanding 

General of the British I Corps,l14 The first 

essential, he said, was the development 

of "overwhelming fire support from all 

sources, air, naval and support craft ... 

to cover the final stages of the approach 

and to enable us to close the beaches. 

This requires daylight." Mediterranean 

experience, in his view, had shown that 

the effectiveness of naval fire depended 

on observation and that it had been 

much greater than was previously supposed. At least forty-five minutes of 

daylight, he estimated, would be necessary for full use of fire support, and he 

concluded that H Hour should be within 

one hour of first light. This was, in general, accepted. Certain adjustments had 

to be made, however, to allow for the 

other more rigid requirements for H 

Hour: suitable tidal conditions. 

The spring tide range on the Normandy Channel coast was about twentyone feet, the neap tide range about 

twelve feet. Low tide uncovered at OMAHA 

Beach a tidal flat of an average width of 

300 yards. Assaulting troops attempting 

to cross this flat would be entirely exposed to enemy small arms, mortar, and 

artillery fire. The higher the tide, the 

smaller the tidal flat and the less risk to 

the assaulting troops. The landings, however, had to take place on a rising tide 

to permi t the vehicle landing craft to 

ground, unload, and withdraw without 

having to dry out. The questions then 

to be answered were: how many vehicles 

114 Ltr, 14 Dec 43. 12th A Cp file 370.03 (Invasion). 
190 

should be landed on the first tide and 

how much time would that require? 

There was another difficulty. Outcroppings of rock off the beaches in the 

British zone would not permit a landing 

at low tide. But landings on all beaches 

had to be roughly simultaneous to avoid 

alerting the enemy before the entire mass 

of the attack could be applied. The 

happy mean seemed to be an H Hour 

three hours before high water. Since 

there was a two-hour stand of high water, 

the time thus decided was also only one 

hour after low tide.n5 

To fix rigid conditions of both light 

and tide for D Day would have placed the 

whole invasion unduly at the mercy of 

the weather. The possibility of a dayto-day postponement in case of bad 

weather was provided by allowing a certain flexibility in the interval between 

first light and H Hour. The minimum 

daylight period was to be thirty minutes; 

the maximum, an hour and a half. The 

required conditions of light and tide prevailed during three days each fortnight. 

An additional requirement of moonlight 

for the airborne drops further narrowed 

the choice to three days a month. The 

first possible D Days after the OVERLORD 

target date were 5, 6, and 7 June. H Hour 

on all tbose dates was to be staggered, 

varying by about an hour from east to 

west because of slightly varying tidal and 

beach conditions. 

Organization and Tactics of the 

Assault Forces 

Each of the five assault divisions was to 

be put ashore by a naval task force or11~ NEPTUNE, Initial Joint Plan, pars. 58-59. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ganized not only for the transport of the 

troops but for their protection in the 

crossing and their support by naval gunfire before and after the landings. In the 

U.S. zone Force U would land the 4th 

Division on UTAH Beach, and Force 0, the 

1st Division on OMAHA. These, together 

with Force B carrying the 29th Division, 

the follow-up for OMAHA Beach, were all 

under the Western Naval Task Force, 

commanded by Admiral Kirk. The three 

British assault divisions, similarly organized, came under the Eastern Naval 

Task Force commanded by Rear Adm. 

Philip Viano 

The assaulting infantry were to be carried in transports specially modified for 

the purpose. The transports would proceed to lowering positions, eleven miles 

offshore in the U.S. zone and seven miles 

offshore in the British zone. There the 

troops would be unloaded into LCVP's 

or LCA's, each of which carried about 

thirty men. The small craft were to go in 

abreast in waves to touch down at regular 

intervals along the whole length of the 

beaches to be assaulted.na 

The basic tactical problem of the assault was to smash through the hard 

shell of enemy shore defenses. Partial 

solution could be found in the normal 

techniques for attack against a fortified 

position. But amphibious attack introduced a significant and complicating difference. The assaulting infantry would 

have no room to maneuver. They could 

not fall back; they could not, except to a 

very limited degree, outflank enemy 

strong points. As the Dieppe commanders pointed out, even though "an assault 

116 NEPTUNE, Initial Joint Plan, pars. 54-56; d. 

[Charles H. Taylor] Omaha Beachhead (Washington, 1945) , p. 31. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

may take place on a flank of the main objective, it is in itself a frontal attack. 

Thus, once the assault is discovered, 

there is little room for subtlety. The main 

necessity is to batter a way through in 

the shortest possible time." 117 The essential lack of "subtlety" in the first phase 

might be mitigated by flexibility in the 

organization of the assault forces. To 

achieve that, the Dieppe commanders 

suggested using a minimum assault force 

on the widest practicable front while 

holding out a large floating reserve in 

readiness to exploit soft spots. The reserve, it was suggested, might well constitute half the total force. Instead of staking 

everything on a power drive, in short, it 

might be possible to "feel your way in." 118 

General Morgan and some of his staff 

were attracted by this concept, as has been 

pointed out, but their efforts to apply it 

were frustrated chiefly by the shortage of 

landing craft. 

In the end, little reliance was placed on 

probing for weakness and exploiting it 

through decisive commitment of reserves. 

The assault was considered as a frontal 

attack which was unlikely even to have 

the advantage of tactical surprise. The use 

of smoke to cover the final run-in to the 

shore was seriously considered in July 

1 943,1l9 but later experimentation led to 

its rejection. Trials at the Assault Training Center and in various Allied exercises 

showed that smoke tended to confuse assault troops as much as the defenders.12o 

117 Dieppe Rpt, cited n. 91. 

118 Address by Maj Cen Roberts (Dieppe Military 

Force Commander), at Assault Training Center, 7 

Jun 43. Adm file 491. See Bibliographical Note. 

119 Proposed revision of Field Manual 31-5, Landings on a Hostile Shore, 1 Jul 43. Adm file 491. 

120 Interv with Brig Cen Paul W. Thompson, cited 

in Jones, NEPTUNE, I, 204. 

191 

The final conclusions were that smoking 

of the hostile shore could not be sufficiently controlled, that it offered too 

many opportunities for fatal mistakes, 

and that by interfering with observed fire 

it would handicap Allied fire superiority_l2l 

An amphibious assault without cover 

of darkness or smoke, and without the 

flexibility of a large floating reserve, depended for success on developing a weight 

behind the initial attack that would not 

only crumble enemy defenses but would 

carry the assaulting troops far enough inland so that follow-up troops could be put 

ashore behind them to consolidate and 

then exploit the beachhead. The double 

requirement that the assaulting troops be 

able to knock out enemy fortifications and 

push rapidly inland required a careful 

balancing of striking power and mobility. 

The first proposal was to organize special 

assault divisions with one or two Rangertype battalions, small and lightly 

equipped for the special task of reducing 

fortifications. The "Ranger" battalions 

would land first, followed by normal battalions. The assault division would go in 

on a broad front and move fast. It would 

be strong enough, when reinforced by 

cannon companies and antitank weapons, 

to hold a beachhead maintenance line. Its 

task then would be finished and exploitation would be undertaken by normal infantry divisions of the follow-up.122 

The notion of a specially organized assault division was retained, but planners 

wished to minimize the structural changes 

and so facilitate the reconstruction of as121 Cf. Commentary on Exercise PIRATE, 12 Oct 43. 

Pre-Inv file 661. 

122 Address by Brig Cen Norman D. Cota at Assault Training Center Conf, 2 Jun 43. Adm file 491. 
192 

sault units for normal infantry tasks once 

they were through the enemy's fortifications. The assault divisions were formed 

therefore simply by reducing the overhead of a normal infantry division both in 

men and vehicles and increasing the normal infantry fire power. While the basic 

divisional structure remained unchanged, 

the rifle companies were organized in assault teams with special equipment to 

deal with fortified positions. The platoons 

of the assault companies were split into 

two assault sections apiece, each with 

twenty-nine men and one officer, the size 

being determined by the capacity of the 

LCVP. The two assault platoons in each 

company included rifle teams, a wire-cutting team, a bazooka team, a flame-throwing team, a BAR team, a 60-mm. mortar 

team, and a demolition team. The third 

platoon was similarly organized except 

that it had an 81-mm. instead of a 60-mm. 

mortar and a heavy machine gun instead 

of a BAR. After the assault, each platoon 

was to be reorganized into a normal rifle 

platoon with two rifle squads and a weapons squad. 

The infantry assault troops were to be 

stripped to the barest combat essentials, 

but their fist was to be mailed. A tank battalion attached to each of the assault regiments would lead the attack. A portion of 

the tanks were to be carried in on LCT's 

to touch down approximately with the 

first infantry wave. Another portion were 

modified for amphibious operation and 

were to be launched about five or six 

thousand yards off shore and swim in 

ahead of the assault waves.123 

123 These were M-4 medium tanks equipped with 

detachable canvas "bloomers"-accordion-pleated 

screens which when raised were capable of floating 

the 32-ton tanks by displacement. They had a duplex 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

The use of tanks in the assault was a 

subject of prolonged discussion and experimentation. In the end, the decision 

was to use them not as an armored force 

but as close-support artillery. Armor's 

characteristics of shock and mobility were 

to be disregarded, and no plans were to be 

made to use the tanks in exploitation 

from the beaches. Tanks were not the 

ideal assault artillery but they seemed the 

best available. Only armored guns had a 

chance of survival on the beaches. Tests 

indicated, moreover, that the tank 75-mm. 

or 76.2-mm. gun could be used effectively 

in neutralizing or destroying concrete 

pillboxes by firing into the embrasures. 

Tank fire so directed would enable the infantry to cut their way through the wire 

entanglements of the fortification, approach the pillbox with flame throwers 

and demolition., and destroy it. It was expected that the majority of the tanks 

would fire from hull down in the water 

and would not leave the beach at all during the assault phase.124 

Following closely the beaching of the 

first tank companies, the leading infantry 

wave would touch down, clear the 

beaches, and cover the landing of engineer demolition teams. The task of the 

engineers-to cut and mark gaps through 

the belts of shore obstacles before these 

were covered by the rising tide-was one 

of the most critical in the operation, and 

its successful accomplishment demanded 

meticulous adherence to the time schedule. The engineers were to work with 

drive-twin propellers for swimming and the nor· 

mal track drive for overland. From the duplex drive 

came their common name "DD's." 

124 Assault Training Center, Training Memos, 

ASLT-4, 15 Jan 44 and ASLT-I, I Mar 44. Adm file 

491. 
OVERLORD REVISED 

special naval demolition units and would 

have the assistance of tankdozers landed 

at this time. 

The succeeding assault waves would 

consist mostly of infantry and additional 

engineers to clear the beaches and mine 

fields inland. The first artillery units 

would come in about an hour and a half 

after the first landings. The heavy debarkation of vehicles across the beaches 

would start about three hours after H 

Hour. By that time the assaulting infantry was expected to have the beach exits 

cleared and to have fought their way well 

inland.125 

Fire Support 

The task of smashing through enemy 

beach defenses was to be facilitated as far 

as possible by naval fire support and air 

bombardment. The early pessimism about 

what fire support could accomplish was 

never entirely dissipated. A theoretical 

study made early in January 1944 concluded that effective neutralization of 

enemy coastal and beach defenses would 

require a naval force of a size that was 

obviously far beyond the range of possihility. The silencing of fifteen enemy 

coastal batteries, for instance, was estimated to require a force of twenty to 

twenty-three battleships or cruisers. The 

drenching of the assault beaches and neutralizing fire on known strong points 

would take about twenty cruisers and one 

hundred destroyers, on the basis of threetenths of a pound of high explosive per 

square yard of target area, or a total of 

125 For further details of the landing scheme as applied on OMAHA, see Taylor. Omaha Beachhead, pp. 

110-33. 

193 

3.375 tons of shells. 126 Not only were the 

ships allotted completely inadequate for 

the task. but there was considerable doubt 

whether even the optimum number of 

bombarding vessels could achieve what 

was demanded of them. COSSAC's naval 

staff estimated in the summer of 1943 that 

it would probably be possible to neutralize (though not destroy) medium and 

heavy coastal batteries, if they were not 

too numerous, but that naval fire support 

could not be relied on to deal with beach 

defenses or unlocated field batteries or 

provide effective close support for the assaulting troops.127 American experience 

in the landings at Tarawa seemed to confirm this pessimism. A full report of the 

Tarawa operation was studied in February by Admiral Ramsay, who observed 

that naval bombardment had apparently 

been effective against open emplacements 

but not against concrete. "The heaviest 

casualties," he noted further, "were 

caused by the failure to neutralize strong 

points and dug-outs during the period immediately before and after the touchdown of the assault." 128 

On the other hand, the experience of 

Dieppe had shown the imperative need 

for overwhelming fire support in an attack against a fortified coast.129 One step 

toward solution of the problem was to increase substantially the naval bombardment forces. Originally these were all to 

be British according to an agreement 

made at Cairo. In February Admiral 

Ramsay assigned one battleship, one 

monitor, seven cruisers, and sixteen de126 COS (43) 770 (0).7 Jan 44. 

127 COS (43) 464 (0). 12 Aug 43. 

128 Ltr. Ramsay to CinC 21 A Gp. Effects of Naval 

Bombardment of Heavily Defended Beaches. 18 Feb 

44. Pre-Inv file 676. 

129 Comb Rpt. The Dieppe Raid. Part V. 
194 

stroyers to the Western Naval Task Force 

to provide escort and fire support for 

First U.S. Army.130 It was realized, in the 

light of the tentative fire plan prepared 

by First Army, that this allocation was insufficient, but the British Admiralty reported that no additional ships could be 

found from British resources. Admiral 

Ramsay in March therefore requested that 

U.S. warships be assigned to OVERLORD.l3l 

During April and May, three U.S. 

battleships, two cruisers, and thirty-four 

destroyers arrived in the theater and were 

assigned to Admiral Kirk's command. 

Certain British ships were detached, but 

the net result was a substantial increase 

in the naval forces available to support 

First Army.132 Force 0 was allotted two 

battleships, three light cruisers, nine destroyers, and three Hunt destroyers 

(British); Force U was assigned one 

battleship, one monitor, three heavy 

cruisers, two light cruisers, eight destroyers, and one gunboat (Dutch). In addition Admiral Kirk was able to set up a reserve fire-support group consisting of one 

heavy cruiser, one light cruiser, and 

seventeen destroyers. The reserve group 

would relieve ships of the other two forces 

which either were badly damaged or had 

depleted their ammunition supply.133 

The fire support plan, in general, emphasized neutralization rather than destruction. It was hoped that, by bringing 

a continuous heavy volume of fire to bear 

on enemy defenses, they would be ren180 FUSA plan, Annex 21, 25 Feb 44. 

181 CbI, Eisenhower to Marshall, 20 Mar 44. Eisen· 

hower Personal Files; d. Cbl, Br Admiralty to Br 

Adm Div (JSM) , 28 Mar 44, Annex IV to COS (44) 

295 (0), 29 Mar 44. 

132 Amendment No.1. 1 May 44 to Operation 

NEPTUNE, Naval Orders. 12 A Gp files, dr 89. 

188 FUSA plan, Annex 12, 27 May 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

dered ineffective during the critical stages 

of the assault. Attacks by air and sea were 

thus planned in a crescendo up to H 

Hour. The first targets were the enemy 

coastal batteries capable of interfering 

with the sea approach. Second were the 

beach defenses, the series of enemy resistance nests, which housed infantry weapons designed to check the assaulting 

troops on the beaches. Finally, naval guns 

were to furnish heavy artillery support 

for the infantry advance inland, pending 

the landing of army long-range artillery.134 

The project of neutralizing enemy 

coastal batteries began long before D Day. 

Allied air forces were assigned missions 

against them during the preparatory 

period. At that time only those batteries 

were to be attacked which had casemates 

under construction, for the object was not 

so much to destroy the guns as to arrest or 

delay work on the protective covering.135 

Actually in the spring nearly all the important batteries in the invasion area were 

still in the process of being encased in 

concrete. Attacks against them, however, 

were severely limited on the one hand by 

the necessity for concealing from the Germans the selected assault areas and on the 

other hand by the tactical air forces' heavy 

prior commitments.136 Security considerations led to the policy of bombing two 

coastal batteries outside the assault area 

for each one bombed inside. Only about 

10 percent of the total bomb tonnage 

dropped during the preparatory phase 

(from the middle of April to D Day) was 

134 Ltr, Gerow to CG, FUSA, Prearranged Naval 

and Air Bombardment Plan, 13 Mar 44. Pre-Inv file 

676. 

135 AEAF Overall Air Plan, 15 Apr 44. 12th A Gp 

file 370.2. 

186 See below, Ch. VI. 
PREINVASION BOMBING of Pointe du Hoe by Ninth Air Force bombers. 
196 

directed against coastal batteries, and only 

a third of that was expended in the invasion area.137 

First U.S. Army in a series of plans 

through May spelled out the details 

of the counterbattery plan as it affected 

the U.S. zone. The battery at Pointe du 

Hoe, consisting of six 155-mm. guns with 

an estimated range of 25,000 yards, remained top priority in each phase of the 

counterbattery program. It was capable of 

firing on lowering positions 138 for both 

U.S. assault forces and against landings 

all along the coast from Port-en-Bessin in 

the British zone to Taret de Ravenoville 

north of UTAH Beach. In addition to receiving a considerable percentage of Allied bombing and shelling, Pointe du Hoe 

was singled out for early capture after H 

Hour by the 2d Ranger Battalion operating under V Corps. Besides Pointe du 

Hoe, First Army asked for bombardment 

of four other batteries before the night of 

D minus 3. They were to be attacked during daylight by medium bombers and at 

night by heavies of the RAF.139 

These earliest attacks were naturally 

enough concentrated against the heaviestcaliber guns in the assault area. Intensification of the attacks on enemy defenses as 

the hour of assault approached brought 

in numerous smaller batteries and increased the weight of the effort. If by D 

minus 1 it was estimated that the enemy 

was no longer in doubt as to the selected 

assault area, then 50 percent of the available heavy day bombers would be put on 

six batteries in the First U.S. Army sector. 

If it seemed likely that surprise was not 

131 Calculations are from statistics in Leigh-Mallory, Despatch, pp. 46-47. 

188 Also called "transport areas." 

139 FUSA plan, Annex 12 (Fire Support), 2d Rev, 

27 May 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

lost, then only half as many bombers 

would attack.140 Not until the night of D 

minus I would bombardment be concentrated in the OVERLORD area without regard for deception. Then RAF bombers 

would attack "with maximum operable 

strength" ten coastal batteries, including 

six in the First Army zone.l41 Medium 

bombers would take up the attack against 

some of these batteries beginning thirty 

minutes before H Hour, joined by heavy 

day bombers from H minus 15 to H minus 

5. Four other inland batteries would be 

attacked by fighter bombers from H Hour 

to H plus 10. In the meantime naval bombardment forces would have come within 

range. At first light, battleships and heavy 

cruisers would open main battery fire on 

enemy coastal guns.l42 

Coincident with the final phases of 

the counterbattery fire beach drenching 

would begin with simultaneous bombardment from sea and air. While heavy 

bombers of the Eighth Air Force attacked 

ihirteen beach defense targets in the 

OMAHA area, medium bombers, beginning 

thirty minutes before H Hour, would attack defenses at UTAH.143 But the burden 

of the task of saturating enemy shore defenses to cover the final run-in of the assault forces was assigned to the lighter 

ships of the naval bombardment forces 

HO Ibid. 

U1 AEAF Overall Air Plan, cited n. 135. 

HZ FUSA plan, Annex 12, 27 May 44. 

143 In early planning it was thought that cratering 

of beaches would be an important tactical by-product of this bombardment, and troops were briefed to 

expect to find cover in shell and bomb holes. See 

proposed revision of Field Manual 31-5, 1 Jul 43. 

Adm file 491. RATTLE Conference, however, assumed 

cratering to be an "adverse" effect of bombing from 

the Army point of view. See RA'ITLE Conf 3d Mtg, 29 

Jun 43. SHAEF SGS file 337/6. Actually the only 

significant cratering that took place was at Pointe du 

Hoe. See below, Ch. IX. 
OVERLORD REVISED 197 

-especially the destroyers and support 

craft.144 Specific beach targets were mostly 

machine gun positions, many having concrete personnel shelters with some light 

artillery pieces. It was not expected, however, that specific targets would be destroyed. Ground commanders asked for 

the destruction of only three targets in the 

Port-en-Bessin area; all others were to be 

neutralized.145 Much reliance was placed 

on the support craft which could continue 

to fire up to H Hour after heavy-caliber 

naval gunfire had to be lifted to targets inland in order to avoid endangering the 

first waves of troops. Particularly important were the rocket craft, LCT(R)‘s, 

which had performed well in the Mediterranean.146 

The availability of support craft, however, was always uncertain, and in the end 

only twenty-three could be assigned to 

support U.S. landings. U.S. commanders 

therefore early considered firing divisional artillery from landing craft. Extensive experiments were conducted by the 

British Combined Operations Headquarters in early 1943. In general those proved 

that self-propelled 105-mm. howitzers 

could achieve an acceptable accuracy in 

direct fire while afloat at ranges from 10,-

000 yards. 147 There developed a certain 

disposition then to think of artillery in 

the assault as moving landward from suc144Light cruisers also participated and the Force 

U plan called for the battleship Nevada and the 

heavy cruiser Quinsy to fire their five-inch batteries 

at beach targets. See Naval Task Force U, Operations 

Order, Annex D, 15 May 44. 

145Norfolk House Mtg, 24 Apr 44, to consider the 

engagement of beach targets in the U.S. First Army 

area. ET0 337 (Conferences (Secret) ) AR-16-Dr 1. 

146CO Rpt, Lessons Learnt in the Mediterranean, 

14 Oct 43. Pre-Inv file 661. 

147 Address by Col H. F. G. Langley (COHQ) , at 

Assault Training Center Conf, 1 Jun 43: cf. proposed 

revision of Field Manual 31-5. Both in Adm file 491. 

cessive firing positions as it would displace 

forward in normal land combat.148 Doctrine of Combined Operations was that 

self-propelled guns should be capable of 

direct fire while afloat, and of direct and 

indirect fire both from beached craft 

and from hull down in the water. Accepting these theories, U.S. commanders 

planned to supplement their close-support craft with LCT’s modified to take 

two or three medium tanks apiece in position to fire during the approach to shore, 

and with normal LCT(5)‘s carrying 105- 

mm. self-propelled howitzers, also in position to fire while afloat.149

Final phase of the fire support plan was 

the arrangement for naval firing in support of the Army’s advance inland. To direct this fire, each of the three assault divisions (4th, 29th, and 1st) had nine naval 

fire support control parties; nine naval 

gunfire spotting teams were to drop with 

the 101st Airborne Division.150 Air observation was to be furnished by forty aircraft of the British Fleet Air Arm, augmented by one RAF squadron and three 

reconnaissance squadrons, the latter to be 

relieved not later than noon on D Day 

for return to normal reconnaissance duties.151 

148 Address by Col M. W. Brewster, Chief, Tactics 

Subsection, at Assault Training Center Conf, 1 Jun 

43. Adm file 491. 

149 Western Naval Task Force had nine LCG (L) ‘s 

armored and equipped with multiple rocket projectors; sixteen LCT(A) ‘s equipped to carry 

medium tanks; and six LCT (HE) ‘s, similar to the 

LCT (A) but with less armor protection. There 

were also eleven LCF’s mounting AA-guns. Two LCT 

(A)‘s or (HE)‘s were to carry a platoon of tanks 

between them. The fifth tank could fire rockets if 

desired. FUSA plan, Annex 21; cf. Western Naval 

Task Force, Operation Plan, 21 Apr 44. 

150 Some of the parties assigned to the 29th Division would operate with the 2d and 5th Ranger 

Battalions. FUSA plan, Annex 21. 

151 AEAF Overall Air Plan, 15 Apr 44. 
CHAPTER VI 

Preliminary Operations 

The French Resistance 

When the Germans conquered France 

in the spring of 1940, they sealed their victory with a symbolic flourish. It was as 

though by dictating the terms of humiliating armistice in the historic railway carriage at Compiegne they meant to prove 

not only that France was beaten but that 

she was helpless even to save her dignity 

in defeat. So it must have seemed in the 

railway car and so, too, throughout most 

of the country. But there were still a few 

Frenchmen who experienced the fact of 

defeat and witnessed the symbol of humiliation without accepting the finality of 

either. In 1940 they could not have 

seemed very dangerous to the conquerors 

or, for that matter, very potent to themselves. Their reaction was spontaneous 

and personal. Yet they were the seeds 

which, nourished by arms and Allied organizers through four years of occupation, 

grew into an undergrol,lnd army numbering about 200,000 men-an army that 

after the Allied landings in June 1944 impressed Allied leaders as having made a 

substantial contribution to the defeat of 

the enemy.l 

During the first two years of the occupation, the Resistance movement developed separately in the occupied and 

unoccu pied zones. When the Germans 

1 Diary of CinC, 17 Jun 44; Rpt, Donovan (OSS) 

to Marshall, 9 Jul 44. OPD file 336.2, sec. II, cases 

29-47. 

finally moved into southern France in N 0-

vember 1942, Resistance leaders were 

faced with the problem of bringing some 

sort of unity out of the anarchy of rival 

groups. At that time the northern zone 

had six independently organized groups; 

the south had three. Only one organization, the communist Front National, 

which operated through the Francs 

Tireurs et Partisans, extended control 

over both the northern and southern 

zones. 2 Between the other groups there 

was virtually no co-ordination. Their separateness was due not only to the fact that 

as clandestine organizations they lacked 

regularized communications; more importantly they were divided by differing 

shades of political opinion. The French 

Resistance cannot be viewed as a simple 

revolt against the enemy, although opposition to the Germans was, of course, always the prime motive. It must be seen 

also as a movement aimed, at least by its 

leaders, at eventual national independence. Whoever controlled the underground would evidently be in the strongest position to control the liberated nation. 

The chief impetus toward national unification came from General Charles de 

Gaulle's headquarters in London. General de Gaulle began in 1940 the formation of a special staff, later known as the 

Bureau Central de Renseignements et 

2 MS # B-035 (Roge), A History of the FFI. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 199 

HITLER LEAVING RAILWAY CARRIAGE AT COMPIEGNE where the GeTmans dictated the 1940 peace terms to the French nation. 

d'Action (Militaire) (BCRA), charged 

with the organization, direction, and supply of the Resistance. Contacts between 

de Gaulle and the native Resistance were 

established through agents supplied by 

the British. The BCRA worked for nearly 

two years (from the summer of 1941 to 

the spring of 1943) with Resistance leaders to amalgamate the Resistance groups. 

Their work culminated in the formation 

of a National Committee (le Conseil National de La Resistance) which met for the 

first time in Paris on 27 May 1943. The 

committee under the presidency of 

Georges Bidault included representatives 

not only of the main Resistance groups 

but of the principal political parties as 

well. Politically the new National Committee recognized General de Gaulle and 

the London committee as trustees of the 

interests of the French nation and responsible eventually for founding a French 

government on democratic principles. De 

Gaulle's personal representative, Jean 

Moulin, was selected as political leader of 

the Resistance. Militarily the committee 

created an underground army (l'Armee 

Secrete) under the direct command of 
200 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

General Delestrain (known to the underground as General Vidal). The Army was 

elaborately organized on a regional basis 

and regional commanders selected. Primarily this organization was intended as 

a framework for the ultimate open co-operation of the French underground with 

the Allied armies.3 

Much of the success of this first de 

Gaullist national organization was illusory, for it is evident that the Gestapo 

was aware of its progress and waited only 

for its completion before striking in June 

1943 with wholesale arrests. De Gaulle’s 

representative died under torture. General Delestrain was shot. The leadership 

of the underground army was decimated. 

The national organization was shattered, 

and Resistance groups throughout the 

country suffered heavy losses.4 

In the widespread catastrophe, however, there were some encouraging facts. 

By tipping their hand in the summer of 

1943, apparently in the expectation that 

Allied landings were imminent, the Germans revealed the fatal weaknesses of the 

highly centralized underground organization in time to permit the establishment 

of a new system of control before D Day. 

Furthermore, although the underground 

suffered severe personnel losses both 

among native resisters and among agents, 

a surprisingly small percentage of supplies was lost and, on the whole, the supply reception committees were able to 

3 French Forces of the Interior, MS, pp. 9-40. Hist 

Div files. This is a 1,500-page history prepared in 

the European Theater Historical Section, under 

direction of Colonel S. L. A. Marshall, by United 

States, French, and British members of the OSS. Cited 

hereafter as FFI History. 

4FFI History, p. 40. 

continue operations in most parts of the 

country.5

Despite their losses, the Resistance 

groups displayed a remarkable resilience, 

and reorganization began at once. It is impossible in short space to describe the 

many ramifications of the new organization. In general it may be said that a nominal national unity was retained while sabotage and paramilitary action were controlled regionally. The Germans continued to make periodic arrests of Resistance leaders, but the new decentralization 

localized the damage to the movement. 

Concurrently with the organization of 

the Resistance for eventual overt activity, 

both the BCRA and a purely British organization, the SOE (Special Operations 

Executive), were concerned with encouraging, directing, and supplying immediate and continuing sabotage. The SOE 

was formed in November 1940 and made 

the responsibility of the Minister of Economic Warfare-a responsibility that was 

added to the minister’s duties as head of 

a department. The first mission of the 

SOE was to investigate the capabilities of 

the French Resistance, stimulate passive 

resistance in French industry working for 

the Germans, and study the possibilities 

of forming an underground army. As it 

began to work through agents in the field, 

the goal of encouraging passive resistance 

was gradually supplanted by the more ambitious aim of developing French Resistance into a strategic weapon that could be 

directed by Allied headquarters against 

military objectives in conformity with the 

master Allied plan.6

5 Memo, SOE, Present Value and Tempo of Resistance, 9 Oct 43. SHAEF G-3 file 322-7 II, Ops C. 

6FFI History, pp. 344-45. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 201 

The SOE did not attempt to interfere 

directly in the indigenous organization 

of the Resistance. The British were content to deal with the groups as established 

and confine their efforts to setting up and 

maintaining communications between 

the Resistance and London. The main 

task at first was to supply the resisters with 

arms and sabotage equipment. Later the 

SOE undertook to direct and co-ordinate 

Resistance action in accord with the OVERLORD plan. 

The first SOE agents parachuted into 

France in the spring of 1941. Among them 

was a French radio operator, Begue. 

Through Begue, contact was made with 

some of the Resistance groups and arrangements made for the first supply mission flown on the night of 7 July 1941. 

Containers packed with explosives, small 

arms, flashlights, and a radio were parachuted to ground organized by members 

of the Resistance. Location and markings 

of the grounds had been previously reported to London by Begues radio. This 

was the first of many “shipments” of arms 

to the French underground which would 

forge out of the will to resist an effective 

weapon of war. But success was still far 

in the future. The year 1941 ended for 

the SOE in failure. Through treachery 

most of the British agents in the field were 

arrested, including Begue and the slender communications link with London 

was snapped.7

The lesson drawn by the SOE from this 

experience was the impracticability of 

canalizing control through a central communications channel. Not only was the 

single communications channel much too 

vulnerable itself but it required the mul7 Ibid., pp. 347-49. 

tiplication of contacts between agents and 

Resistance groups and thus increased unnecessarily the risk that treachery or indiscretion would compromise a widespread organization. Henceforward the 

aim of the SOE was to create independent 

groups with independent communications with London. During 1942, seventeen radio operators, as well as thirty-six 

other agents, were parachuted into France. 

As communications became relatively secure and continuous, supply missions 

were flown in increasing numbers. Additional personnel and materiel were also 

landed by small boats plying between 

Gibraltar and the southeast coast. Deliveries by sea were especially important 

during the winter when bad weather all 

but prevented air drops. The total 

amount of supplies sent during the year, 

however, was very small. In twelve months 

of operation, for instance, only a little 

over one ton of explosives was dropped 

to saboteurs.8 

SOE efforts to supply the Resistance 

movements were always handicapped by 

insufficient air transport. In 1942 and 

through most of 1943 two squadrons (of 

approximately twenty aircraft each) were 

employed to carry out SOE missions. The 

SOE continually begged for more aircraft, 

but every plane assigned to it had to be 

diverted from the bomber offensive and 

the Resistance seemed like a nebulous 

kind of operation to feed at the expense 

of dropping bombs on German industry.9

8 Materials sent during 1942 were as follows: 2,265 

lbs. of explosives; 269 Sten guns; 388 pistols; 856 

incendiaries; 3,424 abrasive products; 630 standard 

charges (clams); 269 cells (food, tobacco, medical 

equipment, etc.). FFI History, p. 351. 

9 Memo, SIS-SOE/SO Aircraft Requirements, 14 

Jan 44. SHAEF SGS file 370.64. 
202 

Furthermore, throughout 1943 the SOE 

program to supply the Balkan guerillas 

had a higher priority than its operations 

in western Europe. All this meant that, 

although from time to time additional 

planes were available for SOE operations 

in France, the supply never kept pace with 

the growing demands from the field.lO 

These demands forced repeated examination of what role the Resistance 

could be expected to play in the liberation of France and how much reliance 

could be placed on it. Planners tended to 

be cautious. First of all, it was difficult to 

get any accurate assessment of the actual 

or potential strength of the movement. 

Second, there was always a danger that the 

movement might be emasculated by arrests on the eve of invasion. Third, even 

though much had been done to organize 

the various patriot groups, it was certain 

that control of their activities would be 

difficult and incomplete. COSSAC, in 

drawing up the original OVERLORD plan, 

decided to regard Resistance activities as 

a bonus and to place no reliance on them 

to accomplish strategic objectivesY 

In criticizing the plan, the British 

Chiefs of Staff asked whether a more definite strategic role might not be assigned 

to the Resistance. A committee representing Army and SOE discussed the question 

and concluded that COSSAC's appraisal 

was generally fair but "it erred on the side 

of caution and did not emphasize the wide 

strategic possibilities." \\That the committee was thinking of was a national uprising. It believed that the sabotage of Resistance groups could not be regarded as 

a strategic weapon unless "backed by a 

general strike or by a rising on a national 

10 FFl History, pp. 396c-96d. 

11 Outline OVERLORD, Part II, par. 23. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

scale." Such an uprising, the committee 

thought, would be desirable from a military standpoint but might be politically 

objectionableP 

Actually there seems little doubt that 

the concept of a national uprising, which 

cropped up in discussions of Resistance 

from time to time, was always unrealistic. 

A French officer working for the OSS (Office of Strategic Services) commented that 

the "favorite notion" of mass uprisings 

"posited the existence of universal courage, whereas courage only inspired a few 

men-as it has always inspired the few 

rather than the many. And the idea of 

mass uprisings implied battling against 

modern tanks with the stone-throwing 

catapults of Caesar's time." 13 

The decision apparently was that mass 

uprisings were at least sufficiently unlikely 

that no reliance could be placed on them. 

In February 1944 SHAEF's conclusion 

was still that Resistance activity must be 

regarded as a bonus.14 In view of this conclusion, the project of supplying the Resistance might have languished, but as a 

matter of fact it received a strong forward 

impetus. In the beginning of 1943, the 

Germans put into effect a forced labor 

draft in France. To escape this draft thousands of young Frenchmen, particularly 

in central and southern France, broke 

into open rebellion. They formed maquis 

bands in hilly and wooded regions and 

began guerrilla warfare against the Germans and the collaborationist French 

Militia. SOE sent agents to contact these 

maquisards and began dropping arms 

12 Progress Rpt, Operation OVERLORD, 10 Sep 43. 

SHAEF G-3 file 322-7 II, Ops C. 

13 Rpt, Analysis of the Resi'tance Movement, 9 

Dec 43. SHAEF G-3 file 370-4-1, Ops C. 

14 Memo, Bull for Morgan, 5 Feb 44. SHAEF SGS 

file 370.64 I. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

and supplies to them,15 The maquis developed into an important movement by 

the fall of 1943. The Prime Minister then 

became interested and in January ordered that an additional thirty-five British aircraft be made available for arming 

the maquis groups of southeastern France. 

With this new transport strength, supply 

drops in February were increased 173 percent.I6 Permanent assignments of aircraft 

for SOE use rose steadily thereafter. In 

January, 50 successful sorties were flown; 

in April, 331; in May, 531; and in June, 

866,17 

The increase in the tempo of supply deliveries reflected also the beginnings of 

American contributions of aircraft. In 

1943 the OSS began operating through 

agents in France. The London headquarters of SO (Special Operations branch of 

OSS) collaborated with SOE and gradually amalgamated with the British 

agency. The amalgamation was completed by January 1944. That month U.S. 

planes flew their first successful supply 

mission into France. In late February, 

however, the chief of Special Operations, 

Col. Joseph P. Haskell, was still concerned over the small scale of the American contribution. He feared especially 

the political repercussions on AmericanFrench relations of allowing the British 

to continue carrying the main burden of 

1~ The first operation took place on 20 March 1943, 

but supplies were sent on a very meager scale until 

the fall of the year. The first agents to the maquis 

were sent in October. FFI History, pp. 362-63. 

16 Sixth Monthly Progress Report to SHAEF from 

SOE/SO Hq, London, 7 Mar 44. SHAEF SGS file 

319.1/10. The planned increase was 300 percent but 

bad weather interfered with operations. Of 400 

sorties attempted during the month only 166 were 

successful. 

17 See SOE/SO Rpts in SHAEF SGS file 319.1/10. 

203 

supporting the Resistance,18 The State 

Department two months later warned the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff that the impression 

was gaining ground among the French 

that, whereas the British were doing 

everything possible to arm the French 

patriots, the United States was holding 

back for political reasons.19 Thus in May, 

twenty-five more U.S. aircraft were assigned to Special Operations over the protests of Air Marshal Sir Arthur W. Tedder who, doubting the value of the Resistance movement, considered the increase unjustified. 20 

Air Marshal Tedder's doubts were unquestionably shared by many in the Allied command,21 and the effectiveness of 

the Resistance as revealed after D Day was 

very generally regarded with surprise. 

There had been signs of the capabilities 

of the Resistance to undermine the German military power in France, particularly in the monthly reports which SOE 

and later SOE/SO headquarters submitted to COSSAC and SHAEF from the fall 

of 1943 when Special Operations was 

placed under the general control of the 

OVERLORD command. But the signs were 

hard to read. Sabotage consisted of a number of more or less un-co-ordinated pinpricks chiefly against various war industries working for the Germans, railroads 

and canals, and telephone and telegraph 

18 Ltr, Haskell to Donovan, 22 Feb 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 370.64 I. 

19 Cbl, JCS to Eisenhower, 17 Apr 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 370.64 I. 

20 Memo, Gen Bull for SHAEF CofS, SOE/SO 

Request for Additional Aircraft, 19 Apr 44; Memo, 

idem., Allocation of Additional Aircraft for SOE/SO 

Missions, 28 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 370.64 I. 

21 At COS (44) 163d Mtg (0), 18 May 44, General 

Smith said that "latest reports" had made the Supreme Commander "discount the value of French 

underground organizations." 
204 

systems. It was difficult to add them up 

and see what they amounted to in terms 

of damaging the enemy's total defensive 

capabilities in France. 

The most continuous and probably most 

effective sabotage was that directed 

against the French railroads. Attacks were 

made to derail German troop and supply 

trains, to cut tracks, blow bridges, and 

damage locomotives. Directed by SOE/ 

SO headquarters, railway sabotage was 

greatly accelerated in 1944 and tied in to a 

certain extent with the Allied air offensive against enemy transportation.22 Damage done by saboteurs compared favorably 

with that inflicted from the air. In the 

first three months of 1944 the underground sabotaged 808 locomotives as compared to 387 damaged by air attack. However, in April and May, air attack was 

stepped up and accounted for the damaging of 1,437 locomotives compared to only 

292 put out of action by saboteurs. Between June 1943 and May 1944 a total 

of 1,822 locomotives was damaged, 200 

passenger cars destroyed, 1,500 cars damaged, 2,500 freight cars destroyed and 

8,000 damaged. 23 Reliable statistics on 

other forms of railway sabotage are incomplete. A report by the Vichy police 24 re22 See below, section on the Bombing of French 

Railroads. 

23 Rpt, SNCF, Les Resultats de l'Action de la 

Resistance dans la SNCF, 10 Nov 44, cited in FFI 

History, pp. I 364ff. 

24 This report, captured by the Resistance, reached 

London in April 1944. SOE/SO headquarters significantly commented on its statistics as follows: "It 

was already known that railway sabotage was considerable but no suspicion that it had reached the 

scale stated by the police has yet reached London." 

See Rpt, Appreciation of Report by Minister of Interior Vichy, Summary of Acts of Sabotage and Disorder in France 25th October-25th November, 14 

Apr 44. SHAEF G-3 file 370-4-1, Ops C. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

cords that during October and November 

1943 more than 3,000 attempts were 

made by patriots to wreck some portion 

of the railway system. In November, 427 

of these were successful major operations 

which included 132 derailments. 

Despite the impressiveness of these 

figures, there remained some doubt as 

to the effect of the destruction on German military mobility. Since only a 

part of the capacity of the French railroads was being utilized directly by the 

German Army, much of the burden of the 

interruptions due to sabotage could be 

and undoubtedly was borne by French 

civilian traffic. 25 On the other hand, 

Rundstedt in October 1943 noted with 

alarm the "rapid increase" in rail sabotage 

which he attributed to the heavy supply 

of arms and explosives that the British 

had parachuted to Resistance groups. He 

reported that in September there were 

534 acts of sabotage against railroads as 

compared to a monthly average of 130 

during the first half of the year. Although 

he did not assess the effect of this sabotage 

on his general preparedness for invasion, 

he made it clear that it was cause for concern, which would become more serious 

at the time of the Allied assault.26 A measure of its seriousness was the partial substitution of German uniformed railway 

workers for employees of the SNCF 

(Societe National des Chemins de Fer). 

Between February and June 20,000 Ger25 In the spring of 1944 the directors of the SN CF 

were apparently unconvinced of the value of rail 

sabotage which they felt was costing the French 

more than the Germans. See G-2 Summary of Info, 

French Railways, II Apr 44. SHAEF G-3 file GCT 

370-14, Ops C. 

26 Rundstedt Report, 25 Oct 43. See above, Ch. IV, 

n.2. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 205 

man workers were brought in chiefly to 

check locomotive sabotage.27 

As D Day approached, SOE/SO headquarters became more concerned with COordinating rail sabotage to relate directly 

to forthcoming military operations. It 

was not expected that Resistance groups 

could seriously interfere with the movement of local enemy reserves in the 

bridgehead area. The Germans had in effect quarantined the coastal strip to a 

depth of about thirty to forty miles inland, and the Normandy Resistance 

groups, as a result, were weak and scattered. Work on the fortifications was done 

either by German labor, or by Frenchmen 

carefully checked for loyalty. Any strangers were immediately suspect and subject to arrest. Such organized groups as 

did exist were difficult to supply because 

of the heavy concentration of antiaircraft 

guns in the coastal zone. Outside the area, 

however, it was thought the Resistance 

might operate effectively to delay the 

movement of strategic reserves into the 

battle zone. The Resistance was therefore 

directed to prepare demolitions to be 

blown on order to cut the main trunk 

lines leading into the lodgment area.28 

The plan for cutting the critical military railroads (Plan Vert) was supplemented by a plan to interfere with road 

traffic (Plan Tortue). Both were developed by the BCRA under the general 

direction of SOE/SO headquarters. Approved by SHAEF, these plans were cir27 OKW/WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Die Entwicklung im Westen vom 1l.-31.III.44. See below, n. 115. 

28The Development of Resistance Groups with 

Reference to the Land Fighting in “OVERLORD," 15 

Feb 44. SHAEF G-3 file 370-14, Ops C; FFI History, 

pp. 8Off; cf. Ninth Monthly Progress Report to 

SHAEF from SFHQ, London, May 1944, 10 Jun 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 319.1/10. 

culated to agents in the field, and saboteurs began placing their demolitions. It 

soon became apparent that effective road 

sabotage would require a large amount 

of heavy equipment which could not be 

delivered in time. Plan Tortue was therefore converted into a project for blocking 

enemy road movements through guerrilla 

action.29 As such, it contributed to the 

Allied victories after D Day. During 

the preparation period, however, more 

emphasis was placed on the rail plan. In 

May SOE/SO headquarters reported that 

57 1 rail targets were ready for demolition 

and 30 road cuts were prepared.30 In addition to accomplishing the specific acts 

of active sabotage, Resistance leaders 

hoped to complete the disorganization of 

the French railroads by planned non-cooperation of the railroad trade union and 

management. 31 It was estimated that in 

those ways serious dislocation of rail traffic in France might be maintained for 

eight to ten days after the Allied landings. 

Since the date of the invasion could not 

be given to the Resistance in advance, arrangements were made to order the execution of sabotage plans by code messages 

broadcast by the BBC. Organizers were 

instructed to listen to BBC broadcasts on 

the lst, 2d, 15th, and 16th of each month. 

If the invasion was then imminent, they 

would hear a preparatory code message. 

They would then remain on the alert 

listening for a confirmatory message “B.” 

29FFI History, p. 83. 

30Report from SFHQ, cited n. 28. SOE and SO in 

April were amalgamated into a single headquarters 

with the title Special Force Headquarters. 

31 See Plan Vert, text in FFI History, pp. 175-87. 175-87. 

The SNCF was generally disposed to co-operate with 

the Allies in passive resistance to the Germans. Resistance groups found many recruits among the employees of the railroads. 

PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

man workers were brought in chiefly to 

check locomotive sabotage. 27 

As D Day approached, SOE/SO headquarters became more concerned with coordinating rail sabotage to relate directly 

to forthcoming military operations. It 

was not expected that Resistance groups 

could seriously interfere with the movement of local enemy reserves in the 

bridgehead area. The Germans had in effect quarantined the coastal strip to a 

depth of about thirty to forty miles inland, and the Normandy Resistance 

groups, as a result, were weak and scattered. Work on the fortifications was done 

either by German labor, or by Frenchmen 

carefully checked for loyalty. Any strangers were immediately suspect and subject to arrest. Such organized groups as 

did exist were difficult to supply because 

of the heavy concentration of antiaircraft 

guns in the coastal zone. Outside the area, 

however, it was thought the Resistance 

might operate effectively to delay the 

movement of strategic reserves into the 

battle zone. The Resistance was therefore 

directed to prepare demolitions to be 

blown on order to cut the main trunk 

lines leading into the lodgment area. 28 

The plan for cutting the critical military railroads (Plan Vert) was supplemented by a plan to interfere with road 

traffic (Plan Tortue). Both were developed by the BCRA under the general 

direction of SOE/SO headquarters. Approved by SHAEF, these plans were cir21 OKW /WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Die Entwicklung im Westen vom 1.1.-31.[[1.44. See below, n. 115. 

28 The Development of Resistance Groups with 

Reference to the Land Fighting in "OVERLORD," 15 

Feb 44. SHAEF G-3 file 370-14, Ops C; FFI History, 

pp. 80ff; d. Ninth Monthly Progress Report to 

SHAEF from SFHQ, London, May 1944, 10 Jun 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 319.1/10. 

205 

culated to agents in the field, and saboteurs began placing their demolitions. It 

soon became apparent that effective road 

sabotage would require a large amount 

of heavy equipment which could not be 

delivered in time. Plan Tortue was therefore converted into a project for blocking 

enemy road movements through guerrilla 

action.29 As such, it contributed to the 

Allied victories after D Day. During 

the preparation period, however, more 

emphasis was placed on the rail plan. In 

May SOE/SO headquarters reported that 

571 rail targets were ready for demolition 

and 30 road cuts were prepared.30 In addition to accomplishing the specific acts 

of active sabotage, Resistance leaders 

hoped to complete the disorganization of 

the French railroads by planned non-cooperation of the railroad trade union and 

management.31 It was estimated that in 

those ways serious dislocation of rail traffic in France might be maintained for 

eight to ten days after the Allied landings. 

Since the date of the invasion could not 

be given to the Resistance in advance, arrangements were made to order the execution of sabotage plans by code messages 

broadcast by the BBC. Organizers were 

instructed to listen to BBC broadcasts on 

the 1st, 2d, 15th, and 16th of each month. 

If the invasion was then imminent, they 

would hear a preparatory code message. 

They would then remain on the alert 

listening for a confirmatory message "B." 

29 FFI History, p. 83. 

80 Report from SFHQ, cited n. 28. SOE and SO in 

April were amalgamated into a single headquarters 

with the title Special Force Headquarters. 

31 See Plan Vert, text in FFI History, pp. 175-87. 

The SNCF was generally disposed to co-operate with 

the Allies in passive resistance to the Germans. Resistance groups found many recruits among the employees of the railroads. 
206 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Forty-eight hours after message “B,” code 

phrases would be broadcast directing that 

the various sabotage plans be put into effect. Since each of the plans had been 

drawn on a regional basis and each of the 

Resistance regions had separate code arrangements, it would have been possible 

to localize the sabotage activity in direct 

support of the landings. It was SHAEF’s 

view, however, that it was preferable to 

obtain the maximum amount of chaos behind the enemy lines at the moment of 

landing, and therefore the signals actually used set all sabotage plans in motion at once.32 This decision reflected 

again the reluctance of Allied headquarters to depend on Resistance activity as a 

precision weapon to be used against 

specific objectives related to the general 

plan. 

As a matter of fact, the post-D-Day 

rail-cutting program of the Resistance 

was extraordinarily effective. During 

June a total of 486 rail cuts was reported. 

On D plus 1 twenty-six trunk lines were 

unusable, including the main lines between Avranches and St. Lo, between St. 

Lo and Cherbourg, and between St. Lo

and Caen. All were sabotaged with 

multiple cuts. Road sabotage achieved at 

least one notable success in delaying the 

movement of the 2d SS Panzer Division 

from the south into the OVERLORD lodgment area.33 

Plans for employing the Resistance in 

action against the enemy after the landing included not only sabotage but direct military action. It was hoped that the 

32 FFI History, p. 388. German agents broke the 

codes. For German reaction, see below, Ch. VIII. 

33Tenth Monthly Report to SHAEF from SFHQ, 

London, June 1944, 10 Jul 44. SHAEF SGS file 319- 

.1/10; FFI History, p. 1474. See below, Ch. X. 

maquis and possibly other Resistance 

groups might be able to engage some 

enemy forces in the interior which would 

otherwise be employed against the U.S. 

and British armies. The exact military 

employment of the underground obviously could not be planned in advance 

since its strength in any given location 

could not even be estimated. However, 

the bonus of having friendly forces behind the enemy’s lines was considered sufficiently likely and sufficiently valuable 

that extensive preparations were made to 

develop and control it. In March 1944, 

SHAEF issued a comprehensive directive 

to the newly designated Special Force 

Headquarters on the use of Resistance 

groups in support of OVERLORD.34 In late 

May and early June headquarters and 

staff of the FFI (Forces FrancaGes de 

l’Interieur) were established under command of Gen. Joseph Pierre Koenig. Koenig set up a tripartite staff (French, U.S., 

British) in London and made plans for 

employing the FFI as one component of 

the Allied armies under the Supreme Allied Commander.35 

But although Koenig became a regularly constituted military commander his 

army remained nebulous. Because of the 

danger of compromising the security of 

Allied plans, it was impossible even to attempt to organize the FFI for specific military missions in advance of D Day. Therefore, in order to encourage Resistance 

groups to organize themselves for military 

action and to get orders to them, threeman teams (Jedburghs) consisting of one 

French and one U.S. or British officer and 

34 SHAEF (44) 25, Operational Directive to SFHQ, 

23 Mar 44. SHAEF G-3 file 322-8, Ops C. 

35Ltr, Koenig to Gen Smith, Commandement et 

Organisation des Forces Francaises de l’lnterieur, 9

Jan 44. SHAEF SGS file 322 (FFI) . 

206 

Forty-eight hours after message "B," code 

phrases would be broadcast directing that 

the various sabotage plans be put into effect. Since each of the plans had been 

drawn on a regional basis and each of the 

Resistance regions had separate code arrangements, it would have been possible 

to localize the sabotage activity in direct 

support of the landings. It was SHAEF's 

view, however, that it was preferable to 

obtain the maximum amount of chaos behind the enemy lines at the moment of 

landing, and therefore the signals actually used set all sabotage plans in motion at once. 32 This decision reflected 

again the reluctance of Allied headquarters to depend on Resistance activity as a 

precision weapon to be used against 

specific objectives related to the general 

plan. 

As a matter of fact, the post-D-Day 

rail-cutting program of the Resistance 

was extraordinarily effective. During 

June a total of 486 rail cuts was reported. 

On D plus I twenty-six trunk lines were 

unusable, including the main lines between Avranches and St. La, between St. 

La and Cherbourg, and between St. La 

and Caen. All were sabotaged with 

multiple cuts. Road sabotage achieved at 

least one notable success in delaying the 

movement of the 2d SS Panzer Division 

from the south into the OVERLORD lodgment area. 33 

Plans for employing the Resistance in 

action against the enemy after the landing included not only sabotage but direct military action. It was hoped that the 

82 FFI History, p. 388. German agents broke the 

codes. For German reaction, see below, Ch. VIII. 

ss Tenth Monthly Report to SHAEF from SFHQ, 

London, June 1944, 10 Jul 44. SHAEF SGS file 319-

.1/10; FFI History, p. 1474. See below, Ch. X. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

maquis and possibly other Resistance 

groups might be able to engage some 

enemy forces in the interior which would 

otherwise be employed against the U.S. 

and British armies. The exact military 

employment of the underground obviously could not be planned in advance 

since its strength in any given location 

could not even be estimated. However, 

the bonus of having friendly forces behind the enemy's lines was considered sufficiently likely and sufficiently valuable 

that extensive preparations were made to 

develop and control it. In March 1944, 

SHAEF issued a comprehensive directive 

to the newly designated Special Force 

Headquarters on the use of Resistance 

groups in support of OVERLORD.34 In late 

May and early June headquarters and 

staff of the FFI (Forces Franraises de 

l'Interieur) were established under command of Gen. Joseph Pierre Koenig. Koenig set up a tripartite staff (French, U.S., 

British) in London and made plans for 

employing the FFI as one component of 

the Allied armies under the Supreme Allied Commander. 35 

But although Koenig became a regularly constituted military commander his 

army remained nebulous. Because of the 

danger of compromising the security of 

Allied plans, it was impossible even to attempt to organize the FFI for specific military missions in advance of D Day. Therefore; in order to encourage Resistance 

groups to organize themselves for military 

action and to get orders to them, threeman teams (J edburghs) consisting of one 

French and one U.S. or British officer and 

34 SHAEF (44) 25, Operational Directive to SFHQ, 

23 Mar 44_ SHAEF G-3 file 322-8, Ops Css Ltr, Koenig to Gen Smith, Commandement et 

Organisation des Forces Franraises de ['[nttfrieur, 9 

Jan 44. SHAEF SGS file 322 (FFI). 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

a radio operator were formed to be parachuted in uniform behind enemy lines 

starting shortly before D Day. The sole assigned function of the J edburghs was to 

provide communication links with the 

FFI command. On occasion, however, 

they were able to supply useful leadership 

for the groups to which they were attached. About a hundred Jedburgh teams 

were organized and eighty-seven of these 

were operational in France at one time or 

another. 36 

A major handicap of the Resistance for 

military action was its inadequate armament, and especially its lack of heavy 

wC~lpons. Partly to remedy this, both the 

Americans and the British organized special, heavily armed units to be parachuted 

behind the lines after operations began. 

They were to be used either independently on tactical missions or more often to 

stiffen the local Resistance groups. The 

American units were called Operational 

Groups and consisted of four officers and 

thirty enlisted men, entirely U.S. personnel. Eleven of these groups were sent to 

France after D Day, five from England 

and six from North Africa. British equivalent units were much larger. These were 

the SAS (Special Air Service) troops whose 

operations were directed by Lt. Gen. F. 

A. M. Browning, Commander of Airborne Troops. Comprising almost 2,000 

men, they included two SAS regiments of 

British personnel, two French parachute 

battalions, and a Belgian independent 

company. The SAS achieved notable success with the well-organized Resistance 

movement in Brittany, and in addition 

was able to carry out useful sabotage of 

railroads leading to the battle areas. 37 

86 FFI History, pp. 364-65. 

87 Ibid., pp. 365, 544. 

207 

It is impossible to appraise the contribution of the Resistance toward softening the enemy in France before the invasion. Not only was there no systematic recording of the facts of their operations, 

but there was, in any case, no satisfactory 

yardstick by which to measure the effectiveness of an irregular force, whose role 

was strategic rather than tactical. Certainly the Resistance impaired the German military power both materially and 

morally. A fighter with a bee in his 

breeches is evidently not at his best. But 

just how much the bee contributes to his 

defeat is a question to which statistical 

method can hardly apply. 

The Combined Bomber Offensive 

Up to the end of 1942, bombing of German military targets was carried out without any dear-cut directive as to target 

systems, aims, or timing. Although target 

priorities had been sketched for the 

Eighth Air Force by the theater commander, the task of integrating the operations of both U.S. and British air forces 

according to a combined plan with a combined objective was first attempted at 

Casablanca in January 1943.38 The Combined Chiefs of Staff then agreed to order 

U.S. and British strategic air forces based 

in the United Kingdom to initiate a 

"Combined Bomber Offensive" whose 

object would be "the progressive destruction and dislocation of the German mili88 Ltr, CofS Eighth AF to CG VIII Bomber Command and VIII Fighter Command, Objectives for 

Operations Eighth Air Force, 20 Oct 42; Ltr, Eaker to 

CG ETOUSA, 31 Dec 43, exhibit 2, Report of Lt. 

Gen. Ira C. Eaker on U.S. Army Air Forces Activities in United Kingdom Covering Period from February 20, 1942 to December 31, 1943 (cited hereafter 

as Eaker Rpt) . AAF file 520.l01A. 
208 

tary, industrial and economic systems, and 

the undermining of the morale of the 

German people to a point where their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened." 39 

This dual aim recognized the divergent 

doctrines of the American and British air 

forces. The Americans believed that, 

through daylight precision bombing, critical sections of German industry could be 

destroyed so effectively as to dislocate 

the economic system and paralyze the 

German war machine. The British, feeling that daylight bombing would prove 

too costly, put their faith in night area 

bombing designed to destroy whole critical industrial and military areas. The 

Prime Minister tried at Casablanca to get 

the Americans to adopt the British view 

on the use of air power and persuade 

them to use the Eighth Air Force for night 

bombing to reinforce directly the operations of the RAF. General Eaker and 

General Arnold defeated the suggestions, 

and the Casablanca directive recognized 

the separate operations of the two air 

forces as two different but complementary contributions to a single task.40 

The primary objectives for both air 

forces in the new combined offensive 

were: (1) submarine construction yards, 

(2) aircraft industry, (3) transportation, (4) oil plants, (5) other enemy war 

industry. It was provided that these priorities might be "varied from time to 

time according to developments in the 

strategical situation." Further flexibility 

was provided in that the targets listed 

89 CCS 166/I/D, The Bomber Offensive from the 

United Kingdom, 21 Jan 43. Approved at CCS 65th 

Mtg, 21 Jan 43. 

40 Eaker Rpt, cited n. 38; d. Craven and Cate, The 

Army Air Forces, II, 227, 301. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

were to be attacked "subject to the exigencies of weather and of tactical feasibility." 41 They might also be supplemented by "other objectives of great 

importance either from the political or 

military point of view." These "other 

objectives" were not defined, but the two 

examples given-submarine bases in the 

Bay of Biscay, and the city of Berlincould have been taken to bracket a wide 

range of targets. 

The Casablanca directive, though formally initiating the Combined Bomber 

Offensive, did not produce any immediate action. The Eighth Air Force, having 

depleted its ranks in order to found and 

nourish the Twelfth Air Force in the 

Mediterranean, remained for about six 

months desperately short of planes and 

men. It was not until the late spring of 

1943 that the air force build-up in the 

United Kingdom resumed the tempo interrupted by the development of the 

Mediterranean theater, and it was only 

then that the Combined Bomber Offensive was implemented by a detailed plan. 

The plan had been in the making 

since December 1942 when a Committee 

of Operations Analysts was appointed by 

General Arnold to prepare a report "analyzing the rate of progressive deterioration that should be anticipated in the 

German war effort as a result of ... increasing air operations ... against its sustaining sources." 42 The committee on 8 

March 1943 reported nineteen enemy 

41 The principal limitation of "tactical feasibility" 

was the short range of all combat planes which, as 

long as the air forces were relatively small, largely 

prevented bomber sorties deep into Germany. 

42 Ltr, Arnold to ACofS Management Control, Research and Analysis to Fix Earliest Practicable Date 

for Invasion of Western Europe, 9 Dec 42. AAF file 

3842-2, Tabs for History. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

industrial systems vulnerable to air attack. 43 Endorsed by the Eighth Air Force 

and the British Air Ministry, the committee's findings were embodied in a formal 

agreed plan which General Eaker submitted to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. From 

the nineteen target systems listed by the 

operations analysts, the air forces picked 

six key enemy industries, including seventy-six precision targets. The systems selected for attack were in order of priority: 

submarine construction yards and bases, 

aircraft industry, ball bearings, oil, synthetic rubber and tires, and military 

transport vehicles. Destruction of the 

seventy-six targets, it was believed, would 

result in elimination of 89 percent of 

the enemy's submarine industry, 43 percent of his fighter aircraft production, 

65 percent of his bomber production, 

76 percent of the ball bearing industry, 48 

percent of his refined oil products, 50 percent of his synthetic rubber, and all of 

his tire production. "The cumulative 

effect," said General Eaker, "will 'fatally 

weaken' the capacity of the German 

people for armed resistance." 44 

There were initial difficulties, however. General Eaker noted that the air 

forces' ability to carry out the planned 

program depended on rendering German 

fighter defenses ineffective. Actually, despite heavy losses, enemy fighter strength 

in the spring of 1943 was still increasing 

rapidly. If the increase continued at that 

rate, it was expected the Germans would 

have 3,000 fighter aircraft by January 

1944. It was, General Eaker reported, 

43 Memo for Cen Arnold, Report of Committee 

of Operations Analysts with Respect to Economic 

Targets within the Western Axis, 8 Mar 43. AAF file 

3842-2, Tabs for History. 

44 JCS Spec Mtg, 29 Apr 43. 

209 

"quite conceivable" that such an increase 

"could make our daylight bombing unprofitable and perhaps our night bombing too." 45 The destruction of German 

fighter aircraft was therefore made an 

"intermediate objective second to none 

in priority." 46 

The J oint Chiefs of Staff accepted the 

plan outlined by General Eaker, and approved his requests for aircraft and personnel to carry it outY The Combined 

Chiefs endorsed the plan on 18 May 1943 

at the Washington Conference.48 Finally 

the directive to initiate the planned 

offensive was issued on 10 June by Air 

Marshal Portal, British Chief of Air Staff, 

who had strategic direction over combined air operations.49 Air Marshal 

Portal interpreted the new plan to mean 

an all-out offensive against the German 

fighter air force and directed the Eighth 

Air Force to attack air-frame and engine 

factories and industries associated with 

them, as well as aircraft repair depots, 

storage parks, and enemy fighter planes 

in the air and on the ground. These attacks were declared of primary importance and the order was that nothing 

should interfere with them. Only when 

45 Ibid. 

46 ccs 217, Plan for Combined Bomber Offensive 

from the United Kingdom, 14 May 43. 

47 JCS 77th Mtg, 4 May 43; JPS 174/1, Plan for 

Combined Bomber Offensive from the United Kingdom, 2 May 43. 

48 CCS 87th Mtg, 18 May 43. 

49 As by agreement at Casablanca, CCS 65th Mtg; 

d. Craven and Cate, The Army Air Forces, II, 304. 

The RAF was senior in experience and, at this time, 

preponderant in numbers. "Strategic direction" was 

never clearly defined nor was Air Marshal Portal 

ever given any clear-cut directive. In fact, however, 

he exercised ad hoc command over the strategic air 

forces as agent of the Combined Chiefs. The directive 

of 10 June was issued as a letter by Air Vice Marshal 

N. H. Bottomley to Air Force Commanders. Copy 

in Eaker Rpt. 
210 

"tactical and weather conditions" prevented attacks against enemy fighter 

plane targets should aircraft be used 

against what nominally remained the 

"primary objective"-submarine construction yards and operating bases. 

The new offensive was slow in getting 

started. Between 1 July and 15 November the Eighth Air Force dropped 22,667 

tons of bombs, but of these only 1,903 

tons hit the enemy aircraft industry despite its overriding priority as a target. 50 

In part, this relatively insignificant effort 

was due to bad weather during the fall 

and winter months. In part, it was due to 

the location of most German aircraft 

plants beyond U.S. fighter range, which 

made bombing prohibitively costly. Two 

raids on 17 August against the ball bearing plants at Schweinfurt and the Messerschmitt fighter aircraft factory at Regensburg demonstrated the impracticability 

at that time of deep penetrations by 

small forces. Losses on the Schweinfurt 

raid were 36 planes out of 300, or 12 percent, and on the Regensburg raid 24 

planes out of 174, or almost 14 percent. 

These figures did not include damage. 

Repetition of the Schweinfurt raid on 14 

October resulted in losses of more than a 

quarter of the attacking aircraft. 51 Although the importance of individual targets might warrant acceptance of such 

losses, they were prohibitive if applied 

to any large portion of the routine bombing offensive. 

While recognizing the difficulties, General Arnold severely criticized the whole 

60 Study by ACofAS, The Strategic Aerial Bombardment of Europe, 10 Dec 43. AAF file 2481-2. 

51 Hq Eighth Air Force, Target Priorities of the 

Eighth Air Force, 15 May 45. AAF file 520.317A. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

record of accomplishment during the last 

half of 1943. Not only were the attacks 

on the enemy aircraft industry disappointingly small, but in general a far 

greater effort was devoted to secondary 

targets than to those whose destruction 

would vitally affect Germany's ability to 

continue the war. Only four vital industries, he said, were attacked and they 

were hit with only 20 percent of the 

total bomb tonnage. 52 

General Eaker believed these strictures 

were unfair. Reporting in December 

1943 on the progress of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive, Eaker said that, while 

only 62 percent of the planned forces for 

the offensive had been allotted, 66 percent of the task was already accomplished.53 Presumably that meant that 

66 percen t of the planned targets had 

been hit. But, since the objective of the 

offensive was not merely to hit targets 

but to destroy them and so dislocate German war industry and "fatally weaken" 

enemy morale, the statistics were neither 

a reliable measure of accomplishment 

nor a fair indication of the job remaining 

to be done. Although it was reasonably 

certain that the Germans had been hurt 

by Allied bombing during 1943, it was 

not true in December that only one-third 

more bombing on the 1943 scale remained to complete the task outlined by 

the plan for the Combined Bomber 

Offensive. 

A more accurate measure of achievement was difficult to discover. From intelligence sources, the British Ministry of 

Economic Warfare and the Air Ministry 

attempted to estimate the effect of bomb52 Foreword by Gen Arnold to Study cited n. 50. 

53 Eaker Rpt. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 211 

ing on the total German war potential. 

They were optimistic. They thought the 

German war potential had been reduced 

by about 10 percent and that a “total 

decline of 20% in overall effort may well 

be fatal.” The job, in other words, was 

about half done. Still more optimistically the report noted a “very much 

greater decline in some individual industries (e.g., ball-bearings and rubber), 

which may be near the point where they 

could cause the collapse of the whole 

war machine.” 54 Even if it were assumed 

that the intelligence reports on which 

that estimate was based were entirely 

accurate and complete, the significance 

of the conclusion still remained as dubious as a doctor’s pronouncement that his 

patient was 50 percent dead. Enemy 

capacity for, and speed in, convalescence 

was always an unknown factor. 

Despite the general optimism in the 

theater at the end of 1943 over the effects 

to date of Allied bombing, it was recognized that the future hung in the balance of the still-unsettled battle for air 

supremacy. By fall, the bombing attacks 

had forced the enemy to keep about half 

of his whole force of fighter aircraft in 

the west. At the same time Eighth Air 

Force claims of enemy fighters destroyed 

in combat were estimated at 75 percent 

of current German production.55 On the 

54Joint Rpt by Min of Econ Warfare and the Air 

Min Int Branch, in Rpt by CofAS and CG U.S. 

Eighth AF on progress made by the RAF and U.S. 

Eighth AF in Combined Bomber Offensive, 7 Nov 

43. AAF file 520.318. Ball bearing output was estimated by the Eighth Air Force A-2 to be down to 

75 percent of preattack levels. See Supplement to 

the Strategic Aerial Bombardment of Europe-Accomplishments and Potentialities, 1 Apr 44. AAF file 

2481-1. 

55 ACofAS Study, cited n. 50. 

other hand, since relatively few direct 

attacks were made on fighter production 

plants, German fighter strength was increasing despite losses.56 The heavy U.S. 

losses in the Schweinfurt raid in October 

demonstrated that, despite attrition of 

German fighters in combat, Allied air 

forces still did not have air superiority 

over more than the fringes of enemyoccupied territory.57 

General Arnold, commenting on the 

situation at the end of 1943, said: “It is 

difficult to appraise the present struggle 

for air supremacy as representing anything short of a major turning point in 

the war. What American and Royal Air 

Force bombers can do to the whole German war machine, once the German 

fighting force is rendered impotent, 

needs no comment. The issue hangs now 

on which side first falters, weakens, and 

loses its punishing power.“58 Whether 

victory in the battle for air supremacy 

was regarded as a prelude to decisive strategic bombing or preparation for OVERLORD, it was accepted as of paramount 

importance. 

With the idea of intensifying the 

bomber offensive, the Joint Chiefs of 

Staff in November proposed a revision of 

the plan to bring it up to date with the 

changed strategic situation. The relative 

importance of targets had changed since 

Casablanca. Submarine construction, for 

example, was no longer entitled to priority, both because the danger from Uboats had been greatly reduced by measures to combat them at sea and because 

in general the bombing of factories and 

56 Eaker Rpt. 

57 Target Priorities, 15 May 45, cited n. 51. 

58Rpt, CG AAF to SW, 4 Jan 44. 

PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

ing on the total German war potential. 

They were optimistic. They thought the 

German war potential had been reduced 

by about lO percent and that a "total 

decline of 20% in overall effort may well 

be fatal." The job, in other words, was 

about half done. Still more optimistically the report noted a "very much 

greater decline in some individual industries (e.g., ball-bearings and rubber), 

which may be near the point where they 

could cause the collapse of the whole 

war machine." 54 Even if it were assumed 

that the intelligence reports on which 

that estimate was based were entirely 

accurate and complete, the significance 

of the conclusion still remained as dubious as a doctor's pronouncement that his 

patient was 50 percent dead. Enemy 

capacity for, and speed in, convalescence 

was always an unknown factor. 

Despite the general optimism in the 

theater at the end of 1943 over the effects 

to date of Allied bombing, it was recognized that the future hung in the balance of the still-unsettled battle for air 

supremacy. By fall, the bombing attacks 

had forced the enemy to keep about half 

of his whole force of fighter aircraft in 

the west. At the same time Eighth Air 

Force claims of enemy fighters destroyed 

in combat were estimated at 75 percent 

of current German production.55 On the 

54 Joint Rpt by Min of Econ Warfare and the Air 

Min Int Branch, in Rpt by CofAS and CG U.S. 

Eighth AF on progress made by the RAF and U.S. 

Eighth AF in Combined Bomber Offensive, 7 Nov 

43. AAF file 520.318. Ball bearing output was estimated by the Eighth Air Force A-2 to be down to 

75 percent of preattack levels. See Supplement to 

the Strategic Aerial Bombardment of Europe-Accomplishments and Potentialities, 1 Apr 44. AAF file 

2481-1. 

55 ACofAS Study, cited n. 50. 

211 

other hand, since relatively few direct 

attacks were made on fighter production 

plants, German fighter strength was increasing despite losses. 56 The heavy U.S. 

losses in the Schweinfurt raid in October 

demonstrated that, despite attrition of 

German fighters in combat, Allied air 

forces still did not have air superiority 

over more than the fringes of enemyoccupied territory.57 

General Arnold, commenting on the 

situation at the end of 1943, said: "It is 

difficult to appraise the present struggle 

for air supremacy as representing anything short of a major turning point in 

the war. What American and Royal Air 

Force bombers can do to the whole German war machine, once the German 

fighting force is rendered impotent, 

needs no comment. The issue hangs now 

on which side first falters, weakens, and 

loses its punishing power."58 Whether 

victory in the battle for air supremacy 

was regarded as a prelude to decisive strategic bombing or preparation for OVERLORD, it was accepted as of paramount 

importance. 

With the idea of intensifying the 

bomber offensive, the Joint Chiefs of 

Staff in November proposed a revision of 

the plan to bring it up to date with the 

changed strategic situation. The relative 

importance of targets had changed since 

Casablanca. Submarine construction, for 

example, was no longer entitled to priority, both because the danger from Uboats had been greatly reduced by measures to combat them at sea and because 

in general the bombing of factories and 

56 Eaker Rpt. 

57 Target Priorities, 15 May 45, cited n. 51. 

58 Rpt, CG AAF to SW, 4 Jan 44. 
212 

pens had hitherto proved ineffective. 59 

New air bases had been acquired in Italy 

on which strategic bombers could be 

based and a new Mediterranean strategic 

air force (the Fifteenth) had been established. It thus became necessary to coordinate attacks and target priorities between the United Kingdom and Mediterranean-based air forces. Finally the OVERLORD D Day was approaching and time 

to establish the prerequisite air supremacy was short.60 

After some debate between the U.S. 

and British Chiefs of Staff over the advisability of concentrating on the Axis 

oil industry, a new directive was issued 

by the Combined Chiefs on 13 February 

1944. The new directive dropped out 

the sytem of primary, secondary, and intermediate objectives. U.S. and British 

bomber commands were ordered to accomplish the "depletion of the German 

air force. .. by all means available." 

Although other objectives were listed, 

the order clearly shifted emphasis away 

from the earlier general aim of dislocating enemy industry to the specific task 

of destroying the enemy air. force. 6! 

69 During 1943, 41.8 percent of the total Eighth 

Air Force bomb tonnage (21,362 tons) was dropped 

on enemy submarine yards and bases. General Eaker 

estimated that the net result of this large expenditure was to prevent 22 out of 200 new submarines 

from being built. Eaker Rpt. Cf. Memo for CofAS, 

Evaluation of Results of Strategic Bombardment 

Against the Western Axis, 27 Jan 44, Tab 56 of Committee of Operations Analysts, COA History, MS. 

AAF files. COA's conclusion was that though "heavy 

attacks have been delivered against submarine manufacture and submarine operating bases, the results 

of these attacks have not been at all proportional to 

the effort expended." 

60 JCS 563, Modifications of Directive for the 

Bomber Offensive, 4 Nov 43. 

61 CCS l66jll, Revised Directive for Combined 

Bomber Offensive, 13 Feb 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

In October 1943 the U.S. Chiefs of 

Staff had proposed the establishment of 

a strategic air force in the Mediterranean. 

It was observed that the Germans were 

meeting the air offensive from England 

by moving critical industries to the southeast and at the same time establishing a 

strong fighter shield in the northwest.62 

Eighth Air Force losses mounted in 

October to a point where General Marshall expressed himself as "deeply concerned" over them. 63 It was felt that 

these losses could be reduced if the 

enemy were forced to disperse his fighters 

in order to guard against bombing sorties from the Mediterranean. General 

Eisenhower was accordingly ordered to 

regroup the Twelfth Air Force under his 

command to form the Twelfth Tactical 

Air Force and the Fifteenth Strategic Air 

Force. The latter, consisting initially 

of six heavy bomber groups and two 

groups of long-range fighters, would be 

under the general direction of the Combined Chiefs of Staff and would be employed primarily against Combined 

Bomber Offensive targets. 64 The plan was 

to build up the Fifteenth Air Force by 31 

March 1944 to twenty-one groups of 

heavy bombers, seven groups of fighters, 

and one group of reconnaissance aircraft. 65 

62 JCS 524, Plan to Assure the Most Effective Exploitation of the Combined Bomber Offensive, 9 

Oct 43. 

63 JCS 125th Mtg, 29 Oct 43. Bomber losses in 

October amounted to 9.2 percent of the aircraft entering enemy territory. See Statistical Summary of 

Eighth Air Force Operations-European Theater, 17 

Aug 1942---S May 1945. AAF file 520.308A. 

64 The Mediterranean theater commander was to 

be allowed to use the units then assigned to the 

Twelfth Air Force in support of theater operations 

until the base objective north and east of Rome had 

been secured. 

66 CCS 217 j I, 19 Oct 43. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 213 

As soon as the Fifteenth Air Force was 

formed, doubts occurred as to the effectiveness of the machinery provided for 

co-ordinating attacks from the Mediterranean and the United Kingdom. Neither 

the liaison between Fifteenth and Eighth 

Air Force headquarters nor the “general 

direction” of the Combined Chiefs was 

thought adequate for the most effective 

exploitation of the whole offensive. The 

Joint Chiefs of Staff therefore proposed 

a U.S. strategic air command with headquarters in England charged with control 

of all U.S. strategic air operations in the 

European-Mediterranean area.66 Initially directly under the Combined 

Chiefs, the new headquarters would later 

be subordinated to the Supreme Allied 

Commander for OVERLORD. The original 

conception was that the Strategic Air 

Forces should command at first only U.S. 

forces but would, some time before D 

Day, take in RAF Bomber Command and 

constitute a strategic air command under 

the Supreme Allied Commander parallel 

to t.he tactical organization of the 

AEAF.67 The U.S. proposal, so far as it 

concerned unification of U.S. air forces, 

was given to the British Chiefs of Staff 

for comment at the Cairo conference of 

November 1943. The British objected 

chiefly on the grounds that the new setup would destroy the close co-ordination 

between the Eighth Air Force and RAF 

the whole bomber offensive against Germany.68 The British objections could be 

considered only as advice, however, since 

Portal freely granted that organization 

of U.S. forces was the exclusive prerogative of the U.S. Chiefs of Staff. Since the 

U.S. Chiefs of Staff did not consider the 

advice sound, they proceeded according 

to their original proposals and ordered 

the establishment in England of headquarters of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces 

in Europe (USSAFE) 69 under command 

of Lt. Gen. Carl Spaatz. At the same time 

that USSAFE was established, General 

Eaker was transferred to command of the 

U.S. Mediterranean air forces and Lt. 

Gen. James H. Doolittle took over the 

Eighth Air Force.70

When General Spaatz arrived in England in January the Eighth Air Force 

was in the midst of its rapid build-up 

which had begun in the spring of 1943. 

There were then operating (as of 31 December 1943) twenty-five groups of 

heavy bombers plus three squadrons 

(which in March became a training 

unit) and eleven groups of fighters.” ‘71 

Two of the latter groups were equipped 

with P-38’s which, with additional wing 

gasoline tanks, had a range great enough 

to accompany bombers deep into Germany. The build-up of long-range fighters increased rapidly in the early months 

through the British Chief of Air Staff. 68 It was JCS 602 (see n. 66) that was submitted 

They proposed instead that the authority to the British as CCS 400. British reply is CCS 400/l, 

of Air Marshal Portal should be ex26 Nov 43. It may be supposed that British objections 

were also connected with their oreviouslv exoressed I , I 

tended to give him general direction of opposition to subordinating strategic air forces to 

SAC. 

69 Later redesignated U.S. Strategic Air Forces 

66JCS 602, Integrated Command of U.S. Strategic (USSTAF) 

Air Forces in the European-Mediterranean Area, 16 70Craven and Cate, The Army Air Forces, II, 749- 

Nov 43. 56. 

67 JCS 601, Strategic Air Force Command in Opera- 71 Statistical Summary of Eighth Air Force Operations Against Germany, 13 Nov 43. tions, cited n. 63. 
214 

of 1944. At the same time belly tanks 

and wing tanks were added to all types 

of fighters to permit them to escort 

bombers at ever extending radii from 

their United Kingdom bases. By March 

the Eighth Air Force was strong enough 

so that bombing missions were deliberately planned to provoke air battles with 

the Luftwaffe. A series of large-scale 

raids on Berlin was inaugurated chiefly 

for this purpose, and though the bomber 

losses at first were fairly heavy (the maximum was sixty-nine on one raid) enemy 

resistance was at last crushed, and on the 

final missions over the German capital 

enemy fighters no longer flew to the attack.72 The peak of German fighter defense was reached and passed in February 

1944, and even in that month the enemy 

was not able to inflict losses on U.S. 

bombers on a scale large enough to deter 

them from continued operations.73 By 

June U.S. bombers had virtually free 

range of the skies and could bomb strategic targets at will. 

While the Eighth Air Force with the 

RAF Bomber Command achieved mastery of the air over western Europe, the 

tactical air forces were being built up to 

exploit this advantage in direct support 

of OVERLORD. In April 1943 General 

Eaker drew up plans to expand the Air 

Support Command of the Eighth Air 

Force for tactical operations. These 

plans were studied and revised during 

the summer. The outcome in the fall 

was a decision to set up a separate U.S. 

72 Study No. 59 by U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, 

Military Analysis Division. The Defeat of the Ger· 

man Air Force. AAF file 137.306. 

73 Plan signed by Gen Anderson and transmitted 

to Eisenhower and Portal. Plan for the Completion 

of the Combined Bomber Offensive, 5 Mar 44. AAF 

files; d. Diary of CinCo 25 Feb 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tactical air force comprising four major 

commands: the medium bomber, fighter, 

air service, and troop carrier commands. 

Lt. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, commander 

of the Ninth Air Force in the Middle 

East, was ordered to England with his 

staff but minus his troops and aircraft.74 

On 16 October 1943 the Ninth Air Force 

was reconstituted in England, absorbing 

the Tactical Command of the Eighth Air 

Force. The latter contributed initially 

four understrength medium bomber 

groups and several reconnaissance squadrons. 75 The new Ninth Air Force grew 

rapidly during the first six months of 

1944. By 1 June it controlled eighteen 

groups of fighters, eleven groups of medium bombers, fourteen groups of transports, and two groups of reconnaissance 

aircraft. 76 

The Ninth Air Force was expressly 

constituted to support the OVERLORD 

ground battle and on 15 December 1943, 

as noted, it came under the operational 

control of Air Marshal Leigh-Mallory's 

74 General Brereton, Annapolis graduate in the 

class of 1911. transferred to the Army after complet· 

ing the Naval Academy course and. in World War I, 

saw Air Corps service. In 1941, after heading the 

Third Air Force in Florida, he was sent to the Philip. 

pine Islands as commander of the American Air 

Forces in the Far East. Early the following year he 

was appointed head of the Tenth Air Force in India. 

In June 1942 he was transferred to Egypt and as· 

sumed command of the Middle East Air Force, which 

in November became the Ninth Air Force including 

all U.S. Army Air Force units in the Middle East. 

General Brereton was given command of U.S. Army 

Forces in the Middle East, in addition to his Air 

Force post. in late January 1943. He held the two 

commands until he and his staff were ordered to 

England. 

75 Col William B. Reed (Exec CofS, Ninth AF). 

The Ninth Air Force in the European Theater of 

Operations, MS. AAF files. 

76 [Lt Col Robert H. George] Ninth Air Force, 

April to November 1944 (Army Air Forces Historical 

Studies: No. 36) , MS, p. 81. AAF files. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

AEAF. It was provided, however, that 

long-range fighters under Ninth Air 

Force command would support the 

Eighth Air Force bomber offensive until 

OVERLORD began. At the same time the 

medium bombers were to reinforce the 

attack against the Luftwaffe by raiding 

enemy coastal airfields and so driving 

enemy fighters inland.77 Such raids were 

carried out with particular effectiveness 

in the spring just before the invasion. 

But throughout the winter the medium 

bombers were largely diverted to attack 

the German V-bomb launching sites, the 

neutralization of which became for a time 

the priority mission of the entire AEAF. 

Sites for launching pilotless aircraft 

were observed to be under construction 

in the summer of 1943, especially in the 

Pas-de-Calais area. By the middle of December photographic reconnaissance had 

confirmed the existence of sixty-nine 

sites.78 It was then estimated that the 

enemy might be able to begin a full-scale 

flying-bomb attack against England in 

February. The prospective enemy operation was called CROSSBOW. 

Instructions were issued to the AEAF 

to bomb all sites that were more than half 

completed. In addition, certain sites were 

assigned to the RAF Bomber Command 

for night attack. Finally, orders issued 

on 15 December to the Eighth Air Force 

assigned "overriding priority" to attacks 

on CROSSBOW sites whenever weather conditions over ,northern France were suitable. The decision to divert any portion 

of the strategic air forces away from the 

primary mission of defeating the Luftwaffe was a measure of the seriousness 

with which the Allies viewed the enemy 

77 Reed, The Ninth Air Force, cited n. 75. 

78 COS (43) 760 (0), CROSSBOW, 17 Dec 43. 

215 

threat to the security of the British Isles 

and OVERLORD preparations.79 

Air attacks against the enemy CROSSBOW 

launching sites, beginning in December, 

continued until the last of the sites was 

captured by the invading forces. Before 

D Day the tactical and strategic air forces 

flew more than 30,000 sorties against 

CROSSBOW installations and estimated that 

they had succeeded in neutralizing 

eighty-six out of ninety-seven identified 

sites. At least seventy-four other sites, 

however, were not detected by Allied 

intelligence before the landings. The 

effectiveness of this program is difficult to 

estimate. Counterattack against the German rocket certainly postponed its use 

and reduced the scale of the eventual at· 

tack on London in June 1944.80 

Long before the success of the AEAF 

air offensive became apparent, however, 

the seriousness of the CROSSBOW threat 

was largely discounted. The flurry of 

alarm in December was within a month 

replaced by sober estimates which calculated that, on the basis of the most 

generous assessments of German production capacity, the flying bombs could not 

be produced in quantity sufficient for a 

major offensive against London or 

against staging areas and ports to be used 

for mounting OVERLORD. For example, 

intelligence reckoned that the largest 

conceivable enemy sustained attack on 

London might mean that the average 

79 Ibid.; d. COS (43) 312th Mtg (0), 22 Dec 43. 

At this meeting the Chiefs of Staff discussed the possibility of dispersing OVERLORD shipping to minimize 

the risks from expected CROSSBOW attacks. 

80 "Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford 

Leigh.Mallory" (submitted to the Supreme Allied 

Commander in November 1944), Fourth Supplement to The London Gazette, No. 37838, 31 December 

1946, pp. 53-54. 
V-BOMB OVER LONDON, JUNE 1944_ Most of these pilotless aircraft were 

launched from the Pas-de-Calais area. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 217 

Londoner would be exposed to a rocket 

bomb explosion within half a mile of 

him once a month.81 Similar calculations 

applied to possible use of the rockets 

against an OVERLORD port area resulted 

in a similar conclusion of probable ineffectiveness.82 At least by March 1944, it 

was clear to SHAEF that German aircraft, with or without pilots, were not 

going to threaten seriously the success of 

OVERLORD. 

The Bombing of French Railroads 

With the threat of CROSSBOW waning 

and the defeat of the Luftwaffe apparently assured, the Allied command 

could decide how air supremacy might 

be exploited to insure the success of 

OVERLORD. Up to the end of 1943, planners had never proposed use of the strategic air forces during the preliminary 

phase on missions directly connected 

with the ground battle, although it was 

suggested that the heavy bombers might 

be sent in to attack German defenses 

about two weeks before the landings. 

Now the unexpectedly early success of 

the air forces in winning the battle for 

control of the air opened the possibility 

of committing them sooner in direct preparation for the assault. 

In December an Allied intelligence 

agency had drawn up a short-term railbombing plan designed to block seventeen selected rail routes immediately before D Day. This recommendation was 

concentrated bombing effort close to 

D Day which, because of the risk of bad 

weather and the probable pressure of 

other commitments at that time, could 

not be guaranteed. As an alternative, 

AEAF developed a plan for a threemonth bombing attack against thirtythree targets in France and Belgium and 

thirty-nine in Germany to disrupt rail 

traffic into the assault area. The new 

plan drafted in the first half of January 

drew on an analysis of the Italian railbombing experience made by Professor 

S. Zuckerman, scientific adviser to AEAF. 

Zuckerman took the view that the Italian 

rail transport system had been virtually 

paralyzed through the destruction or isolation of servicing and repair facilities 

and destruction of locomotives, rolling 

stock, and track. The paralysis was 

brought about, he considered, by a total 

dislocation of the system achieved largely 

by attacks on marshaling yards where the 

servicing facilities were concentrated. If 

similar destruction was to be accomplished in northwest Europe, planners 

estimated that it would take at least three 

months of concentrated effort and would 

involve at least part of the strategic air 

forces.83 

Preliminary discussion by the staff of 

AEAF and representatives of SHAEF 

brought forth no serious objection to the 

plan although Maj. Gen. P. G. Whitefoord, SHAEF G-2, expressed his belief 

83AAF Evaluation Board, Effectiveness of Air Atrejected by-Leigh-Mallory on the grounds tack Against Rail Transportation in the Battle of 

that to be effective it would require a France, Jun 45. This is a study prepared after the 

war by United States air experts in collaboration 

81 COS (44) 25 (0) , Probable Scale and Effect of 

with the French railroad authorities (cited hereafter 

Attack on London by Pilotless Aircraft, 10 Jan 44. 

as AAF Evaluation Board Study). Copy in AAF file 

82 COS (44) 107 (0) (Revised), Progress Report 

138.4-37. Cf. Ltr, R. D. Hughes to Maj Gen F. L. 

Anderson, Report of Conference at Norfolk House, 

by the ACAS (Ops) ,2 Feb 44. 14 Jan 44. USSTAF files. See Bibliographical Note. 

PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

Londoner would be exposed to a rocket 

bomb explosion within half a mile of 

him once a month. 81 Similar calculations 

applied to possible use of the rockets 

against an OVERLORD port area resulted 

in a similar conclusion of probable ineffectiveness. 82 At least by March 1944, it 

was clear to SHAEF that German aircraft, with or without pilots, were not 

going to threaten seriously the success of 

OVERLORD. 

The Bombing of French Railroads 

With the threat of CROSSBOW waning 

and the defeat of the Luftwaffe apparently assured, the Allied command 

could decide how air supremacy might 

be exploited to insure the success of 

OVERLORD. Up to the end of 1943, planners had never proposed use of the strategic air forces during the preliminary 

phase on missions directly connected 

with the ground battle, although it was 

suggested that the heavy bombers might 

be sent in to attack German defenses 

about two weeks before the landings. 

Now the unexpectedly early success of 

the air forces in winning the battle for 

control of the air opened the possibility 

of committing them sooner in direct preparation for the assault. 

In December an Allied intelligence 

agency had drawn up a short-term railbombing plan designed to block seventeen selected rail routes immediately before D Day. This recommendation was 

rejected by Leigh-Mallory on the grounds 

that to be effective it would require a 

81 COS (44) 25 (0), Probable Scale and Effect of 

Attack on London by Pilotless Aircraft, 10 Jan 44. 

82 COS (44) 107 (0) (Revised), Progress Report 

by the ACAS (Ops) , 2 Feb 44. 

217 

concentrated bombing effort close to 

D Day which, because of the risk of bad 

weather and the probable pressure of 

other commitments at that time, could 

not be guaranteed. As an alternative, 

AEAF developed a plan for a threemonth bombing attack against thirtythree targets in France and Belgium and 

thirty-nine in Germany to disrupt rail 

traffic into the assault area. The new 

plan drafted in the first half of January 

drew on an analysis of the Italian railbombing experience made by Professor 

S. Zuckerman, scientific adviser to AEAF. 

Zuckerman took the view that the Italian 

rail transport system had been virtually 

paralyzed through the destruction or isolation of servicing and repair facilities 

and destruction of locomotives, rolling 

stock, and track. The paralysis was 

brought about, he considered, by a total 

dislocation of the system achieved largely 

by attacks on marshaling yards where the 

servicing facilities were concentrated. If 

similar destruction was to be accomplished in northwest Europe, planners 

estimated that it would take at least three 

months of concentrated effort and would 

involve at least part of the strategic air 

forces. 83 

Preliminary discussion by the staff of 

AEAF and representatives of SHAEF 

brought forth no serious objection to the 

plan although Maj. Gen. P. G. Whitefoord, SHAEF G-2, expressed his belief 

as AAF Evaluation Board, Effectiveness of Air Attack Against Rail Transportation in the Battle of 

France, Jun 45. This is a study prepared after the 

war by United States air experts in collaboration 

with the French railroad authorities (cited hereafter 

as AAF Evaluation Board Study) . Copy in AAF file 

138.4-37. Cf. Ltr, R. D. Hughes to Maj Cen F. L. 

Anderson, Report of Conference at Norfolk House, 

14 Jan 44. USSTAF files. See Bibliographical Note. 
218 

that the first seven or eight enemy divisions brought into the battle area would 

come in by road and that therefore the 

rail plan, even if successful, would probably not affect the battle in the early 

stages. Despite this objection, the meeting decided that the proposed attacks 

and the principle on which they were 

based were sound. The number of targets, however, was considered inadequate. 

AEAF therefore revised the plan to include ninety-three targets, of which fourteen in southern France would be attacked by the Fifte~nth Air Force from 

Mediterranean bases. The German targets were omitted. With these revisions 

AEAF and SHAEF representatives expressed themselves as satisfied that the 

plan represented the "only practicable 

method of dealing with the enemy's rail 

communications and that it satisfied 

army requirements." Attacks were to 

begin at once, but would be regarded as 

a bonus until operations in support of 

OVERLORD received precedence over the 

bomber offensive.84 

The decision was not as firm as it 

seemed. The formula with which the 

meeting concluded was the formula of 

the COSSAC planning days when plans 

for air and naval action were drawn up 

by the independent air and naval commands, submitted through the COSSAC 

machinery for Army approval and, after 

such co-ordination, approved. Agreement that the air plan "satisfied army requirements" reflected the habit of mind 

of regarding decisions as made by coequal service commanders. SHAEF was 

84 Allied AF Bombing Committee, 6th Mtg, 24 Jan 

44. USSTAF files. SHAEF representatives were General Whitefoord and General Napier (Movement 

and Transportation Officer) . 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

still very new on the scene and the idea 

of a supreme commander solely responsible for all final decisions affecting the 

operation he commanded whether they 

were primarily air, army, or naval matters had still not been absorbed. SHAEF, 

furthermore, had not yet been given control over the strategic air forces. The 

result was that, while Leigh-Mallory proceeded on the assumption that his plan 

was in effect and actually assigned rail 

targets to the Ninth Air Force in February 1944 as alternatives to its primary 

missions in support of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive, SHAEF was only beginning to study the plan. General 

Whitefoord, the day after the meeting, 

reported to the operations staff of Supreme Headquarters that the AEAF plan 

"may well be worth considering." 85 

Quite different was the reaction at 

General Spaatz's headquarters, USST AF 

(United States Strategic Air Forces). The 

suggestion that any large portion of the 

strategic air forces should be diverted 

from the bomber offensive and brought 

under control of AEAF for tactical purposes was regarded as threatening the 

completion of the vital primary mission 

of the strategic air to defeat the Luftwaffe. An intelligence officer, after examining the AEAF plan, concluded that it 

would fruitlessly dissipate the striking 

power· of the strategic air forces. He 

pointed out, however, that because of 

the peculiar command set-up which put 

Leigh-Mallory directly under Eisenhower 

the pt"an would not compete directly for 

favor with the Combined Bomber Offensive. He suggested that if the strategic 

air forces did not like the plan they 

85 Memo for Bull, West, and McLean, 25 Jan 44. 

SHAEF SGS file 373.24 I. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

would have to devise an alternative for 

submission to General Eisenhower. He 

concluded with a recommendation that 

"a quick and decisive effort be made to 

prevent the Strategic Air Forces being 

engulfed in the Zuckerman program." 86 

General Doolittle, new commander of 

the Eighth Air Force, when asked for an 

opinion, replied that in no case should 

the attack on rail targets by strategic 

bombers be begun until after the German Air Force had been decisively 

beaten. His operations officer felt that 

this objective could be accomplished in 

short order "if we are not prematurely 

distracted." He believed further that the 

system of rail targets could be hit within 

the period D minus 20 to D Day and that 

this would be the most effective time to 

undertake the attackY 

General Spaatz directed that an alternative plan be prepared "for operations 

to follow after accomplishment of the 

primary objective of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive ... and for operations 

of the strategic air forces in the direct 

support of OVERLORD." 88 USST AF planners saw no merits at all in the AEAF 

plan. "Axis European transportation," 

they said, "cannot be recommended as a 

target system for strategic attack"; it was 

too extensive and would require too long 

to destroy. They estimated that "no 

military effect would be felt for more 

than ... nine months" after the program 

was completed. As an alternative they 

86 Ltr, Lt Col Lowell P. Weicker (Dep Dir Int 

USST AF) to Dir Int, Future Plan for Employing 

Air Power in the Support of OVERLORD, 10 Feb 44. 

USST AF files. 

87 Ltr, Cen Anderson (A-3, Eighth AF) to CC 

USSTAF, Force Required Against Railway Targets, 

26 Feb 44. AAF Eighth AF files. 

88 Dir, 12 Feb 44. 

219 

suggested priority attacks on the German 

oil industry, with emphasis on gasoline, 

and secondary attacks on fighter aircraft, 

ball bearing, rubber, and bomber production. Only as a last resort should 

transportation centers in Germany be attacked when weather conditions forbade 

precise attacks on the primary targets. 89 

This USST AF proposal, which became 

known as the "Oil Plan," was submitted 

to General Eisenhower and Air Marshal 

Portal on 5 March with request for the 

Supreme Commander's concurrence. 

It will be recalled that, while the tactical air forces had been subordinated to 

the Supreme Commander at the end of 

1943, the Combined Chiefs of Staff had 

been unable to agree on when and how 

the strategic air forces should come under 

Eisenhower's control. Although it was 

generally conceded that the Supreme 

Commander should command all forces 

(including the strategic air) which he 

needed in the actual battle, the British 

were opposed to turning over the heavy 

bombers to him before that battle. On 

12 February, General Eisenhower received his directive from the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff, conspicuously lacking any 

clause on the control of strategic air. At 

about the same time the AEAF rail plan 

was published and General Spaatz's opposition to it developed. All these circumstances served to give urgency to the 

settling of the command problem. General Eisenhower in the latter part of 

February 1944 brought the problem to 

the Prime Minister. Churchill was at 

first disposed to adhere to his original 

view that the Bomber Command should 

remain independent of the Supreme 

89 Plan for the Completion of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive, 5 Mar 44, cited n. 73. 
220 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Commander while co-operating with him 

in support of OVERLOKD. This was substantially the view advanced by the 

British Chiefs of Staff during- the earlier 

debate with tile U.S. Joint Clliefs and 

was as unacceptable to Eisenhower now 

as it had been then to General Marshall. 

‘Whatever its motive, it seemed to the 

Supreme Commander like holding back 

on what had been agreed on as the Allied 

supreme effort in Europe. If the British 

insisted on anything less than an all-out 

commitment to OVERLOKD, Eisenhower 

told the Prime Minister, he lvould 

“simply have to go home.” 90 Churchill 

then did not prolong his opposition. He 

said he would agree to whatever plan Air 

Marshal Portal and Eisenhower together 

could work out. 

Tile solution drafted by Portal and 

Eisenhower was a proposal to give the 

Supreme Commander “responsibility for 

supervision of air operations out of 

England of all the forces engaged in the 

program” in support of OVERLORD, the 

responsibility to pass when Portal, “as 

executive of the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff for the execution of POINTBLANK 

[the Combined Bomber Offensive] ,” and 

the Supreme Commander jointly approved the plan for air support. The 

Supreme Commander recognized that his 

control of air forces assigned to OVERLORD 

and the Combined Bomber Offensive 

would be subject to intervention by the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff. He also announced his intention of designating Air 

Marshal Tedder, Deputy Supreme Commander, to supervise “all operations under the control of OVERLORD." 91 It was 

90Entry 3 Mar 44, Diary of CinC; cf. ibid., Memo 

under date 22 Mar 44. 

91Tedder had served during World War I with 

understood that the requirements of supporting OVERLORD would not absorb the 

total effort of the strategic air forces and 

that the use of the balance would be 

arranged by Portal and Eisenhower in 

accordance with the existing Combined 

Chiefs of Staff directive for the Combined 

Bomber Offensive. Supervision of this 

part of the air operation would be exercised jointly by Portal and Eisenhower.92 

This agreement, drawn up on 9 March, 

was approved on the 17th by the British 

Chiefs of Staff and forwarded to Washington. The Joint Chiefs accepted all 

the terms except the word “supervision.” 

They preferred “command” and said so. 

But, after a “long and complicated” 93

demurral from the British, they compromised on “direction.” 94

Eisenhower would assume control 

when a plan of air support had been 

agreed upon. But agreement promised 

to be difficult. Opposition to the AEAF 

transportation bombing plan gathered 

during March. Various intelligence experts examined the problem and came 

up with unanimous disapproval chiefly 

on the grounds that German military 

both the Army and the Royal Flying Corps. In 1938 

he began a tour as Director-General of Research and 

Development, Air Ministry. He was Deputy Commander-in-chief of the RAF in the Middle East during the Italian phase of African operations and in 

June 1941 was made Commander-in-Chief, directing 

air attacks against Rommel’s troops and enemy shipping in the Mediterranean. After a short period with 

the Air Council as Vice-Chief of Air Staff, he returned to the Mediterranean early in 1943 as Commander-in-chief, Mediterranean Air Command. 

92 Ltr, Portal to Eisenhower, 9 Mar 44. SHAEF 

SGS file 373/l; cf. CCS 520, Control of Strategic 

Bombing for “Overlord,” 17 Mar 44. 

93 Marshall’s words at JCS 154th Mtg, 21 Mar 44. 

94CCS 520 series. Final agreement is CCS 520/2, 

26 Mar 44. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

traffic required such a small portion of 

the French rail system that 80 or 90 percent of that system would have to be destroyed before troop and supply movements into the assault area could be 

affected. They further questioned 

whether prolonged attack could even sufficiently weaken the system to justify the 

expenditure of bombs. Air Marshal 

Portal was persuaded by their findings 

that the plan was unsuitable. General 

Brooke agreed and, questioning Zuckerman's interpretation of the Italian experience, suggested that rail bombing in 

Italy under much more favorable conditions than would prevail in France had 

actually been of doubtful value.95 

Despite all this opposition, the AEAF 

plan won a powerful advocate in Air 

Marshal Tedder. His advocacy led to 

fresh examinations. General Spaatz observed to General Arnold that since these 

examinations had proved adverse to the 

plan it was hoped by all concerned that 

"the AEAF plan will be repudiated by 

Tedder of his own accord, thus avoiding 

hard feelings." 96 But Tedder did not 

repudiate the plan, mainly because he 

did not feel that the alternative oil plan 

would have effect on OVERLORD in time. 

At a meeting at the Air Ministry on 25 

March presided over by General Eisenhower and attended by all the top airmen 

concerned in the air support question, 

Tedder outlined his views. The German 

Air Force, he felt, should remain the 

priority target, but the residual effort of 

all Allied air forces should be devoted to 

delaying and disorganizing enemy ground 

movements. It was important, he believed, to concentrate all the air forces 

95 COS (44) 93rd Mtg, 21 Mar 44. 

96 Cbl, Spaatz to Arnold, 16 Mar 44. USST AF files. 

221 

on a single target system. In favor of 

the transportation plan he pointed out 

the already strained condition of the 

French railroads. In view of that, he felt 

that rail bombing could delay enemy preparations and, more important, it could 

so canalize rail traffic that it could be 

more easily disrupted completely after 

D Day.97 

As to the first priority of defeating the 

Luftwaffe there was no argument. Attacks on the German Air Force were interpreted further to include attacks on 

ball bearing factories. The debate then 

centered on what rail bombing might 

accomplish. Tedder did not claim that 

the proposed rail attacks would prevent 

all German rail traffic, but he did feel 

that, even in the light of intelligence 

estimates, the bombing would have useful military effect. Portal agreed that 

the efficiency of the enemy rail system 

could be impaired by bombing but 

thought that the damage could be absorbed by curtailment of civilian traffic 

and that the German Army would not be 

affected. War Office and Economic Ministry representatives in general agreed. 

Possibly 30 percent of the present efficiency of the enemy railroads could be 

pared off, they thought, but despite this 

possibility German military traffic would 

still get through. A British economic 

adviser added his belief that, although 

some food would evidently have to be 

carried for the civilian population, the 

Germans would be happy to get along 

without French industry. 

07 Memo, 24 Mar 44, SHAEF SGS file 373/1. Following account of the meeting is from minutes in 

AAF files. Mtg, To Discuss the Bombing Policy in 

the Period Before OVERLORD, 25 May 44, CAS/mise/61 

(Final) . 
222 

General Eisenhower then cut sharply 

into the core of the question. As he saw 

it, the first five or six weeks of OVERLORD 

would be the most critical period, during 

which it was essential to take every possible step to insure that Allied troops got 

ashore and stayed ashore. "The greatest 

contribution that he could imagine the 

air forces making to this aim was that 

they should hinder enemy movement." 

He discounted the arguments that the 

plan would have less than the effect 

claimed for it by AEAF. In default of an 

alternative it was necessary only that the 

rail bombing have some effect, however 

small, to justify adopting it. 

That the plan would have "some" 

effect was generally admitted and the discussion turned to whether there was any 

acceptable alternative. General Spaatz 

summarized his reasons for preferring 

the oil plan already outlined by his staff. 

Strategic attacks on the enemy rail system, he believed, would not affect the 

course of the initial battle, nor would the 

attacks be likely to force the German Air 

Force to fight. The oil plan, on the other 

hand, would evoke enemy reaction and 

so lead to attrition of the German 

fighter air force. It would, furthermore, 

directly weaken enemy resistance and so 

hasten the success of OVERLORD. Spaatz's 

view, in short, was that nothing the strategic air forces could do in the preliminary phase would materially affect the 

battle of the beaches, and that therefore 

they should devote their efforts to a plan 

which would achieve the maximum longrange reduction of German armed 

strength. 

General Eisenhower did not agree. 

The oil plan, he felt, should be considered as soon as the critical phase of 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

OVERLORD was passed, but it did not constitute an alternative to the rail plan. 

The decision of the meeting was that no 

alternative existed and the rail plan was 

approved subject only to General Spaatz's 

examination of whether the Eighth Air 

Force could carry out its portion of it. 

The plan was considered not to affect 

Bomber Command, whose night area 

bombing could be expected to have only 

a fortuitous effect on the German transportation system. 

At the close of the meeting Portal 

warned of British Government opposition and asked that the War Cabinet be 

given an opportunity to consider the implications of killing French civilians in 

the proposed attacks. 

Ever since the plan had been advanced, 

the War Cabinet had viewed as political 

dynamite the idea of bombing French 

and Belgian territory, particularly in attacks on marshaling yards which were 

generally located close to centers of popu· 

lation. Earlier in March the British 

Chiefs of Staff had refused Leigh-Mallory 

blanket clearance of his rail targets without Cabinet approval. Even after General Eisenhower had declared the plan 

essential to the military success of OVERLORD, Cabinet approval was still withheld. Estimates of civilian casualties 

likely to be caused ran as high as 160,000, 

of which it was thought a quarter might 

be killed.98 The Joint Intelligence Committee was invited to prepare an appreciation of French reaction.99 Pending its 

report, certain targets in relatively un· 

populated areas were to be cleared in98 COS (44) 273 (0). Attacks on Rail Targets in 

Enemy Occupied Territory. 19 Mar 44. 

99 Issued as JIC (44) 147 (0) (Final). Bombing 

Targets in France and the Low Countries in Rela· 

tion to Overlord. 15 May 44. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

dividually. For about two weeks the 

Cabinet earnestly debated the question.1Oo Their opposition was at last overcome largely by the firm stand which the 

British Chiefs of Staff took that the program was a military necessity.lOl On 18 

April the Cabinet had cleared all rail 

targets except two in the Paris area.l02 

The Prime Minister however, continued 

to urge General Eisenhower to consider 

alternative targets the bombing of which 

would not kill more than a hundred 

Frenchmen per target. Only if study 

proved all other schemes militarily inferior could he concur that military considerations must override the politicaP03 

At the end of April General Eisenhower 

directed the suspension of attacks on 

twenty-seven targets in heavily populated 

districts, including seventeen of the 

twenty-four targets originally assigned to 

Bomber Command.l04 With modifications such as this and a system of warning 

the civilian population, casualties were 

kept down below the most optimistic estimates. On 16 May the Prime Minister 

had become reconciled to the program 

and, vetoing a proposal to call in French 

railway experts to assess the psychological 

effects of the bombing, he said, "I suggest 

100 COS (44) 190th Mtg (0), 4 Apr 44. For the 

discussion on bombing of French railroads see, in 

addition, COS (44) 258 (0), 10 Mar 44; COS (44) 

273 (0), 19 Mar; and COS (44) 93rd and 95th Mtgs, 

21 and 23 Mar respectively. Entries in Diary of CinC, 

under dates of 5, 13, and 20 Apr 44, summarize the 

salient points accurately. 

101 Cbl, Smith to Marshall, 17 May 44; Ismay, Minute to Prime Minister, 29 Mar 44. SHAEF SGS file 

373.24 I. 

102 Transportation Targets Committee (SHAEF) 

2d Mtg, 18 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 334, bundle N. 

103 Ltr to Eisenhower, 29 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 

373.24 I. 

l04Dir to USSTAF. Bomber Command, and AEAF, 

29 Apr 44. SHAEF SGS file 373.24 I. 

223 

that the matter should be dropped." 105 

As a practical matter it, of course, had 

been dropped and the transportation 

bombing program at that point was 

nearing completion. 

On 14 April General Eisenhower took 

over direction of the strategic air forces 

in support of OVERLORD and three days 

later issued his directive for the transportation bombing. The over-all mission 

of destruction of the German military 

and economic system remained unchanged. The particular mission of the 

strategic air forces was first to deplete the 

German Air Force and destroy the facilities serving it, and second, "to destroy 

and disrupt the enemy's rail communications, particularly those affecting the 

enemy's movements towards the 'OVERLORD' lodgment area." 106 Targets in 

eastern France and part of Belgium were 

allocated to the Eighth Air Force; 

Bomber Command was to hit western 

France and the area around Paris while 

the AEAF concentrated its efforts on 

northern France and Belgium. Although 

German targets were not included in the 

plan as approved in April, the Eighth 

Air Force before D Day dropped about 

5,000 tons on railroad centers in the 

Reich and along the Franco-German 

border.l07 Eisenhower also personally 

gave Spaatz permission to tryout a series 

of heavy attacks on the German oil industry; these were initiated in March and 

continued along with the rail bombing. 

Attacks against oil targets began to assume the proportions of an all-out offen105 Minute, annexed to COS (44) 158th Mtg (0), 

16 May 44. 

106 Dir to USSTAF and Bomber Command, 17 Apr 

44. SHAEF SGS file 373/1. 

101 AAF Evaluation Board Study. 
224 

sive about the middle of May, and on 8 

June General Spaatz announced the destruction of German oil resources as the 

primary strategic aim of the U.S. Strategic Air F orces. 10S 

Bombing of enemy railroads in France 

and Belgium was carried out by all three 

air forces, and before D Day nearly all 

assigned targets had been hit. AEAF reported good results. But outside the 

AEAF the program was carried on with 

general skepticism. A representative of 

21 Army Group referred to it as "pinpricking on rail communications." 109 

The attacks were continued because they 

were believed to constitute the best that 

could be devised and because it was 

hoped they would have some effect. The 

hope, however, according to intelligence 

reports, was sheer delusion. A week before D Day the SHAEF G-2 reported that 

the whole rail bombing operation had 

accomplished nothing of importance. It 

had failed "so [to] reduce the railway 

operating facilities as to impair the 

enemy's ability to move up reinforcements and maintain his forces in the 

West." Although the attacks had probably imposed some slight delays and had 

laid some groundwork for effective tactical thrusts after the assault, it was still 

estimated that the enemy had three times 

the rail capacity needed for military 

traffic, four times the required number 

of cars, eight times the required locomotives, and ten times the required servicing facilitiesYo 

108 Msg, Spaatz to Doolittle, U-63552, 8 Jun 44, in 

Eighth Air Force, Dir Vol 3. AAF files. 

109 AEAF Mtg to discuss bombing targets, 6 May 

44. AAF file 505.25-5. 

110 SHAEF G-2, Evaluation of Rail Centre Attacks, 

20 May 44. AAF file 505.26-38. These conclusions 

were repeated in the report of 31 May. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Seldom have intelligence estimates 

been so wrong. They were wrong pri. 

marily because the method of statistical 

evaluation took no account of either 

cumulative or critical damage. A machine only 10 percent worn out may still 

be incapable of functioning. Similarly, 

destruction of a single cotter pin, an infinitesimal portion of a machine by 

weight, nevertheless may precipitate the 

shattering of the whole mechanism. By 

D Day the Allied air forces, ably assisted 

by saboteurs of the French Resistance, 

had knocked cotter pins out of the railroads all over France, and the transportation system was on the point of total collapse. 

The Germans had long anticipated that 

the Allies would preface their invasion 

of the Continent with a widespread attack on the Continental rail system. 

Rundstedt realized further that without 

an air force of his own he would be virtually helpless before such an attack. Interference with troop movement and supply was certain to be serious. Lacking 

sufficient motor transport even for its 

combat troops, Rundstedt's army was dependent almost entirely on the railroads 

for supply. 

Certain measures might have been 

taken, both to lessen that dependence 

(by decentralization of the supply system, 

for instance) and to protect the railroads. 

Actually, little was done. The Commander in Chief West had to face the 

[~·'in facts that France had been used for 

three years as a grazing ground for the 

rest of the German military establishment and that by the time Hitler recognized the imperative need for strong defensive measures in the west there were 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

no longer any resources with which to 

carry them out. 

The French railroads had already been 

weakened before the war by a series of 

financial crises which resulted in economizing on repair facilities and renewal 

and maintenance expenditures. The campaign of 1940 destroyed 500 way structures and 1,200 railroad buildings. But 

this loss was nothing compared to that 

caused by the depredations of the Germans during the occupation. Out of the 

18,000 locomotives in France, 4,000 were 

removed to Germany, including a large 

percentage of the heavier .types. More 

than a third of the rolling stock, which 

before the war amounted to 31,000 passenger cars and 480,000 freight cars, was 

also "loaned" to Germany. Personnel of 

the SNCF was reduced 20 percent and 

the quality diluted by calling back retired employees and increasing the proportion of unskilled workers.111 

Before Allied bombs began to fall, the 

SNCF was severely strained and lacked 

the usual reserve of excess capacity. Under 

constant pressure to increase loading, 

hampered by shortages perhaps most 

crucial in personnel and facilities for repair, burdened with a cumbersome 

mixed German-French management, and 

plagued with active sabotage and passive 

resistance on the part of a large number 

of workers and the French management, 

the French railroads were peculiarly sensitive to attack. 

In anticipation of transportation difficulties to come, DB WEST on 3 January 

ordered the establishment of a strict priority system restricting rail shipments to 

the most important military supplies. 

111 AAF Evaluation Board Study. 

225 

Seventh Army had worked out and put 

into effect this system for Normandy and 

Brittany by the end of FebruaryY2 Up to 

that time no difficulties more serious 

than local delays were experienced 

through spasmodic Allied air attacks and 

sabotage. But in March the co-ordinated 

attacks began and the strained transportation system showed immediate signs of 

breakdown. Despite the regulation of 

nonessential traffic, 1,600 trains by the 

end of April were backlogged in France, 

including 600 carrying army supplies. In 

addition, valuable army supplies had 

been destroyed in attacks on marshaling 

yards; other supplies ready for shipment 

were held up in warehouses awaiting 

freight cars.ll3 Seventh Army, during the 

month, got a taste of things to come. In 

its sector, two major attacks on Ie Mans resulted in considerable losses of locomotives and cars and put the yards out of operation for several weeks. Since the beginning of 1944 railroads in the army area 

had suffered twenty-five air attacks and 

fifty-six reported cases of sabotage. The 

cumulative effect was to increase the backlog of trains feeding Normandy and Brittany from 30 at the beginning of the 

month to 228 at the end. l14 

The five to six hundred locomotives destroyed in the DB W ES T sector during 

March was nearly double the figure for 

February. But the acceleration of the 

tempo of attacks had only begun. OK\V 

noted that in March the majority of Allied 

112 Sevellth Arm)" KTB; Taetigkeitsbericht des 

Bevollmaechtigten Transport OU;ziers beim A .O.K.7 

(referred to hereafter as Seventh Ann)" Trans. 0.), 

KTB 1.1.-30.vl.44. 

1130B WEST, Oberquartiermeister West (referred 

to hereafter as OB WEST, O.Qu.) , KTB 1.l.-17. 

VIII.N. 

114 Seventh Arm)" Trans. 0., KTB l.l.-30.vI.44. 
BOMBARDMENT OF MARSHALING YARDS at Busigny in northern France. 
PRELIMINARY OPERATIONS 

air attacks in France were still hitting 

Luftwaffe installations. In April the concentration shifted dramatically to railroads: there were 249 reported attacks as 

against 93 in March. Sabotage cases at the 

same time increased from 460 to 500.n5 

The first serious military effect was the 

curtailment of supplies for the construction of the Atlantic Wall. In April the 

naval commander in Normandy was already complaining about the lack of steel 

and concrete due to the destruction of 

rail centers. Construction delays, he 

added, would be inevitable.na 

Countermeasures were discussed in a 

conference on 15 April between Field 

Marshal Keitel, Chief of OKW, and the 

Reich Minister for Rail and Road Communica tions (Reichsverkehrsminister) 

but no really effective measures were 

possible. Fighter protection could not 

be increased, since Allied bombing of 

vital targets in Germany continued unabated while Luftwaffe fighter strength 

115 aKW /WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Der Westen 

1.IV.-16.XII.44, cited hereafter as Der Westen. This 

draft War Diary (KTB) , like that cited in n. 27, 

was written by Major Percy Schramm, OKW historian, from records and daily notes made at OKW 

headquarters. Until the end of 1943 the Diary was 

kept chronologically and supplemented by information from participants in the operations. After 1943 

the diary was written up at intervals of three months 

or more in the form of separate narratives on the 

various fronts and the special problems faced by 

OKW. Besides official' documents, Schramm made 

use of a M erkbuch in which he recorded informal 

notes on the situation meetings he attended and 

special interviews he held with the Deputy Chief of 

WFSt, General Warlimont. In view of the destruction of OKW records ordered in 1945 by General 

Scherff, the copies of Schramm's Ausarbeitungen for 

1944 represent unique source material for OKW 

history. 

116 Marine Gruppenkommando West, Kriegstagebuch (referred to hereafter as Navy Group West, 

KTB) ,16.IV-30.IV.44. Nayy D~pt files, Tambach Collection. 

227 

deteriorated. Military leaves were suspended throughout the west on 25 April 

to relieve the pressure on the railroads.u7 

Additional restriction of nonmilitary traffic, which achieved a sharp curtailment of 

rail operations in France, brought a temporary improvement. Seventh Army 

noted that its backlog of trains had been 

reduced from 228 at the end of March to 

120 at the end of April.ll8 Reduction in 

total traffic further cut the losses of equipment. But the statistical improvement indicated no solution to the problem. 

Allied attacks were stepped up in May. 

Seventh Army reported "important destruction" during the first week and predicted that in case of a landing the enemy 

would be able to disrupt rail traffic completely, as he had done in Italy. The same 

conclusion had already led DB WEST to 

order the formation of truck companies 

under centralized control that would pool 

all available motor transport for supply in 

accordance with the critical tactical needs. 

The order was not easy to implement in 

view of critical shortages of motor transport. On 7 May Seventh Army had worked 

out the details of a scheme to motorize 

portions of certain infantry divisions in 

reserve as well as Kampfgruppen of the 

coastal defense divisions so that they 

could be employed in mobile fighting. 

The remainder of all units were to give 

up all transportation for the formation of 

motor companies under corps controleach company with a capacity of 120 tons. 

Units in the forward positions would 

bring their weaponing up to 75 percent 

of authorized allotments and secure three 

days' supply of all material needed to 

make them self-sufficient in combat. It 

117 Der Westen. 

118 Seventh Army, Trans.a., KTB 1.I.-30.VI.44. 
228 

was reckoned that it would take three 

days for resupply through the centralized 

transport system,119 

One German answer to Allied bombings, in short, was an attempt to reduce 

dependence on the railroads. The other 

was an attempt to keep the railroads in 

repair. Repair of bomb damage on rail 

lines and marshaling yards was generally 

not a difficult or time-consuming process. 

Even after very heavy raids on marshaling yards, traffic could almost always be 

resumed in a day or two. Evidently, however, widespread and constant air attacks 

could involve a very heavy total expenditure of man-hours for repair. The cumulative strain spread across theater boundaries. By the middle of January, for example, all the rail lines in Italy were 

broken and the supply situation became 

so serious that two more railway engineer 

battalions were requisitioned, one from 

Russia and one from the west. At the end 

of March Rundstedt was called on to send 

another battalion to Italy. Although the 

French railroad system was then already 

beginning to suffer from Allied attacks 

the Italian situation was thought to be 

still worse.120 Rundstedt at the end of 

March was thus left with about three railway engineer battalions to supervise repair work on French railroads for military use. Laborers were drawn at first 

from the SNCF and from the civilian 

population as a whole. But when the coordinated bombings began to take effect 

in the spring extraordinary measures became necessary. Immediately 18,000 men 

119 Order, Seventh Army to subordinate corps and 

divisions, Beweglichmachung und Bildung zusaetzlichen Transportraumes, 7 May 44. Seventh Army, 

KTB Anlagen l.1.-30.v1.44. 

120 OKW /WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Die Entwicklung im Westen vom 1.1.-31.111.44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of Organization Todt were taken off construction work on the Atlantic \-Vall to 

try to keep the railroads running. On 8 

May OKW approved the withdrawal of an 

additional 10,000 men.l2l Two weeks later 

Reich Minister Albert Speer noted after 

a conference with Hitler that the latter 

approved his view "that in the west, even 

though building operations on the Atlantic Wall should be possible, the main 

duties of the O.T. [Organization Todt] 

should lie in the elimination of difficulties 

in transport, including those in the interior of France." 122 

But repairs could not keep pace. To the 

systematic attacks on marshaling yards, 

the Allied tactical air forces in May added 

new damaging attacks on bridges over the 

Seine, Oise, and Meuse Rivers. These attacks, begun suddenly on 7 May, had not 

been incl uded in the original transportation bombing plan because it was believed 

on the basis of experience in Italy that the 

weight of bombs required to knock out a 

bridge was out of all proportion to the 

military value of success. The first attacks were undertaken experimentally at 

the urging of 21 Army Group, which had 

little faith in the efficacy of general attacks 

on rail centers. 123 Success was spectacular. 

Bridges were toppled along the whole 

length of the Seine from Rouen to 

Mantes-Gassicourt before D Day at a cost 

of only 220 tons of bombs to a bridge. On 

26 May, all routes over the Seine north of 

Paris were closed to rail traffic and they 

remained closed for the next thirty days 

despite German efforts to repair on.e or 

121Der Westen. 

122 Notes by Reich Minister Albert Speer on Conference with Hitler on 22, 23 May 44, MS (trans). 

AAF files. 

123 AEAF Mtg, 6 May 44. AAF file 505.25-5. 
RESULTS OF AIR ATTACKS on railroad bridges and rolling stock. Bridge over 

the Seine at Port du Graviers (above), and wreckage of military train after aerial 

strafing attack (below). 
230 

two of the less completely damaged structures. German repair operations were 

kept under observation and whenever a 

bridge seemed on the point of becoming 

usable again it was reattacked.124 The success of the first bridge bombings led to 

the development of a plan to close off the 

lodgment area. The first line of interdiction was set at the line of the Seine and 

Loire Rivers and a gap section between 

the rivers. The second line included 

bridges over a number of rivers on a general line from Etaples to Fismes to Clamecy and thence along the upper Loire to 

Orleans. Bridges on the Loire were not to 

be hit until after D Day to avoid defining 

the assault area. (Map IV) 

On 21 May, known to the air forces 

as "Chattanooga Day," fighter-bombers 

opened attack on line targets, bombing 

open track and small stations and strafing 

trains and rail facilities. Seventh Army on 

that day recorded 50 locomotives destroyed in its sector.125 French records 

124 For example. two bridges south of Oisel were 

attacked and damaged on 10 May. The Germans decided to repair one for emergency use. On 6 June the 

railway engineers announced that it was operating. 

On that day it was bombed but suffered only light 

damage. The next day Allied planes returned to 

finish the job. The attack caused heavy damage. but 

the German engineers nevertheless set to work to 

repair the bridge and estimated that they could 

have it in shape again by 2 July. Allied air forces 

kept watch and on 29 June when the repairs were 

almost finished flew again to the attack. That attack 

at last finished the agony as three superstructures 

fell into the river and the Germans abandoned all 

thoughts of repair. See Rpts of the 6th Ry Eng Regt. 

May-Jun 1944, in OKH Chef des Transportwesens, 

General der Eisenbahntruppen, Lagemeldungen 

(Ausschnitte) Frankreich, Band la, 194~44. 

12~ Seventh Army, Trans.O., KTB I.I.-30.VI.44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

show 113 locomotives damaged during 

the day throughout France.126 Generaloberst Friedrich Dollmann, commander 

of Seventh Army, told Rommel the new 

attacks would bring a grave deterioration 

of the already strained transportation system and asked increasing use of motor 

transport.127 Before D Day 2,700 sorties 

were flown against line targets. 

Transportation bombing before D Day 

had a far more profound effect on the 

ability of the German Army in the west 

to resist invasion than the Allies realized. 

Statistics were misleading. The number 

of locomotives destroyed by air attack 

was actually less than the number awaiting repair from normal deterioration; the 

physical destruction done to rail and servicing facilities was small; rail cuts were 

repaired quickly on the important military lines. But despite all these facts, 

which mathematically added up to negligible destruction, rail traffic in France 

actually declined 60 percent between 1 

March and 6 June. More significantly, in 

the area most heavily bombed, the Region 

Nord, three-quarters of the normal traffic 

was knocked off the rails. In the Region 

Ouest (generally in the invasion zone), 

which was bombed relatively lightly in 

order to preserve security, traffic declined 

by only 30 percent, but immediately after 

the assault it dropped even lower than in 

the Region Nord. These results were to 

prove critical in the battle for Normandy.128 

126 AAF Evaluation Board Study. 

127 Seventh Army, KTB I.I.-30.VI.44, 23 May 44. 

128 AAF Evaluation Board Study. Normal traffic 

calculated as that of 1943. 
CHAPTER VII 

German Defense Measures, 1944 

OKW Policy in 1944 

German strategy for 1944 rested on the 

realization that decisive offensives could 

no longer be mounted in the east and that 

the growing strength of the Western 

Allies made almost certain a major invasion attempt before the end of the year. 

The prospective invasion of western Europe presented both the gravest danger 

to the Reich and the most hopeful opportunity for turning defeat into victory. If 

the Allies were not stopped at the landings, their attack would carry at once into 

the heart of Germany; if they were 

stopped and their beachheads annihilated, it was unlikely that a new attempt 

could be made for a long time to come, 

and as many as fifty German divisions 

might thereby be freed for the struggle 

against the Soviet Union.1 

Recognizing the superiority of the Allied military potential, the Germans knew 

that their one chance for defeating the 

invasion was to defeat it quickly. It was 

therefore vital that the maximum German force be on the spot to fight the decisive battle as soon as the Allies attacked. 

To stake everything on a battle whose 

place and timing would be entirely of the 

enemy's choosing was to put an all but im1 OKW /WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Die OKW 

Kriegsschauplaetze im Rahmen der Gesamtkriegsfuehrung l.l.-31.l1I.44. Cited hereafter as Die OKW 

Kriegsschauplaetze. See above, Ch. VI, n. 115. Cf. 

Fuehrer Directive No. 51, 3 Nov 43. Translation in 

App. D. below. 

possible burden on the defense, demanding of it a mobility it did not have and a 

sure knowledge of enemy intentions it 

had no means of acquiring. It was one 

thing to decide-as Hitler did with the 

issuance of his Directive No. 51-to prepare the west for the critical battle to 

come; it was another to find the means to 

carry out those preparations. 

Regardless of how critical the defense 

of the west was declared, there could be 

no question of withdrawing forces from 

the hard-pressed eastern armies to reinforce it. The best that could be hoped for 

was to hold on to forces already in the 

various occupied territories outside of 

Russia and devote to the west the bulk 

of the new resources in men and equipment that became available in the months 

remaining before the Allies attacked. 

After Hitler's November order, OKW 

drew up a plan providing in detail for the 

shift of troops to meet a major Allied invasion of anyone of the western theaters 

of operations. If the invasion hit Francethe most likely possibility-OKW planned 

to move three infantry divisions from 

Norway and Denmark, one infantry division, a Werfer regiment and a corps headquarters from Italy, and four mobile infantry or Jaeger divisions and some minor 

units from the Balkans.2 Although these 

2Die OKW Kriegsschauplaetze. Werfer regiments 

were equipped with either heavy mortars or rocket 

projectors. Jaeger divisions were light infantry divisions. 
232 

troop shifts would not amount to evaclIation of any occupied area, they would 

mean a considerahle concentration of 

force. 

Such concentration was based on the 

assumption that the Allies would make 

one main attack. In January OK\V began 

to wonder whether the assumption was 

justified. All signs still pointed to an attack across the Channel, probably at its 

narrowest point, but there were also indications that such an attack might be 

preceded or accompanied by other major 

thrusts. OK W noticed the "astonishing" 

emphasis in Allied quarters on preparations for a "second front" and reasoned 

that these might be designed to conceal 

another "main blow" that would not 

strike across the Channel. The "other 

place" selected might be Portugal or the 

Balkans, but the choice of the latter had 

particular plausibility.3 It seemed unlikely that the large Allied forces in the 

Mediterranean would be committed in 

the slow and costly attempt to push all 

the way up the Italian peninsula.4 The 

Balkan area offered greater strategic 

prizes and was conveniently at hand. 

Whatever area was threatened OKW 

viewed the twin facts of accumulated Allied power in the Mediterranean and 

comparative stalemate in Italy as a kind of 

strategic unbalance which might be 

solved by another sudden major assault. 

German jitteriness on this score was not 

calmed by a report at about this time 

from agents in England that the ratio of 

Allied seagoing landing ships to landing 

3 Summary, dtd 4 Jan 44, of impressions of senior 

naval member of the Armed Forces Operations Staff 

in Seekriegsleitung/I.Abt., KTB 1.-31.1.44, 15 Jan 

44; Die OKW Kt·iegsschal1plaetze. 

• OKW /WFSt, KTB I.lX.-31.XIl.43, 28 Dec 43. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

craft for Channel use was ten times as 

great as the Doenitz staff had previollsly 

estimated." This discovery seemed to confirm the guess that the Allies were planning an expedition outside the Channel. 

All these fears seemed to be further 

confirmed by the Allied landings at 

Anzio on 22 January. The Anzio beachhead, in the German view, had only a slim 

tactical connection with the main Italian 

front. General JodI, Chief of the Armed 

Forces Operations Staff, considering it to 

be an independent, self-sustaining operation, argued that it might well be the first 

of a series of attacks on the periphery of 

the Continent with the purpose of forcing 

dispersion of German reserves in preparation for a thrust across the Channel.6 This 

interpretation drew support from the fact 

(which the Germans found "surprising") 

that the Allies instead of at once pushing 

inland from the Anzio beaches paused for 

about a week to consolidate a beachhead, 

as though the object were not to gain tactical objectives but to attract German 

forces. Reasoning thus, JodI told Hitler 

that they now had to reckon with a peripheral Allied strategy which would probably entail attacks on Portugal, on the 

west and south coasts of France, or in the 

Aegean, before the assault on the Kanalkueste. \Vith regard to France, it was 

thought that the most likely Allied peripheral operations would be simultaneous 

landings on the Mediterranean and Biscay coasts to pinch off the Iberian Peninsula. This threat was taken seriollsly 

enough that during February two new 

infantry divisions then being formed were 

attached to Nineteenth Army for defense 

5Seekriegsleitung/I.Abt., KTB 1.-31.l.44, 16 Jan 

44. 

6 Die OKW Kriegsschauplaetze. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 

of the south coast and the 9th SS Panzer 

Division was released from DB WEST 

and moved south into the Avignon area 

as army reserve. One new division went 

to First A rmy for defense of the Biscay 

coast and Spanish border. 7 

The most important effect of the new 

appreciation, however, was to unsettle 

German plans for the defense. If the Allies 

were going to pursue a policy of many 

simultaneous or successive assaults, the 

Germans could not afford to weaken sectors not immediately under attack in 

order to concentrate on one main invasion. It would, in fact, be very difficult to 

discover which of many attacks constituted the major threat. Partly for this 

reason, and partly because the military 

situation both in the Mediterranean area 

and in Russia was shifting so rapidly during the early months of 1944 that any 

plans for the future were subject to almost daily changes, OK VV in March canceled its comprehensive defense plans. 

Instead, theater commanders were advised that troop movements would be ordered in detail only at the time they were 

needed, presumably after a given Allied 

attack had developed into a major action. 

In addition, a new plan was drawn providing for a shift of certain units from the 

Replacement Army in Germany to any 

OK W front under heavy attack. DB 

WEST by this plan might get one corps 

headquarters, two reinforced panzer grenadier regiments, one reinforced infantry 

demonstration regiment, Kampfgruppen 

of three infantry regiments which were 

cadre for new divisions, a motorized artillery demonstration regiment, five Landesschuetzen battalions, and one Nebel7 OKW /WFSt, KTB AusariJeitung, Die Entwicklung im Westen 1.1.-31.[[1.44. 

233 

werter demonstration battalion. 8 These 

miscellaneous, partly green units were 

hardly a substitute for the eight divisions 

(reinforced) which would have gone to 

DB WEST under the old plan. Although 

OKW did not formally abandon the intention of drawing additional reinforcements from occupied areas not under attack, as a practical matter the possibility 

of such reinforcement had by March become negligible. With the high command 

admitting the possibility of not one but 

several landings, strategic uncertainty 

would evidently delay any possible concentration.9 

By March 1944, the German western 

defense had thus been weakened by a 

growing confusion as to Allied intentions. 

This confusion, however, was a relatively 

small element in the difficulties that multiplied for the Germans after the end of 

1943. Not threats but immediate dangers 

in both the south and east were the principal preoccupations of the German high 

command. For three months after Hitler 

issued his order that the west was no 

longer to be weakened in favor of the Eastern Front, the Germans succeeded generally in holding the manpower dikes despite ominous cracks, and rising tides of 

Soviet victories. Just before Christmas, 

1943, the Russians launched an offensive 

on the Kiev front which in a few days 

drove nearly two hundred miles west; in 

January, Leningrad was relieved by successful attack against the German Army 

Grouj) North; at the end of the month, 

8 Die OKW Kriegsschauplaetze. Landesschuetzen 

battalions were security units. Nebelwerfer were 

rocket projectors or chemical mortars. 

9 In fact only one division was moved from other 

OKW theaters to OB WEST in the first month of the 

invasion. This was the 89th Division from Norway. 

and it was committed on the Kanalkueste. 
234 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

much of the German Eighth Army was 

encircled near Cherkassy; in February, 

the Russians attacked the German Sixth 

Army in the IJkraine in a general offensive to clear the Dnepr bend. The temptation again to corral idle divisions from the 

west vvas very great. But only one infantry division was taken from Norway, and 

it was replaced by a unit which, though 

not completely formed, was roughly 

equivalent in combat strength. The west 

suffered only minor depredations. In 

February, three reinforced regiments being formed in Germany and earmarked 

Ear OKW reserve for the west went east. 

During the same month 3,000 Russianfront soldiers who were suffering from 

frostbite were exchanged for a like number of troops in the west.10 Signs of the 

mounting pressure of the Russian war, 

these borrowings still did not constitute 

important weakening of the west. 

But at the end of January the Anzio 

landings had opened another small crack. 

The Germans reacted to the Anzio attack 

in force, not only because they believed 

it to be the first of a series of major Allied 

amphibious assaults, but because they saw 

the possibility of gaining political prestige 

by wiping out at least one Allied beachhead. In accordance with plans for meeting a large-scale landing in the southwest, 

the fully motorized 715th Division was 

ordered out of France. By 4 February, 

however, it was seen that this reinforcement was not enough to crush the Anzio 

beachhead and General Jodl asked Hitler 

for permission to move in the 9th SS 

Panzer Division, the only fully combatready armored division in France. Hitler 

refused. With an eye on the large Allied 

10 Die OKW Kriegsschauplaetre; OKW/WFSt, 11 OKW/WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Die Kaempfe 

KTB Ausarbeitung, Osten 1.I.-31.III.44. urn den Brueckenkopf Nettuno 22.1.-31.III.44. 

reserve forces in North Africa, he feared 

an attack against the Mediterranean coast 

of France. He doubted, furthermore, 

whether the 9th SS Panzer Division, even 

if eventually returned to France, could 

make up its losses in Italy, particularly in 

equipment. OB WEST thus survived that 

crisis. But the loss of the 715th Division, 

which because of its unusual mobility had 

been included with the reserve armored 

force, was serious enough.11

Much worse was to come. In March, the 

manpower dikes broke wide open as the 

Soviet Union launched a new offensive, 

and at the same time fears increased that 

Hungary was getting ready to pull out of 

the war. These circumstances forced temporary abandonment of the principles of 

Hitler’s Directive No. 5 1. The bulk of the 

troops for the occupation of Hungary 

(carried out in the latter part of the 

month) were to be furnished by the Commander in Chief Southeast from the Balkans, and by the Replacement Army, but 

OB WEST had to send the Panzer Lehr 

Division, a corps headquarters, some aircraft, and a few minor units. The plan 

was to return all these units as soon as 

Hungary was firmly in German hands. 

In fact, the occupation took place rapidly 

and smoothly and the bulk of the Hungarian Army remained under arms and 

continued to fight for the Germans. The 

Panzer Lehr Division thus was actually 

able to come back to France in May. But 

two divisions from the Replacement 

Army and two of the divisions contributed by the Commander in Chief Southeast were shuttled on to the Russian front 

and a third was saved only by a last-minute appeal to Hitler. The loss indirectly 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 235 

affected the west in that it further reduced the reserves available to meet the 

invasion. 

With the Russian armies again on the 

move and threatening to collapse the 

whole southern wing of the German defense, the danger of invasion in the west 

for a time dimmed by comparison. The 

Russians attacked on 4 March. On the 9th 

Uman fell; the Germans evacuated Kherson and Gayvoron on the 14th. Still the 

Russian armies suffered no check. Before 

the end of the month they crossed the 

Bug, Dnestr, and Pruth Rivers. In Galicia 

they temporarily encircled the German 

First Panzer Army. The crisis for the Germans was too desperate to permit consideration of long-range plans. Reinforcements were needed at once and they had 

to be taken wherever they could be found. 

On 10 March the 361st Division was ordered out of Denmark, and replaced with 

a division of much lower combat value. 

Two weeks later a similar exchange removed the 349th Division from France 

and brought as a substitute a new weak 

division, the 331st, from the Replacement 

Army. At about the same time four divisions under OB WEST (the 326th, 346th, 

348th, and 19th Luftwaffe Field) were 

ordered to give up all their assault guns, 

initially to strengthen Romanian forces 

and later to be distributed to various divisions along the whole Eastern Front. 

The big ax fell on 26 March when the 

whole II SS Panzer Corps with the 9th 

and 10th SS Panzer Divisions received 

marching orders to leave France and go 

to the assistance of the First Panzer 

Arrny.12 

The departure of the ZZ SS Parzzer 

Corps left OB WEST with only one fully 

12 Die OKW Kriegsschauplnc,tre. 

mobile division (the 21st Panzer). The 

OKW historian has suggested that, had 

the Allies invaded at that time, Rundstedt 

could have offered no effective resistance 13 This may be an exaggeration, but 

it is’ true that the end of March 1944 

marked one of the low points of preparedness in the west and that during the next 

six weeks, with the Russian front relatively stabilized, the west did much to recoup its losses. By the middle of May four 

panzer divisions were ready for combat 

(despite deficiencies of equipment) and 

four more were being built up. Toward 

the end of the month Panzer Lehr Division returned from Hungary and the Zst 

SS Panzer Division from the Eastern 

Front was attached to OB WEST for rebuilding. At the same time the XLVII

Panzer Corps under General der Panzertruppen Hans Freiherr von Funck, one 

of the oldest and most experienced armored commanders in the German Army, 

was brought from the east to serve under 

Rundstedt. 

Actually the recuperative powers of the 

west under the severe and continuing 

strain of supplying transfusions to the 

east were remarkable. Between November 1943 and June 1944, the total of combat divisions under Rundstedt’s command increased from forty-six to fiftyeight. The increase was accounted for in 

part by the transfer of fought-out units 

from Russia but in larger part by the 

formation of new units. In the fall of 

1942 the German Army, already sorepressed for manpower, adopted the policy 

of combining training with occupation 

duties. The old combined recruiting and 

training units were split, and the recruit 

henceforth after induction into a recruit13 Ibid. 

GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 235 

affected the west in that it further reduced the reserves available to meet the 

InvaSIOn. 

With the Russian armies again on the 

move and threatening to collapse the 

whole southern wing of the German defense, the danger of invasion in the west 

for a time dimmed by comparison. The 

Russians attacked on 4 March. On the 9th 

Uman fell; the Germans evacuated Kherson and Gayvoron on the 14th. Still the 

Russian armies suffered no check. Before 

the end of the month they crossed the 

Bug, Dnestr, and Pruth Rivers. In Galicia 

they temporarily encircled the German 

First Panzer Army. The crisis for the Germans was too desperate to permit consideration of long-range plans. Reinforcements were needed at once and they had 

to be taken wherever they could be found. 

On 10 March the 361st Division was ordered out of Denmark, and replaced with 

a division of much lower combat value. 

Two weeks later a similar exchange removed the 349lh Division from France 

and brought as a substitute a new weak 

division, the 331st, from the Replacement 

Army. At about the same time four divisions under OB WEST (the 326th, 346th, 

N8th, and 19th Luftwaffe Field) were 

ordered to give up all their assault guns, 

initially to strengthen Romanian forces 

and later to be distributed to various divisions along the whole Eastern Front. 

The big ax fell on 26 March when the 

whole II SS Panzer Corps with the 9th 

and 10lh SS Panzer Divisions received 

marching orders to leave France and go 

to the assistance of the First Panzer 

ArmyP 

The departure of the II SS Panzer 

Corps left OB WEST with only one fully 

12 Die OKW Kriegsschauplaetze. 

mobile division (the 21st Panzer). The 

OK W historian has suggested that, had 

the Allies invaded at that time, Rundstedt 

could have offered no effective resistance. 13 This may be an exaggeration, but 

it is true that the end of March 1944 

marked one of the low points of preparedness in the west and that during the next 

six weeks, with the Russian front relatively stabilized, the west did much to recoup its losses. By the middle of May four 

panzer divisions were ready for combat 

(despite deficiencies of equipment) and 

four more were being built up. Toward 

the end of the month Panzer Lehr Division returned from Hungary and the 1st 

S5 Panzer Division from the Eastern 

Front was attached to OB WEST for rebuilding. At the same time the XLVII 

Panzer Corps under General cler Panzertruppen Hans Freiherr von Funck, one 

of the oldest and most experienced armored commanders in the German Army, 

was brought from the east to serve under 

Rundstedt. 

Actually the recuperative powers of the 

west under the severe and continuing 

strain of supplying transfusions to the 

east were remarkable. Between November 1943 and] une 1944, the total of combat divisions under Rundstedt's command increased from forty-six to fiftyeight. The increase was .accounted for in 

part by the transfer of fought-out units 

from Russia but in larger part by the 

formation of new units. In the fall of 

1942 the German Army, already sorepressed for manpower, adopted the policy 

of combining training with occupation 

duties. The old combined recruiting and 

training units were split, and the recruit 

henceforth after induction into a recruit13lbid. 
236 

ing unit near his home was sent to an affiliated training unit in the field. In 1943 

about two-thirds of these training units 

were located in France, the Low Countries, Denmark, Poland, Lithuania, the 

Soviet Union, and northern Italy. The infantry and panzer units were organized 

into reserve divisions of which twenty-six 

(including four panzer) were formed 

during 1942 and 1943. Half of these were 

stationed in the OB WEST sector. 

Though they remained under the commander of the Replacement Army and 

theoretically retained their primary function of training replacements, in reality 

they came to be regarded as low-grade 

field divisions. Their time was increasingly devoted to garrison duty and on occasion to fighting Resistance forces. In 

order to carry out these duties, they received administrative attachments from 

the regular field army. As their operational responsibilities expanded and they 

began to occupy a permanent place on 

OB WEST's order of battle, it became impossible for them to give up personnel for 

filler replacements to regular units. In 

short they became themselves an integral 

part of the field army. In recognition of 

this fact, most of them were eventually redesignated as infantry or armored divisions. Six of OB WEST's reserve divisions, including all three reserve panzer 

divisions, had thus been upgraded before 

the invasion. Five of the remaining seven 

were similarly converted in the summer 

of 1944; the other two were disbanded. H 

Besides converting reserve divisions, 

the Commander in Chief West enlarged 

his army by rehabilitating German units 

14 WD TM-E # 30-451; Military Intelligence Division. The German Replacement Army (Ersatzheer). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

from the east as already noted, and by activating new divisions out of miscellaneous personnel drawn in part from his own 

resources and in part from the Replacement Army. The effect of all this on the 

organization and character of the west 

army must be described in some detail, 

but in summary it may be said that the 

steady drain of the Eastern Front left to 

Rundstedt on the eve of his great battle 

two kinds of units: old divisions which 

had lost much of their best personnel and 

equipment, and new divisions, some of 

excellent combat value, some only partially equipped and partially trained. The 

majority of the new divisions were formed 

according to streamlined tables of organization designed generally to use the fewest 

possible men to produce the maximum 

fire power. 

Organization for Combat 

Between 1939 and 1943 the German 

standard infantry division contained 

three regiments with a total of nine rifle 

battalions. Each of the infantry regiments 

had, besides its twelve rifle and heavy 

weapons companies, a 13th (infantry 

howitzer) and 14th (antitank) company. 

The division had also an antitank and a 

reconnaissance battalion. Organic artillery consisted of one regiment of one 

medium (ISO-mm. howitzer) and three 

light (IOS-mm. howitzer or gun) battalions with a total armament of fortyeight pieces. German division artillery 

was thus roughly equal to that of a U.S. 

division. Chiefly because of the antitank 

and reconnaissance units, on the other 

hand, the division with 17,200 men was 

substantially larger than its U.S. counterpart. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 237 

It was also substantially larger than 

could be supported by the dwindling supply of manpower after four years of war. 

In October 1943 the division was drastically overhauled to reduce its size while 

maintaining its fire power. Organization 

charts of the new-style division (with 

13,656 men) comprising three regiments 

of two battalions each had only just been 

published when further slashes were ordered. The problem (set in January 1944 

by Hitler) was to trim the personnel to 

something like 11,000 without affecting 

the combat strength. Army planners rejected this sleight of hand as impossible 

and contented themselves with a further 

cut from 13,656 to 12,769. Reductions 

were made chiefly in supply and overhead, 

and the proportion of combat to service 

troops was thereby raised to 75-80 percent. The result was the so-called 1944- 

type infantry division.15 

The reduction from nine infantry battalions to six was partly alleviated by the 

substitution of a Fuesilier battalion for 

the old reconnaissance unit. The Fuesilier 

battalion, still charged with reconnaissance duties, was organized like a rifle battalion except that one company was 

equipped with bicycles and the unit had 

slightly more horse-drawn vehicles and 

some motor transport. In practice the 

Fuesilier battalion came to be reckoned 

as a seventh rifle battalion. 

Besides lopping off three battalions, the 

new division pruned out the rifle squad 

and company while at the same time increasing the proportion of automatic 

weapons. 16The basic unit, the rifle com15 OKH/Org.Abt., KTB Anlagen, 1944. 

16 It should be noted that this process, while forced 

by the shortage of manpower, also followed the direction of German tactical doctrine which always 

pany, was cut to 140 enlisted men and 2 

officers, as compared with the U.S. company of 187 enlisted men and 6 officers. 

Rifle strength in the German division was 

about 1,200 less than in the American but 

the total division fire power was superior. 

About equal in artillery, the German division enjoyed a slight preponderance in 

infantry howitzers, and a heavy superiority in automatic weapons.17

The 1944 infantry division was set up 

as the basic type for new divisions as well 

as for the reorganization of certain old 

formations, as for instance, the Luftwaffe 

field divisions.18 The division which included the bulk of Rundstedt’s infantry, 

however, the static (bodenstaendige) division, was exempted from reorganization 

unless specifically so ordered. The static 

divisions were formed at the request of 

Rundstedt in 1942 in order that he would 

have a nucleus of divisions not subject to 

transfer to the east. Though triangular 

with nine rifle battalions, they were substantially weaker than the normal oldtype infantry division. They lacked the 

reconnaissance battalion and had only 

three battalions of artillery.19

Although the static divisions were expressly designed as permanent garrison 

troops for the west, they were by no means 

safe from the periodic troop collections 

emphasized small infantry units equipped with maximum automatic fire power. 

17 See App. F, Comparative Fire Power of the U.S. 

and German 1944.type Infantry Divisions. 

18These divisions, of which there were twenty, 

are not separately discussed since they played no 

part in the fighting described in this book. They 

were formed of Luftwaffe personnel, remained at first 

administratively under the Luftwaffe, and then were 

integrated into the Army. 

19 OKH/Org.Abt., KTB 1.I.-31.VII.42, 31 Jul 42: 

Organisation des Heeres, Band 10 in Befehlshaber 

des Ersatzheeres. Allgerneines Heeresamt. 

GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 237 

It was also substantially larger than 

could be supported by the dwindling suppi y of manpower after four years of war. 

In October 1943 the division was drastically overhauled to reduce its size while 

maintaining its fire power. Organization 

charts of the new-style division (with 

13,656 men) comprising three regiments 

of two battalions each had only just been 

published when further slashes were ordered. The problem (set in January 1944 

by Hitler) was to trim the personnel to 

something like 11,000 without affecting 

the combat strength. Army planners rejected this sleight of hand as impossible 

and contented themselves with a further 

cut from 13,656 to 12,769. Reductions 

were made chiefly in supply and overhead, 

and the proportion of combat to service 

troops was thereby raised to 75-80 percent. The result was the so-called 1944-

type infantry di vision.15 

The reduction from nine infantry battalions to six was partly alleviated by the 

substitution of a Fuesilier battalion for 

the old reconnaissance unit. The Fuesilier 

battalion, still charged with reconnaissance duties, was organized like a rifle battalion except that one company was 

equipped with bicycles and the unit had 

slightly more horse-drawn vehicles and 

some motor transport. In practice the 

Fuesilier battalion came to be reckoned 

as a seventh rifle battalion. 

Besides lopping off three battalions, the 

new division pruned out the rifle squad 

and company while at the same time increasing the proportion of automatic 

weapons.l 6 The basic unit, the rifle com-

'" OKH/Org.Abt., KTB Arlfagen, 1944. 

IG It should be noted that this process, while forced 

by the shortage of manpower, also followed the direction of German tactical doctrine which always 

pany, was cut to 140 enlisted men and 2 

officers, as compared with the U.S. company of 187 enlisted men and 6 officers. 

Rifle strength in the German di vision was 

about 1,200 less than in the American but 

the total division fire power was superior. 

About equal in artillery, the German division enjoyed a slight preponderance in 

infantry howitzers, and a heavy superiority in automatic weapons. 17 

The 1944 infantry division was set up 

as the basic type for new divisions as well 

as for the reorganization of certain old 

formations, as for instance, the Luftwaffe 

field divisions. 18 The division which included the bulk of Rundstedt's infantry, 

however, the static (bodenstaendige) division, was exempted from reorganization 

unless specifically so ordered. The static 

divisions were formed at the request of 

Rundstedt in 1942 in order that he would 

have a nucleus of divisions not subject to 

transfer to the east. Though triangular 

with nine rifle battalions, they were substantialiy weaker than the normai oldtype infantry division. They lacked the 

reconnaissance battalion and had only 

three battalions of artillery.19 

Although the static divisions were expressly designed as permanent garrison 

troops for the west, they were by no means 

safe from the periodic troop collections 

emphasized small infantry units equipped with maximum automatic fire power. 

17 See App. F, Comparative Fire Power of the U.S. 

and German 1944-type Infantry Divisions. 

18 These divisions, of which there were twenty, 

are not separately discussed since they played no 

part in the fighting described in this book. They 

were formed of Luftwaffe personnel, remained at first 

administratively under the Luftwaffe, and then were 

integrated into the Army. 

10 OKH/Org.Abt., KTB 1.l.-J1.vlI.42, 31 Jul 42; 

Organisation des Heeres, Band 10 in Befehlshaber 

des Ersatzheeres. Allgemeines Heeresamt. 
238 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

for the east. Actually, by the end of 1943, 

most of the divisions had lost their third 

regiments. Attempts in 1943 and early 

1944 to rehabilitate the units and fill 

their ranks chiefly with Ost battalions resulted in virtual abandonment of tables 

of organization in favor of improvisation 

that reflected both the particular nature 

of the coastal assignments and the vicissitudes of the long struggle for manpower 

and equipment. In total strength and 

number and variety of combat units the 

static divisions bore little resemblance to 

one another. While the 716th Division, 

for instance, had six battalions and only 

one regimental headquarters under its 

control on D Day, 20the 709th, occupying 

two and a half times as long a coast line, 

had eleven battalions under three regimen ts. 

Even after the 1944-type division had 

been standardized, experimentation continued. Certain divisions (notably the 

77thand 91st in Seventh Army area) organized their six rifle battalions in two 

regiments. They lacked the fuesilier battalion and had three instead of four artillery battalions. 21 In the case of the 77th 

Division this organic lack was partly made 

up by the attachment of an Ost battery 

and a Volga-Tatar rifle battalion. The 

91st Division went into combat with an 

attached parachute regiment. The tworegiment infantry division therefore did 

not operate in T/O form in the invasion 

area, and for the German Army as a whole 

it may be regarded as experimental and 

eccentric, designed further to conserve 

20 Its second regiment was attached to the 352d 

Division. See below, Ch. VIII. 

21Tables of Organization show an antitank company instead of the normal battalion. The 77th Division, however, had a two-company antitank battalion 

with 24 guns (75.mm. and 50.mm.). 

manpower but not accepted as a generally 

satisfactory solution. 

The best infantry units in the 1944 German Army were the parachute divisions, 

administratively under the Luftwaffe but 

tactically always subordinated to Army 

command. Until the fall of 1943 German 

airborne forces comprised only one corps 

with two parachute divisions. At that time 

Goering proposed and Hitler approved a 

program intended to produce by the end 

of 1944 two parachute armies with a total 

strength of about 100,000 men. They were 

to be an elite arm and were put on an 

equal status with the SS units in recruiting, armament, equipment, and training.22 

Of the new parachute units created 

during the early months of 1944, OB 

WEST received the 3d and 5th Divisions 

and the 6th Parachute Regiment (from 

the 2d Parachute Division).23 Only the 

separate regiment and the 3d Division 

were encountered during the fighting described in this volume. Both were firstrate fighting units. 

The 3d Parachute Division comprised 

three regiments of three battalions each 

and in addition had in each regiment a 

13th (mortar) company, 14th (antitank) 

company, and 15th (engineer) company. 

The mortar company in the 6th Parachute Regiment actually contained the 

nine heavy (1 20-mm.) mortars which the 

tables of organization called for, but in 

the 3d Parachute Division weaponing 

22 MS # B-839 (von der Heydte). 

23 When its parent 2d Parachute Division was sent 

to Russia in November 1943, the 6th Parachute 

Regiment was left in Germany to provide cadre for 

the 3d Parachute Division. The regiment, while still 

formally organic to the 2d Parachute Division, was 

reconstituted under the direct command of the First 

Parachute Army. 

238 

for the east. Actually, by the end of 1943, 

most of the divisions had lost their third 

regiments. Attempts in 1943 and early 

1944 to rehabilitate the units and fill 

their ranks chiefly with Ost battalions resulted in virtual abandonment of tables 

of organization in favor of improvisation 

that reflected both the particular nature 

of the coastal assignments and the vicissitudes of the long struggle for manpower 

and equipment. In total strength and 

number and variety of combat units the 

static divisions bore little resemblance to 

one another. While the 716th Division, 

for instance, had six battalions and only 

one regimental headquarters under its 

control on D Day,20 the 709th} occupying 

two and a half times as long a coast line, 

had eleven battalions under three regiments. 

Even after the 1944-type division had 

been standardized, experimentation continued. Certain divisions (notably the 

77th and 91st in Seventh Army area) organized their six rifle battalions in two 

regiments. They lacked the fuesilier battalion and had three instead of four artillery battalions. 21 In the case of the 77th 

Division this organic lack was partly made 

up by the attachment of an Ost battery 

and a Volga-Tatar rifle battalion. The 

91st Division went into combat with an 

attached parachute regiment. The tworegiment infantry division therefore did 

not operate in T /0 form in the invasion 

area, and for the German Army as a whole 

it may be regarded as experimental and 

eccentric, designed further to conserve 

20 Its second regiment was attached to the 352d 

Division. See below. Ch. VIII. 

21 Tables of Organization show an antitank company instead of the normal battalion. The 77th Divisio'1. however. had a two-company antitank battalion 

with 24 guns (75-mm. and 50-mm.) . 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

manpower but not accepted as a generally 

satisfactory solution. 

The best infantry units in the 1944 German Army were the parachute divisions, 

administratively under the Luftwaffe but 

tactically always subordinated to Army 

command. Until the fall of 1943 German 

airborne forces comprised only one corps 

with two parachute divisions. At that time 

Goering proposed and Hitler approved a 

program intended to produce by the end 

of 1944 two parachute armies with a total 

strength of about 100,000 men. They were 

to be an elite arm and were put on an 

equal status with the SS units in recruiting, armament, equipment, and training.22 

Of the new parachute units created 

during the early months of 1944, OB 

WEST received the 3d and 5th Divisions 

and the 6th Parachute Regiment (from 

the 2d Parachute Division).23 Only the 

separate regiment and the 3 d Division 

were encountered during the fighting described in this volume. Both were firstrate fighting units. 

The 3d Parachute Division comprised 

three regiments of three battalions each 

and in addition had in each regiment a 

13th (mortar) company, 14th (antitank) 

company, and 15th (engineer) company. 

The mortar company in the 6th Parachute Regiment actually contained the 

nine heavy (120-mm.) mortars which the 

tables of organization called for, but in 

the 3d Parachute Division weaponing 

22 MS # B-839 (von der Heydte) . 

23 When its parent 2d Parachute Division was sent 

to Russia in November 1943. the 6th Parachute 

Regiment was left in Germany to provide cadre for 

the 3d Parachute Division. The regiment. while still 

formally organic to the 2d Parachute Division, was 

reconstituted under the direct command of the First 

Parachute Army. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 239 

was miscellaneous,100-mm l . 

mortars and 105.mm. Nebelwerfer.24 The The 

parachute division had only one battalion 

of light artillery (twelve 70.mm. howitzers). An order of 12 May 1944 to substitute an artillery regiment with two 

light battalions and one medium was not 

carried out before the division entered 

combat. The same order called for formation of a heavy mortar battalion (with 

thirty-six 120.mm. mortars) but this, too, 

was apparently not complied with. During April and May the division was able 

to constitute its antiaircraft battalion 

which had, besides light antiaircraft artillery, twelve 88-mm. guns. The total 

ration strength of the division as of 22 

May was 17,420. The strength of the 6th 

Parachute Regiment with fifteen companies was 3,457. Both were thus considerably larger than the normal corresponding infantry units. They were superior not only in numbers but in quality. 

Entirely formed from volunteers, they 

were composed principally of young men 

whose fighting morale was excellent.25 

24 Kriegsgliederung, 18 May 44. Seventh Army, 

KTB Anlagen 1.1.-30.VI.44; cf. MS # B-839 (von der 

Heydte) . Weaponing of the 6th Parachute Regiment 

is as given in Seventh Army organization charts. Von 

der Heydte’s report differs slightly. He says the regiment originally had twelve 105-mm. Nebelwerfer, 

but as the manufacture of these was discontinued 

they were gradually replaced, partly by 81.mm. 

mortars and partly by 120.mm. mortars. 

25 MS # B839 (von der Heydte). The 6th Parachute Regiment was fully trained in jumping. Each 

man had made at least nine jumps, including three 

night descents. About three-quarters of the men of 

the 3d Parachute Division had some jump training 

but this was because the division received trained 

paratroopers as cadre. The division itself did not 

carry out jump training. MS # B-401 (General der 

Fallschirmtruppen Eugen Meindl, CG II Parachute 

Corps). Apparently neither of the parachute divisions in France was equipped with parachutes. See 

MS # B-283 (Blumentritt). 

The average age of the enlisted men of 

the 6th Parachute Regiment was 171/2. 

The parachute units were also much better armed than corresponding army units. 

The rifle companies of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment had twice as many light machine guns as the infantry division rifle 

companies. The heavy weapons companies with twelve heavy machine guns 

and six medium mortars each were also 

superior in fire power to army units. Chief 

weakness of the parachute troops was one 

they shared with the rest of Rundstedt’s 

army-their lack of motor transport. The 

6th Parachute Regiment, for instance, 

had only seventy trucks and these comprised fifty different models.26 

Theoretically, about on a par with the 

parachute divisions were the panzer grenadier divisions which, by American 

standards, were infantry divisions with 

organic tank battalions, some armored 

personnel carriers, and some self-propelled artillery. The only such division 

in the west during the invasion period 

was the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division (Goetz von Berlichingen). Like all 

SS divisions it was substantially stronger 

than the corresponding army division. On 

the other hand, like so many west divisions, its combat strength in fact was much 

less than it appeared on paper. Its six rifle 

battalions were organized in two regiments which were supposed to be motorized; one battalion was supposed to be armored. In reality four of the battalions 

had improvised motor transport (partly 

Italian), two being equipped with bicycles. The “tank” battalion had thirtyseven assault guns, five less than authorized. The division had no tanks. Intended 

26 MS # B-839 (von der Heydte). 

GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 

was miscellaneous, including 100-mm. 

mortars and 105-mm. Nebelwerfer. 24 The 

parachute division had only one battalion 

of light artillery (twelve 70-mm. howitzers). An order of 12 May 1944 to substitute an artillery regiment with two 

light battalions and one medium was not 

carried out before the division entered 

combat. The same order called for formation of a heavy mortar battalion (with 

thirty-six 120-mm. mortars) but this, too, 

was apparently not complied with. During April and May the division was able 

to constitute its antiaircraft battalion 

which had, besides light antiaircraft artillery, twelve 88-mm. guns. The total 

ration strength of the division as of 22 

May was 17,420. The strength of the 6th 

Parachute Regiment with fifteen companies was 3,457. Both were thus considerably larger than the normal corresponding infantry units. They were superior not only in numbers but in quality. 

Entirely formed from volunteers, they 

were composed principally of young men 

whose fighting morale was excellent.25 

24 Kriegsgliederung, IS May 44. Seventh Army, 

KTB Anlagen l.l.-30.v1.44; d. MS # B-S39 (von der 

Heydte) . Weaponing of the 6th Parachute Regiment 

is as given in Seventh Army organization charts. Von 

der Heydte's report differs slightly. He says the regiment originally had twelve 105-mm. Nebelwerfer, 

but as the manufacture of these was discontinued 

they were gradually replaced, partly by Sl·mm. 

mortars and partly by l20-mm. mortars. 

25 MS # .B-S39 (von der Heydte). The 6th Parachute Regiment was fully trained in jumping. Each 

man had made at least nine jumps, including three 

night descents. About three-quarters of the men of 

the 3d Parachute Division had some jump training 

but this was because the division received trained 

paratroopers as cadre. The division itself did not 

carry out jump training. MS # B-401 (General der 

Fallschirmtruppen Eugen Meindl, CG II Parachute 

Corps). Apparently neither of the parachute divisions in France was equipped with parachutes. See 

MS # B-2S3 (Blumentritt). 

239 

The average age of the enlisted men of 

the 6th Parachute Regiment was 17Y2. 

The parachute units were also much better armed than corresponding army units. 

The rifle companies of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment had twice as many light machine guns as the infantry division rifle 

companies. The heavy weapons companies with twelve heavy machine guns 

and six medium mortars each were also 

superior in fire power to army units. Chief 

weakness of the parachute troops was one 

they shared with the rest of Rundstedt's 

army-their lack of motor transport. The 

6th Parachute Regiment) for instance, 

had only seventy trucks and these comprised fifty different models. 26 

Theoretically, about on a par with the 

parachute divisions were the panzer grenadier divisions which, by American 

standards, were infantry divisions with 

organic tank battalions, some armored 

personnel carriers, and some self-propelled artillery. The only such division 

in the west during the invasion period 

was the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division (Goetz von Berlichingen). Like all 

SS divisions it was substantially stronger 

than the corresponding army division. On 

the other hand, like so many west divisions, its combat strength in fact was much 

less than it appeared on paper. Its six rifle 

battalions were organized in two regiments which were supposed to be motorized; one battalion was supposed to be armored. In reality four of the battalions 

had improvised motor transport (partly 

Italian), two being equipped with bicycles. The "tank" battalion had thirtyseven assault guns, five less than authorized. The division had no tanks. Intended 

26 MS # B-S39 (von der Heydte) . 
240 

personnel strength was 18,354, of which 

on 1 June the division actually mustered 

17,321. The antitank battalion, supposed 

to consist of three companies of self-propelled guns, had actually only one company, equipped with nine 75-mm. and 

three 76.2-mm. guns. The division had a 

full armored reconnaissance battalion of 

six companies, and an antiaircraft battalion. The latter contained twelve towed 

88-mm. guns as well as guns of smaller 

calibers, but lacked almost a fifth of its 

personne1. 27 

To meet the invasion in June, OB 

WEST had six army and three SS panzer 

divisions. Their strength and organization varied so widely that it is impossible 

to talk of a type. Personnel strength of the 

army divisions ranged from 12,768 (9th 

Panzer) to 16,466 (2d Panzer).28 The SS 

divisions, which had six instead of four 

infantry battalions, varied from 17,590 

(9th SS Panzer)29 to 21,386 (lst SS 

Panzer). All the panzer divisions were 

thus much larger than their American 

counterparts, the 1st SS being more than 

twice as large. On the other hand they all 

had fewer tanks. Here again individual 

variations were enormous. The type organizational tables for both army and SS 

divisions called for a tank regiment with 

one battalion of Mark IV and one bat27 Status Report, 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division "Goetz von Berlichingen," I Jun 44. Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppen, ZU5tandsberichte, SSVerbaende VIIl.43-VIl.44. Substitution of assault 

guns (generally 75-mm. guns without turrets, on selfpropelled chassis) for tanks became quite usual in 

the panzer grenadier division. 

28 Overstrength of 296 apparently accounted for by 

an attached "tank" battalion, armed with assault 

guns. 

29 The 9th SS Panzer Division was brought back to 

France during June. See below, Ch. X. The three 

SS panzer divisions under OB WEST on 6 June were 

the 1st, 2d and 12th. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

talion of Mark V tanks. Each battalion 

was supposed to have four companies each 

with twenty-two tanks. The fact was 

quite different. Even the 2d Panzer Division) the best prepared of the armored 

divisions on D Day, had less than its authorized number of the heavier Mark 

V'S.30 Each of the divisions had a separate 

and slightly different organization which 

in no case conformed to the type. The 1st 

SS Panzer Division, for instance, was supposed to have 45 assault guns, 21 Mark 

III, 101 Mark IV, and 81 Mark V tanks. 

It had in fact the full complement of assault guns but only 88 tanks in all, including 50 IV's and 38 V's. The table of organization for the 2d SS Panzer Division) 

on the other hand, called for 75 assault 

guns of which 33 were on hand on 1 June; 

7 Mark III tanks, none on hand; 57 Mark 

IV tanks, 44 on hand; and 99 Mark V's, 25 

on hand.31 

The army panzer divisions included, in 

addition to the two regiments (four battalions) of infantry and one tank regiment, a self-propelled antitank battalion 

(armed more often with assault guns), an 

armored reconnaissance battalion, a 

towed antiaircraft battalion and an artillery regiment with one light self-propelled battalion, one light towed battalion, and one medium towed battalion. 

SS divisions had an additional towed 

light battalion. 

The miscellaneous tank armament of 

the panzer divisions was typical of the 

weaponing of nearly all units in the west 

and reflected the long drain on the Ger30 It had 94 Mark IV's and 67 Mark V's. 

31 Status Reports, 1st SS Panzer Division "Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler," and 2d SS Panzer Division 

"Das Reich," I Jun 44. Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppen, Zustandsberichte, SS-Verbaende VIIl.43-

Vll.44. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 241 

man war economy of the Russian war and 

the increasing production difficulties imposed by the accelerating Allied air offensive. As long as the Russian front was the 

main theater of war and the west was not 

immediately threatened, it was natural to 

ship the bulk of the best materiel to the 

east and arm the west as well as possible 

with what was left. The policy of equipping west divisions primarily with captured materiel was laid down in December 1941 when ten divisions were ordered 

so equipped.32 The east continued to enjoy priority on new equipment until the 

end of 1949, and although German-made 

tanks and assault guns were shipped to 

OB WEST during that time the deliveries 

were often more than outweighed by the 

transfer of armored units. First-class armored equipment remained a comparative rarity in divisions assigned to OB 

WEST until 1944. At the end of October 

1943, for instance, there were in the west 

703 tanks, assault guns, and self-propelled 

88-mm. antitank guns (called "Hornets"). At the end of December the number had risen only to 823, the increase 

being largely in the lighter Mark IV tank. 

All the Hornets and Tiger (Mark VI) 

tanks had been shipped out to the Russian front, and the stock of assault guns 

was considerably decreased. The total of 

823, moreover, compared to a planned 

build-up of I ,226.:l:l The new year brought 

a change. January showed only a slight 

increase, but thereafter the deliveries to 

the west were speeded up. Although most 

32 Memo, OKH /Org.Abt. for OKH /Op.Abt., Umbewaffnung von Westdivisionen aut BeutewafJen, 6 

Dec 41. OKH/Op.Abt., Kraette Westen, Allgemein, 

Band fl, J3.X.41-25.Vfl.42. 

33 This and the following material on tanks is from 

Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppen, Fuehrervortragsnotizen, Band I, 3.IV.43-1.v1.44. 

new Tiger tanks continued to go to the 

east, deliveries to OB WEST of the powerful Panther (Mark V) tank were notably 

increased. At the end of April OB WEST 

had 1,608 German-made tanks and assault 

guns of which 674 were Mark IV tanks 

and 514 Mark V's. The planned total for 

the end of May was 1,994.34 

Against the background of disintegrating German war economy, the tank buildup in the west was a notable achievement 

that strikingly revealed the importance 

assigned to the forthcoming struggle with 

the Western Allies. Exponents of the 

theories of Blitzkrieg, like Generaloberst 

Heinz Guderian, the Inspector General 

of Panzer Troops, believed that without 

a large armored striking force Germany 

could not hope to return to offensive operations essential for ultimate victory. In 

late 1943, therefore, Guderian proposed 

and Hitler approved a scheme to form a 

ten-division strategic armored reserve 

while at the same time trying to bring all 

armored divisions up to strength in equipment. The need, in short, was for new 

tanks in large numbers. But the combined 

pressure of the Allied air offensive and 

Russian ground attack was rapidly creating an economic quagmire in which the 

harder the enemy struggled the deeper he 

sank. Russian armies were destroying 

existing tanks while Allied bombers were 

making it increasingly difficult to produce new ones. The Germans tried to find 

an answer in diverting additional men, 

materials) and factory space into the manufacture of tanks. One result was to curtail the production of prime movers and 

parts. But without prime movers in adequate numbers the German armies in 

34 In addition, units in the west still had a considerable number of French and Russian tanks. 
242 

Russia were unable to withdraw their 

heavy guns or retrieve tanks that were 

damaged or out of fuel. Between October 

and December 1943,979 Mark III and IV 

tanks and 444 assault guns were lost, in 

large part because they had to be abandoned in retreat. Similarly between July 

and December 2,235 artillery pieces and 

1,692 antitank guns were captured or destroyed. General Guderian at last pointed 

out that there was little sense in producing more tanks and guns if they were to 

be thus recklessly sacrificed. 

A still more important by-product of 

concentrating on tank manufacture at the 

expense of a balanced production program was the increasingly serious lack of 

spare parts. In June 1943 the Germans 

had 2,569 operational tanks with 463 in 

process of repair. In February 1944, only 

1,519 tanks remained operational while 

1,534 were under repair. During February, moreover, only 145 damaged tanks 

were actually returned to the front. On 

the first of the month, Guderian estimated that the tanks and assault guns 

awaiting repair equaled about nine 

months' new production. At the end of 

March, the situation had not improved; 

the number of operational tanks was still 

decreasing despite accelerated deliveries 

of new machines. 

Although the German Army in the 

west on the eve of its great test was considerably weaker than planned in equipment, quality, and numbers, it was nevertheless a force strong enough to hope for 

victory in a battle in which Allied materiel superiority would be partly counteracted by the natural advantages of a 

coast line defense. (Map V) Under 

Rundstedt's command on I June 1944 

were 58 combat divisions of which 33 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

were either static or reserve, suitable 

only for limited defense employment. 

There were 24 divisions classified as fit 

for duty in the east by reason of their 

relative mobility and high-grade personnel. They included 13 infantry divisions, 

2 parachute divisions, 5 army panzer divisions, and 4 SS panzer and panzer grenadier divisions. One panzer division 

(the 21st), being still equipped in part 

with captured materiel, was not considered suitable for service in Russia, although in other respects it was ready for 

offensive use, and in fact had exceptional 

strength in heavy weapons. 35 

All the infantry divisions were committed on or directly behind the coast 

under the command of one of the four 

armies or the German Armed F orees 

Commander Netherlands. 36 The four 

armies were the First holding the Atlantic coast of France, the Seventh occupying Brittany and most of Normandy, 

the Fifteenth along the Kanalkueste) and 

the Nineteenth defending the French 

Mediterranean coast. The Seventh Army) 

which was to meet the actual invasion, 

had fourteen infantry (including static) 

divisions under the control of four 

corpsY 

Command and Tactics 

It may be that the most serious weakness of the German defense in the west 

35 MS # B-441 (GeneraIIeutnant Edgar Feuchlinger, CG 21st Panzer Division) . 

36 Wehrmachtbefehlshaber Niederlande. Equivalent in size to a corps command_ 

37 Seventh Army (LXXXIV Corps) also had responsibility for defense of the Channel Islands and 

commanded the 319th Division stationed there. 

But, since this division never figured in any of the 

fighting and because of Hitler's orders could not 

even be considered as a reserve, it will not be included in any calculations of Seventh Army's strength. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 

was not the shortage of men and materiel 

but the lack of a unifIed command. \Vhile 

Rundstedt was charged with the entire 

responsibility for the defense of France 

and the Low Countries, his powers were 

far from commensurate with that responsibility. He had, in the first place, no 

command over air and naval units. The 

four air corps that comprised the fighter 

and bomber aircraft stationed in the 

west were under command of the Third 

Air Force (Generalfeldmarschall Hugo 

Sperrle), which in turn was directly subordinate to OKL. Similarly Navy Group 

West, which under Admiral Theodor 

Krancke commanded the destroyers, torpedo boats, and smaller naval vessels 

based in the ports within Rundstedt's 

jurisdiction, was responsible directly to 

OKM. Rundstedt could issue no orders 

to either Sperrle or Krancke; he could 

only request their co-operation. (Charts 

2,3,4) 

Air and naval forces were too small to 

have decisive effect on the battle. From 

Rundstedt's point of view the more important limitation of his power was the 

fragmentation of the command over the 

ground forces. Some of this fragmentation was normal and universal in the 

German military establishment. The 

Third Air Force had, for instance, besides command of the flying units, admmistrative control over parachute 

troops and the antiaircraft units that 

were under the III Flak Corps.38 Navy 

Group West controlled through regional 

commanders not only ships and shore installations but most of the coastal artillery, although command of the latter was 

38 Tactically and for purposes of supply III Flak 

Corps was under the Luftgaukommando Westfrankreich. 

243 

mixed. The Navy had complete jurisdiction before operations on land had 

begun. Afterward, firing on sea targets 

remained a naval responsibility, but at 

the moment of enemy landing, in most 

cases, command of the batteries in the 

beachhead area was to pass to the Army. 

Virtually the whole burden of tying in 

the important naval batteries to the 

coastal defense was thus shifted to the 

initiative of local commanders. 

A similar division of command affected 

the employment of the security troops 

which as instruments of the occupation 

were normally under the two military 

governors (M ilitaerbefehlshaher), France 

and Northern France (including Belgium). The military governors were 

directly subordinated to OKH, but for 

purposes of repelling invasion their security troops might be tactically under 

DB WEST. In preparation against invasion, the Commander in Chief \Vest 

could only direct that the military governors co-operate with the army groups 

in matters affecting the latter's authority 

and undertake to settle any differences 

that might arise between them. Even this 

control was limited. Employment of security troops could only be ordered by 

the Commander in Chief West "in matters outside the scope of security." 39 

During 1944 DB WEST's authority 

was abridged in special ways. In November 1943, it will be recalled, Field 

Marshal Rommel had taken command of 

the Army Group for Special Employment, which was charged at first with in39 Grundlegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers 

West Nr. 38, Neuregelung der Befehlsgliederung 

im Ob. West-Bereich, 7 May 44, cited hereafter as 

OB WEST Grundlegender Befehl Nr. 38. OKW /-

WFSt, Op. (R.), Grundlegende Befehle West 28.lV.42-

7.V.44. 
244 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

I 

SUPREME COMMANDER OF THE ARMED FORCES I 

HITLER 

I 

I 

OKW 

ARMED FORCES OKM OKL OKH HIGH COMMAND NAVY LUFTWAFFE ARMY KEITEL HIGH COMMAND HIGH COMMAND HIGH COMMAND 

DOESITZ GOERISG HITLER 

I 

OB WEST ~ NAVY GROUP THIRD AIR 

,...-------------- WEST - FORCE , Rl'SDSTEDT , KRAS(KE SPERRLE , 

, NAVAL UNITS FOUR AIR CORPS , 

, SHORE III FLAK CORPS , INSTALLA nONS 

, NA VAL COASTAL 

BATTERIES 

, 

I I 

MILITARY ARMY GROUP G ARMY GROUP B 

GOVERNORS BLASKOIfTT/ I PERSOSAL ,1CCEIS ROMMEl, IlELGILMN, FRANCE FIRST ARMY ARMED FORCES AND FRANCE NINETEENTH NETHERLANDS 

SECURITY ARMY (LXXXVIII CORPS) 

TROOPS LXVI CORPS FIFTEENTH ARMY 

(RES) SEVENTH ARMY 

.... - - - -- -- - -- ... .- - - - - - - - - - -""I 

l57th DIV , II 

, (RES) • : PRCHT CORPS: ... __________ ..J 

..... --------.- ... 

STAff, PANZER 

GROUP WEST 

(,E}'R t'. 

SCHIf'EPPE,'Bl'RG 

I 

T R ,11 "I S (. r----i-----' 

ARMY GROel' G · ARMY GROI!P IJ 

RESERVES · RESERVES 

LVIII PZ CORPS · · (RES) 

lJth amI 11th · · 2<-1. 116lh. and 21st 

I'Z DIVS · PZ DIVS 

.... -- - - - - - - -.... · , : 2d SS PZ OJV: · · ...... _-_ .. _-_ ..... , 

· OK W RESER VES 

r--------------, 

• HQ I SS I'Z CORPS. 

: 1s[ ~S. 12th 5S. 17th SS : . PZ GR DIVS . L ______________ .J Direct chain of command 

PZ LEHR DIV Conditional tactical control of 

cenain elements or co.operation _ ........ .... __ ..................... 

CHART 2.-GERMAN CHAIN OF COMMAND IN THE WEST, MAY 1944 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 245 

L 

IX 

AIR CORPS 

Miscellaneous 

bomber 

squadrons. 

I 

X 

AIR CORPS 

Includes Naval 

Air Rcn Units 

and miscella· 

neous born ber 

s<Juadrons. 

I THIRD AIR FORCE I SPERRLE 

I 

I I I I 

II RECON- 2 AIR II 

DIVISION AIR CORPS FIGHTER NAISSANCE 

Bombers and 

torpedo born bers. 

CORPS UNITS 

No unics. 

Hq merged with 

II Fighter 

Corps in late 

June 1944. 

I 

I 

4 FIGHTER I DIVISION 

Miscellaneous 

day and nighr 

fighter squadrons. 

Major units 

comprised 5 and 

123 Long Range 

Rcn Groups and 

13 Close Rcn 

Groups. 

I 

I 

5 FIGHTER I DIVISION 

Miscellaneous 

day and nighr 

fighter squadrons. 

CHART 3.-LuFTWAFFE COMMAND IN THE \'\TEST 

COM· COM· COM- COM· 

MANDING MANDING MANDING MANDJNG 

ADMIRAL ADMIRAL, ADMIRAL, ADMIRAL, 

NAVAL SOUTHER;'\J ATLANTlC KANAL· 

TROOPS FRANCE COAST KLTESTE 

PARI~ COAST 

NAVAL COM- NAVAL COM NAVAL COM· 

MANDERS MANDERS MANDERS 

LAN(jL'EOo< HRITTANY PAS-DJ:-

( ALAIS FREN(H LOIRE 

RIVIERA SOMME· GAS(ONY SEINE 

NORMA.'\'DY 

( HA!\"NEL 

I~LAND~ 

CHART 4.-GERMAN NAVAL COMMAND IN THE WEST 
246 

spection of the western defenses and the 

preparation of plans for counterattack 

against the main Allied landings wherever these might take place. Ultimately 

the Rommel headquarters was to conduct 

the main battle against the invading 

forces. About the middle of December, 

Rommel, having completed the first of 

his tasks, the inspection of the coastal defenses .of Denmark, arrived in France 

and began a survey of the Fifteenth Army 

sector. Both he and Rundstedt recognized 

at once that it was neither logical nor 

practical for the Special A rmy Group to 

remain outside the theater chain of command.40 Its independence could only be 

a source of friction and inefficiency. On 

30 December Rundstedt recommended 

that it be subordinated to OB WEST as 

Army Group B with command of the 

Seventh and Fifteenth Armies and of the 

German Armed Forces of the Netherlands. Whether the initial suggestion for 

this change came first from Rommel or 

from Rundstedt, it was clearly in the beginning agreeable to bothY Since the 

main Allied invasion was likely to strike 

somewhere along the Channel coast, it 

made sense to put Rommel in immediate 

command there in order to familiarize 

him with his task and allow him to take 

such steps as he found necessary to 

40 Ltr, Rundstedt to Salmuth, 27 Dec 43. Fifteenth 

Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 26.X.-27.XII.43; 

MS # A-982 (Vizeadmiral Friedrich Ruge, Navy 

liaison officer with Army Group B); MS # C-069b 

(Ruge); MS # C-069c (Buttlar·Brandenfels); MS 

# C-06ge (Warlimont); !VIS # C-069f (Rundstedt). 

41 The change was logical and there is nothing in 

the rather fragmentary contemporary record to confirm the thesis of the OB WEST history (MS # T121) that Rommel was forced on OB WEST from 

above and was unwanted. Cf. MS # C-069a (Blum· 

entritt); MS # C-069d (Zimmermann); MS # C06ge (Warlimont); MS # C-069f (Rundstedt). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

strengthen the defense. Hitler approved 

but warned OB WEST that the Rommel 

headquarters was still to be considered 

available for commitment elsewhere.42 

Rundstedt accepted the condition, and 

the reconstitution of A rmy Group B was 

ordered to take effect on 15 January. 

Rommel's subordination to OKW was at 

this time canceled.43 

His position, however, remained anomalous: whereas he had less than full command over the armies attached to him, he 

enjoyed an influence over the whole defense of the west which was in some 

measure commensurate with Rundstedt's. 

His orders provided that he was to be 

solely responsible for the conduct of 

operations (KampfJuehrung), but that in 

matters not directly affecting this tactical 

command OB WEST would continue to 

deal directly with the armies. Thus on 

questions of defense, training, organization and equipment, supply, artillery 

matters, communications, and engineer 

problems, the command channel might 

bypass the new army group.44 Rommel 

continued to be the coastal inspector for 

the whole of the west, and although his 

reports henceforth were forwarded 

through OB WEST his ability to influence coastal defense policies and practices 

did much to blur his subordination to 

Rundstedt. Moreover the binding of 

the Rommel staff to a geographical sec42 Rad. 1 Jan 44. OKW /WFSt, Op. (H.), to OKH/· 

Gen.St.d.H., OB WEST, and Army Group B. OKH/· 

Org.Abt., Bd. Chetsache 7.V.43-4.Il.44. Commitment 

was specifically contemplated in Denmark and Hungary. In fact, neither contingency materialized. For 

Hungary operation see above. p. 234. 

43 Rad, 1 Jan 44. cited n. 42; Order. 12 Jan 44, 

OB WEST, (Ia Nr. 246/44). OKH/Op.Abt., Gliederung West, Chefsachen, Band VIII, 2.Teil, 8.1.-21.-

II.44. 

44 Order, 12 Jan 44. cited n. 43. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 247 

tor was only tentative; the headquarters 

was thought of still as a reserve command 

and as such the recommendations of its 

commander carried special if informal 

weight. 45 Finally, and most importantly, 

Rommel in common with all German 

field marshals en joyed at all times the 

right of appeal directly to Hitler.46 That 

privilege was especially important for the 

west because of the personalities invol ved. The evidence indicates that Rommel had an energy and strength of conviction that often enabled him to secure 

Hitler's backing, whereas Rundstedt, 

who was disposed whenever possible to 

compromise and allow arguments to go 

by default, seems to have relaxed command prerogatives that undoubtedly remained formally his. It is possible, of 

course, that he too came under Rommel's 

influence and failed to press acceptance 

of his own ideas because he was content 

to allow Rommel to assume the main 

burden of responsibility. In any case the 

clear fact is that after January 1944 Rommel was the dominant personality in the 

west with an influence disproportionate 

to his formal command authority. 

Rommel's position, however, was not 

unchallenged. In November 1943 Rundstedt, thinking in terms of a large-scale 

counterattack against the main Allied 

landings, created a special staff to control 

armored units in that attack. The staff, 

designated Panzer Group West, was 

headed by General der Panzertruppen 

Leo Freiherr Geyr von Schweppenburg, 

and was directed to take over at once the 

formation and training of all armored 

units in the west and to advise the Com45 OKW /WFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Der Westen, 

1.lV.-16.Xll.44, cited hereafter as Der Westen. 

46 MS # C-047 (Halder). 

mander in Chief West in the employment 

of armor. Geyr was ordered to co-operate 

with and respect the wishes of army 

group commanders.47 Actually, however, 

Geyr's ideas on the proper employment 

of armor were so completely at variance 

with Rommel's that co-operation was impossible. 

In March 1944, at a meeting of the 

senior commanders in the west with 

Hitler, Rommel asked for an extension 

of his own authority that to all intents 

would have eliminated Geyr and Rundstedt as well from effective command of 

the defense forces. Specifically he requested that all armored and motorized 

units and all GHQ artillery in the west 

be put directly under his command and 

that he also be given some control over 

the First and Nineteenth Armies. The 

latter two armies, defending the Atlantic 

and Mediterranean coasts of France respectively, were at this time still subordinated immediately to OB WEST. 

In one sense, Rommel's request logically 

arose from his mission. Assigned responsibility for countering the major Allied 

invasion attempt, he required control 

over all the forces that might be used in 

the defense. It was plausible furthermore that such control should be turned 

over to him before the battle so that he 

could properly prepare and dispose the 

troops to fight the kind of battle he 

would order. Making a strong bid to 

unify defense policies, he asked that the 

Humpty-Dumpty command in the west 

be put together again under him. Although the method of repair naturally 

did not please Rundstedt, his objections 

47 Order, 19 Nov 43, OR WEST (fa Nr. 681/43). 

Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 2.l11.43-

lYfll.44; Order, 12 Jan 44, cited n. 43. 
248 

were unheeded at the March meeting 

and Hitler approved the expansion of 

Rommel's command. Only after a study 

by the operations staff of OKW had supported Rundstedt's later written protest 

did Hitler reverse himself. Even then the 

reversal was not complete. Three panzer 

divisions (the 2d, 21st, and 116th) were 

assigned to Rommel as A rmy Group B 

reserves, over which he was to have full 

tactical control while Geyr remained responsible for their training and organization. 48 The patchwork solution solved 

nothing. 

At the same time four other panzertype divisions in DB WEST's sector (the 

1st SS Panzer, 12th SS Panzer, 17th SS 

Panzer Grenadier, and Panzer Lehr) 

were set aside as a central mobile reserve 

under the direct command of OKW. The 

two decisions smacked of a compromise 

tending to preserve something of both 

Rommel's and Rundstedt's tactical 

ideas. 49 The main effect, however, was to 

deprive the Commander in Chief West 

of the means to influence the battle 

directly without transferring those means 

to Rommel. Thus, even such inclusive 

authority as was possible in the German 

military establishment' was scrupulously 

withheld from both high commanders in 

the west. 

The final command change before the 

invasion was made in May when Rundstedt ordered the formation of a second 

48 Der Westen. 

49 Rundstedt apparently considered the attachment of these reserves to OKW purely formal and 

made plans to use them under Geyr. Compare, however, what happened on D Day (Ch. VIII) . Control 

of the three SS divisions had a triple twist: trained 

and organized under Panzer Group West, tactically 

subordinated to OKW, they were for administrative 

purposes under the SS-Fuehrungshauptamt. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

army group headquarters to take command of the First and Nineteenth 

Armies. Army Group G, formed under 

Generaloberst Johannes Blaskowitz, took 

over, besides the two armies, the remaining three panzer divisions in France (the 

9th, 11th, and 2d SS).50 The reorganization provided a counterbalance for Rommel and somewhat simplified the command channels. It probably also expressed final recognition of the impracticability of the reserve high command 

concept. 

With the establishment of Blaskowitz's 

headquarters, Rundstedt undertook to 

define his own position. He outlined for 

himself what amounted to an over-all 

ground command in his theater, subject 

to the restrictions already discussed. He 

announced his intention of granting his 

army group commanders the maximum 

freedom of action in their own sectors. 

He would intervene only when he fundamentally disagreed with their policies 

or when decisions had to be made affecting the theater as a whole. He promised 

to confine his directives to passing on 

Hitler's orders and to specifying policies 

that ought to be uniformly carried out 

by all commands.51 

In fact, during the critical preparatory 

months of 1944, general directives were 

few either from Rundstedt or Hitler. 

Hitler, far away at his headquarters in 

500B WEST Grundlegender Befehl Nr. 38, 7 May 

44. Blaskowitz's command was given inferior status 

as an Armeegruppe instead of the usual Heeresgruppe, in part because of lack of personnel and 

perhaps also in part as a mark of the relative disfavor in which Blaskowitz was held by Hitler. 

Oberkommando Armeegruppe G, KTB Nr. 1, 26.-

IV.-30,VI.44; Der Westen; MS # T-121 (Zimmermann et al.) . See Chart 2, p. 244. 

510B WEST Grundlegender Befehl Nr. 38, 7 May 

44. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 249 

East Prussia, was so preoccupied with the 

Russian war that he did not even visit 

the west until after the invasion. Furthermore he seems not to have had any clear 

and consistent view of tactics himself, and 

his interventions in the western scene 

resulted more often in decisions of detail 

than in definitions of policy. The failure 

of Hitler to provide consistent guidance 

together with the vague demarcation of 

authority between Rommel and Rundstedt left the west with a vacillating 

leadership. Defense preparations in 1944 

were increasingly scarred by compromise 

as the Commander in Chief West and the 

commander of Army Group B made detailed decisions in accordance with divergent aims. 

The perspective from which Rommel 

viewed his task derived in part from his 

experience with desert warfare in North 

Africa and in part from the circumstances of his new assignment. It is important to bear in mind that Rommel 

came to the west only at the point when 

the battle was about to be fought there, 

and that he was assigned responsibility 

specifically for the conduct of that battle. He had not endured the long waiting 

period with its periodic alarms. He had 

not spent months making plans, calculating actual but shifting deficiencies 

against ideal needs, outlining defense systems and struggling to find the means to 

carry them out. The theoretical approach 

to tactics-the drafting of the abstractly 

best plan first, the search for resources 

second-was ruled out by the nature of 

his mission as well as by the limited time 

at his disposal. He was appointed coastal 

inspector and told to assess defensive 

capacities and make his plans accordingly. 

Whatever he chose to do had to be completed in three or four months. He was 

bound therefore to start by examining 

his limitations. 

The experience in North Africa had 

convinced Rommel of the folly of trying 

to use massed armor as long as the enemy 

enjoyed air superiority. In Africa Rommel commanded some of the best trained 

and equipped troops that Germany produced. In France he was to command an 

army that was already crippled in part by 

inadequate training, inferior human 

material, and lack of mobility. Furthermore, there was still less hope in 1944 

than in 1942 that the Luftwaffe could 

challenge the supremacy of the Allies in 

the air. To Rommel that meant that 

mobile operations were itnpossible in fact 

however desirable they might be in 

theory. If the German Army could not 

hope to maneuver on anything like terms 

of equality with the Allies, its only 

chance for a defensive success was to fight 

from the strongest possible natural positions. The pillboxes, entrenchments, 

wire, and mines of the Atlantic Wall and 

the waters of the Channel, in short, 

seemed to Rommel to offer not only the 

best but the only means to offset Allied 

superiority in mass and mobility.52 

Rommel therefore was led to place an 

exclusive dependence on fortifications 

that Rundstedt never advocated and that 

even Hitler had not contemplated in his 

directive of November. The battle for 

the west, Rommel believed, would be decided at the water's edge, and the decision 

would come literally within the first 

forty-eight hours of the Allied landings.53 

In accord with that diagnosis, his first 

aim was to create a defensive belt around 

52 MS # A-982 (Ruge). 

53 Ibid. 
250 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the entire coast (with special concentration on the Fifteenth Army sector) extending five or six kilometers inland. 

Within this belt all infantry, artillery, 

headquarters staffs, and reserves up to 

division level were to be located in a 

series of resistance nests.54 Between the 

resistance nests mines and obstacles were 

to be laid so thickly as to prevent enemy 

penetration. Because of limited time, 

labor, and materials, Rommel concentrated on many simple, field-type defenses 

rather than on a few complex fortifications. He stressed in particular the laying of mines. He introduced, further, a 

defense device new to the Atlantic Wall: 

underwater obstacles designed to wreck 

landing craft.55 In Normandy, hedgehogs 

and tetrahedra located inland as tank 

obstacles were moved to the beaches 

suitable for enemy landings. They were 

supplemented by Belgian Gates and 

stakes slanting seaward. The intention 

was to cover every possible landing beach 

between high- and low-water marks with 

obstacles staggered to leave no free channel for even a flat-bottomed boat to reach 

shore. Obstacles as far as possible were 

to be mined. As it was considered most 

likely that the Allies would land at flood 

tide to reduce the amount of open beach 

to he crossed under fire, laying of the obstacles began at the high-water line and 

was extended in belts seaward as materials and labor became available.56 

To complete his hedgehog fortress, 

- 

54 See below, Ch. VIII, n. 158, for a description of 

various types of German fortifications. 

55 MS # A-982 (Ruge) Underwater obstacles of 

this type were first used in 1943 by the Germans in 

the west, when preparing the defense of the Danish 

coast against an attack from the sea. For description 

of obstacles mentioned in the text, see Glossary. 

56 MS # A-982 (Ruge) 

Rommel undertook to stake all fields 

suitable for glider landings behind the 

coastal zone. The stakes were to be 

placed close enough together so that 

gliders could not come down between 

them. They, too, were to be mined. The 

German estimate was that Allied airborne troops would be used in diversionary and subsidiary operations, for 

which Brittany and Normandy were considered the most likely target areas. Rommel therefore concentrated the erection 

of antiairlanding obstacles in these 

areas.57 

The general scheme of obstacle defense 

of the Continent was further to be extended by mine fields in the Channel. 

Sixteen fields, each about five miles long, 

were put down in the Channel between 

Boulogne and Cherbourg from August 

1943 to January 1944. These were to be 

kept renewed as far as possible, but it 

was not believed that they would have 

much effect on Allied shipping. They 

were therefore to be supplemented by 

hasty mine fields laid down by all available vessels immediately before the invasion was expected. These fields would be 

planted without keeping open any 

marked lanes for German vessels. From 

Zeebrugge to Granville thirty-six mine 

fields were planned. It was also planned, 

when invasion seemed imminent, to sow 

mines from the air in British harbors. 

Finally along the French coast shallowwater mines were to be laid and a special 

seventy-kilogram concrete mine was developed for the purpose.58 In all these 

57 Bericht ueber die Reise des Herrn Oberbefehlshabers am 17. und 18. Mai 44. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen 1.I.30.VI.44. 

58 ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1944; hfarinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.1.-31.1.44. 

250 

the entire coast (with special concentration on the Fifteenth Army sector) extending five or six kilometers inland. 

Within this belt all infantry, artillery, 

headquarters staffs, and reserves up to 

division level were to be located in a 

series of resistance nests. 54 Between the 

resistance nests mines and obstacles were 

to be laid so thickly as to prevent enemy 

penetration. Because of limited time, 

labor, and materials, Rommel concentrated on many simple, field-type defenses 

rather than on a few complex fortifications. He stressed in particular the laying of mines. He introduced, further, a 

defense device new to the Atlantic Wall: 

underwater obstacles designed to wreck 

landing craft. 51) In Normandy, hedgehogs 

and tetrahedra located inland as tank 

obstacles were moved to the beaches 

suitable for enemy landings. They were 

supplemented by Belgian Gates and 

stakes slanting seaward. The intention 

was to cover every possible landing beach 

between high- and low-water marks with 

obstacles staggered to leave no free channel for even a flat-bottomed boat to reach 

shore. Obstacles as far as possible were 

to be mined. As it was considered most 

likely that the Allies would land at flood 

tide to reduce the amount of open beach 

to be crossed under fire, laying of the obstacles began at the high-water line and 

was extended in belts seaward as materials and labor became available. 56 

To complete his hedgehog fortress, 

54 See below, Ch. VIII, n. 68, for a description of 

various types of German fortifications. 

G5 :\1S # A-982 (Ruge). l:nderwater obstacles of 

this type were first used in 1943 by the Germans in 

the west, when preparing the defense of the Danish 

coast against an attack from the sea. For description 

of obstacles mentioned in the text, see Glossary. 

56 I\1S # A-982 (Ruge). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Rommel undertook to stake all fields 

suitable for glider landings behind the 

coastal zone. The stakes were to be 

placed close enough together so that 

gliders could not come down between 

them. They, too, were to be mined. The 

German estimate was that Allied airborne troops would be used in diversionary and subsidiary operations, for 

which Brittany and Normandy were considered the most likely target areas. Rommel therefore concentrated the erection 

of antiairlanding obstacles 1Il these 

areas. 57 

The general scheme of obstacle defense 

of the Continent was further to be extended by mine fields in the Channel. 

Sixteen fields, each about five miles long, 

were put down in the Channel between 

Boulogne and Cherbourg from August 

1943 to January 1944. These were to be 

kept renewed as far as possible, but it 

was not believed that they would have 

much effect on Allied shipping. They 

were therefore to be supplemented by 

hasty mine fields laid down by all available vessels immediately before the invasion was expected. These fields would be 

planted without keeping open any 

marked lanes for German vessels. From 

Zeebrugge to Granville thirty-six mine 

fields were planned. It was also planned, 

when invasion seemed imminent, to sow 

mines from the air in British harbors. 

Finally along the French coast shallowwater mines were to be laid and a special 

seventy-kilogram concrete mine was developed for the purpose. 58 In all these 

07 Bericht ueber die Reise des Herrn Oberbefehlshabers am 17. und 18. Mai 44. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen 1.1.-30.V1.44. 

580NI, Fuehrer- Conferences, 1944; Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.1.-31.1.44. 
ANTILANDING OBSTACLES under construction on a French beach (abolle). 

Lower picture shows Belgian Gate. 
252 

ways Rommel sought to make the expected invasion physically impossible. 

The Allied force entangled in the spider 

web of obstacles would be given the 

paralyzing sting by the German Army 

waiting at the water's edge. 

Rommel's construction and mine-laying program called for a very large expenditure of labor, and labor was scarce. 

It has already been pointed out that 

Organization Todt was employed chiefly 

in the major port fortress areas, on Vweapon sites, and, in the spring of 1944, 

on railroad maintenance. In the apportionment of the remaining labor supply 

among the armies, Fifteenth A rmy continued to receive priority. Seventh Army 

thus had special difficulty in completing 

its defense works. The LXXXIV Corps 

was assigned three engineer battalions in 

January, two for fortress building and 

one for mine laying. In addition, 2,850 

men of the former French Labor Service 

were set to work on a secondary defense 

line immediately behind the belt of 

coastal resistance points. Pleas for more 

construction hands were answered by attachment of two Ost battalions.59 

The only other available labor source 

was the combat troops. Increasingly during 1944 infantrymen were employed in 

work details on the Atlantic Wall with 

consequent serious reduction of combat 

training. The reserve battalion of the 

709th Division) for instance, devoted 

three days a week exclusively to labor 

duty. The time for training in the rest 

of the week was further reduced by 

transport and guard details. During the 

first two weeks in May the battalion was 

employed full time on the coastal defense 

59 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-JO.Vl.44, 5, 6, 8, and 

16 Jan 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

III the Barfleur sector.60 The 709th was 

an old division, but its personnel constantly shifted. The lack of continuous 

adequate training meant that the total 

combat fitness of the division steadily 

deteriorated through the accretion of untrained recruits. 

Still worse was the effect on the new 

and reorganized divisions that represented a large proportion of the German 

striking force in the west. In Seventh 

Army all but one of the nonstatic infantry 

divisions were organized during 1944. 

New divisions accounted for six of the 

fourteen divisions under the army's command. All of these units were burdened 

with construction duties. In February 

Rommel ordered that infantry be used 

to lay mines and obstacles. On 25 May 

Seventh Army reported to OKH that all 

its units were engaged in construction 

projects and that consequently the necessary training was not being carried OUt.61 

The only units specially exempted 

from work on the fortifications were the 

two parachute divisions. The 3d Parachute Division was brought into Brittany 

in March and stationed east of Brest. Its 

mission was to complete its organization 

and at the same time train for defense 

against airborne attack. The 5 th Parachute Division moved into the Rennes 

area between 5 and 14 May with a similar mission. Both divisions in May were 

put under command of the II Parachute 

Corps which, though subordinated tactically to Seventh Army) was administratively and for training purposes under 

the Third Air Force. Since the Luftwaffe 

was thus responsible for parachute unit 

60 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.1.-JO.VI.44. 

61 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-JO.VI.44, 25 May 44. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 253 

training and, on the other hand, was not 

responsible to army commands anywhere 

in the hierarchy, Reich Marshal Goering 

ordered that the parachute divisions not 

be used for construction work except in 

providing local security for themselves 

against airborne attack. 62 The 5th Parachute Division had scarcely more than 

begun to fill out its ranks when invasion 

struck; but the 3d proved one of the best 

prepared of the new units in Seventh 

Army. 

The general stinting of training under 

the circumstances seems to have been inevitable and apparently did not arouse 

any serious protests at the time.63 Where 

Rommel's program met really effective 

opposition was in his efforts to concentrate reserves within the coastal zone. If 

it was true that the Germans had to 

fight on a fortified line, if they could not 

hope to maneuver freely, and if the crisis 

of the battle against the invaders would 

come within the first forty-eight hours, 

then it followed that all forces would be 

wasted which were not near enough to 

the coast to be committed at once against 

the first landings. This deduction was 

the final extension of the doctrine of 

static defense implicit in the original 

decision to build the Atlantic Wall. At 

least one high German commander had 

predicted the development and had 

warned against it in caustic tones. Sodenstern, commanding the Nineteenth Army, 

wrote privately in the summer of 1943 of 

his fear that German generalship would 

62 Ibid., 20 Feb 44. 

63 Various commanders since the war have under· 

scored this lack of training as one of the most serio 

ous weaknesses of the defense. The evidence, how· 

ever, is inconclusive. See MS # B--234 (Pemsel); MS 

# B--466 (Geyr); MS # B--784 (Obcrst1eutnant 

Friedrich von Criegern, CofS LXXXIV Corps) . 

exhaust itself in the construction of huge 

masses of concrete. "As no man in his 

senses," he argued, "would put his head 

on an anvil over which the smith's hammer is swung, so no general should mass 

his troops at the point where the enemy 

is certain to bring the first powerful blow 

of his superior materiel." 64 Rommel's 

answer, in all likelihood, would have 

been, first, that there was no practical 

alternative, second, that the first Allied 

blow at the point of the landings would 

not be the most powerful but the weakest 

since only a small portion of Allied fire 

power could then be effective, and, third, 

that the German general in massing his 

troops in fortified positions was at least 

giving their heads some protection 

against the smith's hammer. 

The difference of opinion was essen· 

tially a difference in judgment of what 

was possible. Rommel's chief of staff 

has testified that Rommel would have 

preferred a battle of maneuver had he 

seen any chance of its succeeding. 65 Rundstedt, like Sodenstern, was clearly more 

optimistic, perhaps because he had not 

had firsthand experience with the air 

power of the Western Allies. In any case, 

he did not accept Rommel's thesis and 

the influence of DB WEST was exerted 

spasmodically in resisting Rommel's efforts to shift the weight of the army for· 

ward to the coast, and in trying instead 

to free as many units as possible from 

bondage to the rigid defense system. 

In practice any plan to introduce flexibility into the defense depended primarily on whether units could be made 

64 Notes written in August 1943, appended to MS 

# B--276 (Sodenstern). 

65 MSS # B--720 and # C-017 (Speidel). 
254 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

mobile and whether they could be organized and equipped to support themselves in combat. Through the early 

months of 1944 Rundstedt struggled to 

strengthen and provide some transport 

for the coastal divisions. In the Seventh 

Army area he succeeded in forming mobile Kampfgruppen (of reinforced regiments) from four of the infantry divisions (the 265th, 266th, 275th, and 353d) 

defending the Brittany coast. In case of 

a major invasion of Normandy, Seventh 

Army had plans to move these Kampfgruppen into the combat zone. In the 

Cotentin, the 243d Division was converted from a static into a nominal attack infantry division.66 It was reorganized according to the 1944 type with 

six infantry battalions. Four battalions 

were to be equipped with bicycles. The 

artillery regiment, supply troops, and 

antitank battalion were to be motorized. 

Reorganization took place in late 1943, 

but the motorization planned to begin 

in May 1944 could be carried out only in 

very limited degree.67 

It should be observed in this connection that German notions of mobility in 

the west in 1944 hardly corresponded to 

American concepts of a motorized army. 

A mobile infantry unit in general was 

one equipped with bicycles, with horsedrawn artillery, and a modicum of horse 

and motor transport for supply purposes. 

It was called mobile more because of its 

ability to maintain itself in the field than 

66 The Germans classified divisions in four categories, depending on whether they were capable of full 

attack, limited attack, full defense, or limited defense 

missions. In these categories the degree of mobility 

was one of the most important factors. All static di. 

visions were in the third or fourth categories. 

67 Karteiblatt, 243d Infantry Division. OKH/Org.- 

Abt., Karteiblaetter 1943-1945. 

because of its ability to move rapidly 

from one place to another. 

For the most part the Germans lacked 

resources even to provide that limited 

mobility for the west army. Rundstedt’s 

efforts to restore mobility to his static 

divisions on the whole failed. A beginning, for instance, was made to upgrade 

the 709th Division, but the vehicles allotted in March had to be withdrawn in 

May when, as a result of the Allies’ successful rail bombing attacks, Seventh 

Army began to scrape together everything on wheels to form corps transport 

companies.68 

Rundstedt’s efforts to put wheels under his army were at least partly offset 

by Rommel’s concurrent labors to dig in 

every available soldier and gun along the 

coast line. After an inspection trip in 

the LXXXZV Corps sector in February, 

Rommel concluded that reserves were 

held in too great strength too far from the 

coast. In particular, he felt that the 352d

Division, located near St. Lo, and the 

243d Division, near la Haye du Puits, 

should be regrouped so that they could 

be committed in the first hours after an 

enemy landing. Seventh Army therefore 

ordered that the divisional reserves of 

the 709th and 716th Divisions (the 795th 

Georgian Battalion and 642d Ost Battalion respectively) should be committed 

at the coast, that the 243d and 352d Divisions should move slightly northward,69 

and that the 352d Artillery Regiment of 

the latter division should be emplaced in 

the coastal zone under the control of the 

68 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.I.-30.VI.44. 

69 New assembly areas were: for the 243d Division, 

Carentan-MontebourgBricquebec-Lessay; for the 

352d Division, Bayeux-Trevieres-Isigny-St. Lo.
GERMAN MOBILE INFANTRY equipped with bicycles (above), and animal 

transport (below). 
CAPTURED GERMAN ARMOR. U.S. troops inspecting Panther (Mark V) tank 

(above) and 75-mm. assault gun (below) mounted on Mark IV chassis. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 257 

716th Division.70 Similar reshuffling in 

Brittany put the artillery of the 275th and 

353d Divisions into static defense positionsY The shift forward of the 352d Division meant in effect that it was no longer 

in reserve. On 14 March Seventh Army 

therefore proposed that the division actually take over responsibility for the left 

half of the 716th Division sector. On DB 

WEST's approval, this change was accomplished by 19 March. With the doubling 

of the troops on the coast, the former battalion sectors of the 716th Division became regimental sectors. The 726th Regiment of the 716th was attached to the 

352d) less the 2d Battalion which became 

division reserve for the 716th. One regiment of the 352d plus the Fuesilier Battalion was held in corps reserve in the vicinity of Bayeux. 72 

Hitler, whose ideas, possibly under 

Rommel's influence, had undergone some 

change since Directive 51, wondered at 

this time whether all units of limited mobility which were located immediately behind the coast should not as a matter of 

policy be incorporated in the main line 

of resistance (MLR), leaving only fully 

mobile forces as attack reserves. General 

JodI of the OKW pointed out that, except for three divisions, units were already far enough forward for their artil70 Two battalions of the 352d Artillery Regiment 

were a·lready ordered committed on the coast on 26 

January 1944. See Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44, 

26 Jan 44. 

71 The 353d Division was the sister division of the 

352d, formed at the same time and according to the 

same tables of organization. As an attack infantry 

division, it was scheduled for full offensive employment. The 275th Division, a static division, upgraded 

in part, would give up a mobile Kampfgruppe if 

needed for employment outside Brittany. 

72 Seventh Army, KTB 1.I.-30.V1.44, 14, 19 Mar 

44. The reserve regiment was rotated. After 20 May, 

it was the 915th. 

lery to bear on the invasion beaches. To 

shift all troops into the coastal fortifications would be dangerous since concrete 

shelters were limited and field work 

might be destroyed by Allied bombing. 

In Brittany and the Cotentin, moreover, 

it was necessary to preserve some depth of 

defense in order to resist probable airborne landings. 73 

Commitment of all forces at the MLR 

was thus not accepted as a principle. But 

in practice Rommel continued to shift 

the weight of his army forward. In April 

the 21 st Panzer Division was moved from 

Rennes to Caen where its battalions were 

split on either side of the Orne River and 

its artillery committed on the coast. The 

disposition to all intents removed the 21st 

Panzer Division as a unit from the pool of 

mobile reserves. 74 The other two panzer 

divisions directly under Rommel's command were placed in position to reinforce 

the Fifteenth Army) one between Rouen 

and Paris, the other near Amiens. In May, 

another inspection tour convinced Rommel that movement of units from right to 

left into the invasion area would be impossible. He therefore requested that the 

four divisions in OKW reserve be assembled nearer the coast. Rundstedt entered 

an immediate protest with OKW, contending that the move was tantamount to 

committing the reserves before the battle. 

OK W agreed, and Rommel's proposal 

was turned down. 75 

13 Der Westen. 

14 The 21st Panzer Division replaced the 77th Division in the Caen area. The 77th was shifted to St. 

Malo-St. Brieuc where in turn it replaced the 346th 

Division. The 346th had been taken out of static 

coastal defense positions in the latter part of 194~, 

made mobile, and in January 1944 transferred to 

Fifteenth Army. 

1~ Der Westen. 
258 

These four divisions (three panzer and 

one panzer grenadier) thus saved by 

OKW's intervention were the only mobile units in the west on the eve of invasion which could properly be designated 

strategic reserves. Three were located 

within easy marching distance of Normandy (easy, that is, if the Allied air 

forces were discounted); the fourth was 

far away on the Belgium-Netherlands 

border. 

In summary, the conflict between Rommel's and Rundstedt's theories of defense 

was never resolved definitely in favor of 

one or the other and led to compromise 

troop dispositions which on D Day were 

not suitable for the practice of either 

theory. The pool of mobile reserves had 

been cut down below what would be 

needed for an effective counterattack in 

mass; it had been removed from DB 

WEST's control, and, as though to insure 

finally that it would not be employed in 

force, it had been divided among three 

commands. While the possibility of seeking a decision by counterattack had thus 

been whittled away, considerable forces 

were still held far enough from the coast 

so that, if Rommel's theories were correct, 

they would be unable to reach the battlefield in time to influence the action. In 

short, operational flexibility had been 

curtailed without achieving a decisive 

thickening of the coastal defense. 

The Defense on the Eve of Invasion 

The scheduled completion date for the 

winter construction program and all 

troop preparations for meeting the expected invasion was 30 April,76 Up to that 

76 Grundlegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers 

West Nr. 33, Neuregelung des Bauwesens in den 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

time the Germans made all arrangements 

to repel a major attack against the Kanalkueste. At the end of 1943 Hitler ordered 

the assembly of all available forces behind 

the front of the Fifteenth A rmy and the 

right wing of Seventh Army, but the latter 

sector was to be considered much less in 

peril. DB WEST was to release four divisions from coastal sectors of the Seventh, 

First, and Nineteenth Armies. Of these, 

the 243d Division, released from Seventh 

Army, was to remain as a reserve division 

in the army area. The other three were all 

attached to Fifteenth Army. Similarly, of 

four reinforced regiments obtained at this 

time from the Replacement Army, three 

went to Fifteenth A rmy; one was attached 

to the 709th Division. The latter attachment was made because the coastal de. 

fenses of the 709th Division were thin and 

enemy attack there was "possible." 77 

That possibility, however, was not 

taken very seriously until the end of 

April. Since the German intelligence 

system had been supplying very little reliable information, estimates of Allied intentions continued to be based more on 

logical inference than on fact. Air reconnaissance was severely restricted by Allied 

air supremacy. Reconnaissance by sea 

could never be depended on. German 

agents in England steadily dwindled and 

the work of those remaining was made almost fruitless by the closing off of the 

English coastal areas in April 1944. News 

filtering through neutral countries, especially from Portugal and Switzerland, was 

abundant but confusing.78 The difficulty 

besetzten Westgebieten, 3 Nov 43. OKW /WFSt, op. 

(H.), Grundlegende Befehle West 28.IV.42-7.V.44. 

770KH/op.Abt., Gliederung West, Chefsachen, 

Band VIII, 1.Teil, 1l.XII.42-2.I.44, and 2.Teil, 8.1.-

21.II.44. 

78 MS # B-234 (Pemsel). 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 259 

was not that no reliable reports got 

through, but that they were too few and 

too spasmodic to allow the formation of 

a convincing picture of Allied intentions, 

particularly since such a picture had to 

compete for acceptance with various preconceptions. 

The best guess was Hitler's, though 

how he arrived at it the records do not 

show. While military leaders were nearly 

unanimous in predicting invasion in the 

Pas-de-Calais area, Hitler in March suddenly decided that the Allies were likely 

to land on the Cotentin and Brittany 

peninsulas. He believed they would be 

tempted by the ease with which defensible bridgeheads could be established 

there, but he apparently did not undertake any analysis of the possible military 

advantages. 79 

The supposition of a special threat to 

Normandy and Brittany received some 

support a few weeks later from the Navy. 

On 26 April Admiral Krancke, Commander of Navy Group West) observed 

that recent air photographs showed no activity in the ports of southeast England or 

the mouth of the Thames, and concluded 

that Cap Gris Nez and the coast northeast 

were not threatened by Allied landings. 

The conclusion was reinforced by the 

facts that Allied air attacks against coastal 

79 Seekriegsleitung/I.Abt., KTB 1.-31.[[1.44,4 Mar 

44, and KTB 1.-31.V.44, 3 May 44; Der Westen. 

German generals, commenting after the war on their 

experiences, were unanimous in giving Hitler the 

credit for first pointing to the danger of invasion in 

Normandy. In the light of the German Army's general reluctance to admit that Hitler had shown any 

military perspicacity at aU, the testimony is fairly 

convincing. The generals, who were then unable to 

see the military advantages of a Cotentin assault as 

compared to an attack against the Kanalkueste, alleged that Hitler's choice was sheer intuition. The 

records at least do not contradict that interpretation. 

batteries and radar installations were concentrated between Boulogne and Cherbourg, that Allied mine sweeping and 

mine laying generally blocked off the 

same area, and that the bombing of railroads had interrupted traffic to the Channel coast but had not affected communications with the Atlantic area. In short, Admiral Krancke felt that all signs pointed 

to an invasion between Boulogne and 

Cherbourg, probably with the main effort 

against the Cotentin, the mouth of the 

Seine, or the mouth of the Somme.80 This 

appreciation differed from previous estimates only in lopping off the Pas-deCalais sector between Boulogne and Dunkerque as a possible landing area. The resulting difference in emphasis, however, 

was striking, particularly in the singling 

out of the Cotentin as threatened by a possible major attack. Later reports by Admiral Krancke further emphasized this 

threat, particularly from Allied airborne 

attack. 81 Krancke's view, developed chiefly 

during May, was that Le Havre and Cherbourg seemed likely prime objectives for 

the Allied invasion forces. This conviction grew as it was seen that Cherbourg 

and Le Havre alone of the major French 

ports had been spared from heavy air attack. 

Whether Hitler saw and reacted to 

these naval estimates or whether he had 

access to other information, in late April 

his interest in Normandy increased and 

he began to insist strongly on the need to 

reinforce the defense there. 82 On 6 May 

80 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.-30.-

IV.44, 26 Apr 44; d. in same KTB Lageuebersicht des 

Marinegruppenkommandos West, Fuehrungsstab, 

Rueckblick Monat April 1944. 

81 Seekriegsleitung/1.Abt., KTB 1.-31.V.44, 15 May 

44. 

82 Der Westen. 
260 

Seventh A rmy was notified by Rommel of 

Hitler's concern, and the army ordered 

the deployment of one parachute regiment and two separate battalions in the 

immediate vicinity of Cherbourg. The 

parachute regiment selected was the 6th 

and it was to be placed in the general 

area of Lessay-Periers. The 206th Panzer 

Battalion, a separate tank battalion 

equipped with a miscellany of Russian, 

French, and German light tanks, was ordered to dig in between Cap de la Hague 

and Cap de Carteret. The Seventh Army 

Sturm Battalion was sent to la Haye du 

Puits and later shifted to Ie Vast, southeast of Cherbourg. Decision was made at 

the same time to divert to the Cotentin 

the 9Ist Division, which was then on its 

way from Germany to Nantes. Orders 

were issued the next day switching the 

trains to the vicinity of la Haye du Puits. 

The 91 st Division was told that on arrival 

it would take over command of the 6th 

Parachute Regiment. This movement 

was completed on 14 May. On 9 May 

Rommel ordered that the IOIst Stellungswerfer Regiment, released from OB 

WEST reserve, be committed in the Cotentin, split between the east and west 

coasts. On the day that this move was completed, 12 May, the 17th Machine Gun 

Battalion (a well-trained unit of young 

men) also completed relief of the 795th 

Georgian Battalion on Cap de la Hague 

and the latter battalion, under command 

of the 709th Division, was moved on 17 

May south to Brucheville northeast of 

Carentan. Mission of all the major units, 

the 9Ist Division, 6th Parachute Regiment, and Seventh Army Sturm Battalion, 

was defense against airborne landings. 

The 1 OOth Panzer Replacement Battalion 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

south of Carentan at the same time was 

instructed to be prepared for action 

against airborne troops.83 

The Cotentin was thus substantially 

reinforced and fully alerted a month before the two U.S. airborne divisions were 

dropped there. While expecting airborne 

assault on the Cotentin, however, neither 

Rommel nor Rundstedt reckoned that 

such assault would form part of the main 

Allied effort. Having reinforced the actual garrison in the peninsula, therefore, 

they took no further steps to cope with a 

major landing in the area. On the contrary, a Seventh A rmy proposal on 5 May 

to shift the whole of the LXXIV Corps 

from Brittany to Normandy in case of 

large-scale landings in the LXXXIV 

Corps sector was rejected by Field Marshal Rommel.84 No reserves were moved 

nearer the Cotentin, and no plans were 

made to move them in mass in case of attack. 

As for the Navy, having called its opponent's trumps it relaxed under the 

curious delusion that the Allies might not 

play at all. Krancke's thesis seems to have 

been that unless the invasion were preceded by large and devastating attacks on 

83Seventh Army, KTB l.l.-30.VI.44, 6, 7, 9, 12 

May 44; Seventh Army, Trans.O., KTB l.I.-30.Vl.44, 

8 May 44, and Anlage 15. The Sturm Battalion was 

an irregular Army unit for shock employment. It 

contained about 1,100 men in four companies armed 

as infantry and had four light field howitzers. The 

lOIst Stellungswerfer Regiment was organized in the 

west in January 1944. It consisted of three mobile 

rocket launcher battalions armed either with 210-

mm. rocket launchers or 280-mm./320-mm. launchers. The lOOth Panzer Replacement Battalion, equipped with a handful of French and Russian light 

tanks, had very slight combat value. Half of the 

243d Division which occupied inland ports was also 

charged with antiairborne defense. See MS # B-845 

(Schlieben) . 

8' Seventh Army KTB l.I.-30.VI.44, 2, 5, May 44. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 261 

the coastal batteries it could not succeed.85 

He noted on 31 May that such attacks had 

indeed increased, but they were, he 

thought, still too limited to insure the success of landings. Actually, from his point 

of view, he was right. Despite his prognostications about the threat to the Cotentin 

he continued to believe that large-scale 

landings would strike the Pas-de-Calais. 

Here the coastal batteries were formidable. The Allied air attacks had hit them 

more often than they had hit any other 

sector of the coast, and yet the attacks up 

to the eve of D Day had eliminated only 

eight guns. In the Seine-Somme sector 

five had been destroyed, and three in N ormandy.86 The Navy thus remained confident that its artillery could still knock 

the Allied invasion fleet out of the water 

-provided of course it sailed where it was 

expected. That confidence was further 

nourished by the fact that, despite heavy 

air attacks on radar stations, the radar 

warning system remained virtually intact 

as of 31 May. In fine, reviewing the situation on 4 June Admiral Krancke was 

driven to the conclusion that not only was 

attack not imminent but there was a good 

chance that observed Allied preparations 

were part of a huge hoax. The mixture of 

bluff and preparation for a later invasion 

would keep up, the naval chief thought, 

until German forces were so weakened in 

85 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.-31.-

V.44, 22 May 44. 

86 Rpt, 12 Jun 44, Admiral Kanalkueste. Seekriegsleitung/l.Abt., KTB Anlagen 1.-30'vI.44. This, however, does not take into account total interference 

with the effectiveness of the coastal batteries through 

destruction of communications and damage to auxiliary facilities. Air attacks in Seventh Army area at 

least were a serious enough threat to uncasemated 

batteries that General Dollmann ordered alternate 

and dummy positions prepared. 

the west that landings could be attempted 

without great risk.87 

The contrast between Krancke's optimism about enemy intentions and his 

sober accounting of the helplessness of 

his own forces in the face of enemy overwhelming superiority was the most striking aspect of his last report before the invasion. His fleet of combat ships was so 

small that it could scarcely be talked 

about in terms of a naval force and even 

what he did have was for the most part 

bottled up in the ports by what he called 

"regular and almost incessant" Allied air 

sortieS. His main offensive units in June 

were a flotilla of destroyers (which on 1 

April had two ships operational),88 two 

torpedo boats,89 and five flotillas of small 

motor torpedo boats (S-Boote) with thirtyone boats operational. In addition he had 

a few mine sweepers and patrol craft. Fifteen of the smaller submarines based in 

French Atlantic ports, though not under 

Krancke's control, were scheduled to take 

part in resisting the invasion. Midget submarines and remote-controlled torpedoes 

were being developed but they never got 

into the fight.90 Even this tiny fleet could 

not operate. Krancke reported thirty Allied air attacks on his naval forces during 

87 Lageuebersicht des Marinegruppenkommandos 

West, Fuehrungsstab, Rueckblick Monat Mai 1944 in 

Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.-31.V.44, 

cited hereafter as Navy Group West, Rueckblick 

Monat Mai 1944. Blumentritt, CofS, OB WEST, also 

believed the invasion would not come. See MS # 

T-121 (Zimmermann et al.). 

88 Figures not available for a later date. In any 

case, however, the destroyers were not used against 

the invasion fleet in the landings. 

89 He had seven on 1 April, lost three in a brush 

with Allied destroyers in April and two more in May. 

Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 1.-15.lV.44, 

KTB 16.-30.lV.44, KTB 1.-15.V.44, and KTB 16.-

3I.V,44. 

90 Conf, 29 Jun 44, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1944. 
262 

May and added that even in dark nights 

his units got no relief. He predicted an 

enforced reduction of effort and heavy 

losses in the future. 91 In the meantime he 

found himself unable to carry out his plan 

for blocking off the invasion coast with 

mine fields. Delivery of all types of mines 

had been delayed chiefly by transportation difficulties. Up to the end of April 

there were on hand only enough concrete 

shallow-water mines to put in two mine 

fields in the Dieppe area. 

In May, more mines became available. 

But in the meantime the mine-laying fleet 

had been depleted by Allied attacks, and 

increased Allied air surveillance of the 

sea lanes made all German naval activity 

difficult. 

The anticipated mining operations 

[Kranke reported on 4 June] to renew the 

Hanking mine fields in the Channel have not 

been carried out. On the way to the rendezvous at Le Havre T -24 fell behind because 

of damage from [a] mine, "Greif" was sunk 

by bombs, "Kondor" and "Falke" were damaged by mines, the former seriously. The 6th 

MS-Flotilla [mine layers] likewise on its 

way to Le Havre to carry out KMA [coastal 

mine] operations reached port with only one 

of its six boats, one having been sunk by 

torpedoes and the other four having fallen 

out through mine damage, air attack or sea 

damage. The laying of KMA mines out of 

Le Havre therefore could not be carried OUt.92 

In fact during the month only three 

more coastal mine fields could be laid and 

all these were put down off the Kanalkueste. The essential mining of waters 

around the Cotentin could scarcely be 

begun. Naval defense preparations were 

91 Navy Group West, Rueckblick Monat Mai 1944. 

92 Ibid. All ships mentioned in the report were 

torpedo boats. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

actually losing ground. The program of 

replacing the 1943 mine fields in midChannel finally had to be abandoned in 

March 1944 because of lack of mines and 

because of Allied radar observation. 

Krancke estimated that the deepwater 

fields would all be obsolete by mid-June. 

Some hasty mine fields were laid in the 

Bay of the Seine during April but their 

estimated effective life was only five 

weeks. The dearth of materials and adequate mine layers continued to disrupt 

German plans. Krancke's conclusion on 

the eve of invasion was that mining activity of E-boats could only provide a 

"nonessential" contribution to the German defenses. 93 

If Admiral Krancke's forces were helpless in naval action, they were scarcely 

more effective on land, where their assigned task of casemating coastal batteries 

dragged along past the completion date 

with no end in sight. Hitler had ordered 

in January that all batteries and antitank 

guns were to be casemated by 30 April.94 

On that date Admiral Krancke reported 

that of 547 coastal guns 299 had been casemated, 145 were under construction; remaining concrete works had not been 

begun. Like all other defense preparations, this effort had been concentrated 

along the Kanalkuesie. In the Pas-deCalais and Seine-Somme sectors, 93 of the 

132 guns had been casemated. Normandy 

had 47 guns, 27 of which were under concrete at the end of April. As for the fixed 

antitank positions, 16 of the 82 guns had 

93 Navy Group West, Rueckblick Monat Mai 1944. 

Mines swept by the Allies during the crossing on 6 

June were presumably among those counted obsolete 

by the Germans. Some fresh mines were laid in the 

assault area during the night of 6-7 June. See MS 

# D-333 (Krancke) and MS # D-334 (Ruge). 

94 Seventh Army, KTB l.l.-30.v1.44, 17 Jan 44. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 263 

been covered in the Fifteenth A rmy area. 

The nine guns in the Seventh A rmy sector 

were all open.95 

The Army's construction program, of 

course, suffered along with the Navy's and 

was far from completion on D Day. Shortage of materials, particularly cement and 

mines, due both to production and to 

transportation difficulties affected all fortification work. The shortage of cement, 

critical even at the outset of the winter 

construction program, was greatly intensified by the Allies' all-out rail bombing 

offensive. Late in May LXXXIV Corps, 

for example, received 47 carloads of cement in three days against a minimum 

daily need of 240 carloads. Two days after 

this report was made, the flow of cement 

to the Seventh A rmy area stopped altogether as trains had to be diverted to 

carrying more urgently needed ordinary 

freight. During May the cement works in 

Cherbourg were forced to shut down for 

lack of coal. Plans were then made to 

bring up cement by canal to Rouen and 

ship by sea to the Seventh A rmy area, but 

this was a last-minute solution and could 

never be tried OUt. 96 

On 15 May Seventh A rmy reported that 

its defense preparations were to be considered complete, its beach obstacles and 

antiairlanding obstacles set, and its troop 

dispositions made. This was, to say the 

least, an exaggeration, analagous to a 

claim that a bombing program was complete as soon as all targets had been hit. 

In fact, a week later LXXXIV Corps estimated that the construction program was 

95 Status Report, Stand der Verschartungen, Stichtag 30.lV.44, in Marinegruppenkommando West, 

KTB 16.-30.lV.44. 

96 Seventh Army, Trans.O., KTB 1.I.-30.VI.44, 25, 

28 May 44, and Anlage 8; Seventh Army KTB 1.l.-

30'v1.44, 23 May 44. 

only half complete.o7 The corps was particularly concerned that not even the 

fortification of the immediate MLR along 

the water's edge nor the naval and army 

coastal batteries were finished. The socalled Zweite Stellung, which Rundstedt 

in late 1943 ordered to be built a few 

kilometers in from the coast line in order 

to get some depth of defense, had progressed still more slowly, even though, being largely a system of prepared field positions constructed by the French, it took 

relatively few priority materials or labor. 

In March LXXXIV Corps reported the 

position 65 percent finished, but the more 

critical fact was that only thirty-one of the 

planned eighty-eight resistance nests and 

strong points were actually fully ready for 

defense. In the sector of the 709th Division, defending the vital east coast of the 

Cotentin, only one of forty-two planned 

positions was fully prepared. Rommel decided in April that the Zweite Stellung 

was wasting time and effort that were 

vitally needed for reinforcing the main 

line of resistance. He therefore ordered 

all work discontinued except where the 

Zweite Stellung lay close to the coast and 

could be considered part of the primary 

defense.os Thus the last chance to secure 

some depth of defense was lost. 

But the sacrifice of depth did not result in solidity for the main line. Despite 

Seventh A rmy's report that obstacles on 

the shore line and in fields suitable for 

airborne landings were complete by the 

middle of May and needed only deepening, it was precisely that deepening which 

alone could have made them effective. 

Rommel's inspection of the antiairlanding obstacles on 18 May convinced him 

97 Seventh Army KTB 1.I.-30'v1.44, 15,22 May 44. 

98Ibid., 13 Apr 44. 
264 

that, far from being complete, they had 

only just been begun. Few were mined 

and his goal was to have them all mined. 

For that purpose he required 13,000 shells 

for Normandy alone. 99 As for the shore 

obstacles, they had been completed only 

along the high-water mark and a few 

yards seaward. Admiral Krancke warned 

against continued acceptance of earlier 

estimates that the Allies would land at 

high tide. loo If landings were made near 

low tide they would not be materially 

hindered by the obstacles already in place. 

This was true but increasing their number was inevitably a slow process. A measure of the difficulties faced by the German 

Army was the experience of the 352d Division) which had to cut stakes for obstacles by hand in the Foret de Cerisy some 

ten or twelve miles inland, haul the wood 

by cart to the beach, and drive the stakes, 

again by hand, into the tidal fiats.lol 

Mining of the coastal zone had made 

considerable progress but was still far 

short of the goal. In the first six months 

of 1944 Rommel succeeded in tripling 

the number of mines in the coast defense 

zone. But the five or six million mines 

laid by D Day contrasted with Rommel's 

own minimum estimate of fifty million 

needed for continuous defense belts. For 

the 352d Division sector alone ten million 

were needed to cover a thirty-mile front 

to a depth of three miles. The division 

99 Bericht ueber die Reise des Herm Oberbefehls· 

habers am 17. und 18. Mai 44. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen l.l.-30.v1.44. For lack of sufficient mines, 

the artillery shells were to be provided with trip 

wires and attached to the antiairlanding stakes. 

100 An important element in this changed estimate 

was the observation of British landing exercises in 

May. Seekriegsleitung/1.Abt., KTB 1.-31.V.44, 7 May 

44. 

101 MS # B-432 (Oberstleutnant Fritz Ziegelmann, 

G-3, 352d Division) . 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

actually received about ten thousand antipersonnel mines during 1944 and no 

Teller mines at all.I°2 

Similar incompleteness marked the fortifications on D Day. On the east coast of 

the Cotentin, strong points and resistance 

nests were spaced about 875 yards apart; 

between the Orne and Vire Rivers they 

were 1,312 yards apart. 103 Most of them 

were field fortifications, sometimes with 

concreted troop shelters and sometimes 

embodying concrete gun casemates. Of 

the installations in the 352d Division 

sector only 15 percent were bombproof; 

the remainder were virtually unprotected 

against air attack. lo4 The fortifications had 

no depth whatsoever. According to the 

commander of the 716 th Division the 

forty to fifty fortified resistance centers in 

his sector were beaded along the coast like 

a string of pearls.I05 Generalmajor Horst 

Freiherr Treusch von Buttlar-BrandenfeIs, OKW operations staff officer, had 

warned after his inspection trip of Normandy defenses in January that if the 

enemy broke through one strong point 

there would be a gap of three or four 

kilometers into which he could advance 

unhindered.lo6 The abandonment of the 

Zweite Stellung meant that to a large 

degree this condition still prevailed in 

June. 

Rommel's inability to complete the Atlantic Wall undoubtedly contributed to 

the general ineffectiveness of German resistance to the Allied landings on 6 June. 

A stronger wall would have meant a 

102 Ibid.; MS # A-982 (Ruge). 

103 MS # B-234 (Pemsel). 

1~ MS # B-432 (Ziegelmann). 

105 MS # B-62l (Richter). Generalleutnant Rich· 

ter commanded the 716th Division at the time of the 

invasion. 

106 MS # B-672 (Buttlar-Brandenfels). 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 265 

harder crust, and in cracking it the Allies 

would unquestionably have suffered 

heavier losses. But it also seems likely that 

such a difference would not have proved 

decisive. The critical weakness, as Rommel had seen, was the German inability 

to maneuver. And the most important 

cause of that \\"as the unchallenged supremacy of the Allies in the air. The Luftwaffe had not only been beaten before D 

Day; it had been all but annihilated. 

The story of what happened to Goering's air force. which four years before had 

been the world-famed spearhead of blitzkrieg, cannot here be told in detail. 

Among the causes of its decline there was 

at least an element of bad judgment. 

Through 1942 Hitler persisted in believing that the end of the war was just 

around the corner of the next campaign; 

at the same time he refused to recognize 

the tremendous productive capacity of the 

\Vestern Allies, particularly the United 

States. 107 Al though in 1940 the Germans 

had pioneered in the use of specially developed attack aircraft for support of 

ground operations, after the end of the 

French campaign they neglected to develop the tactics further. They turned 

instead first to creating a bomber fleet to 

knock out England and later to producing 

fighter forces to protect the homeland. 

Their efforts on both scores were inadequate. In the meantime the development 

of an Air Force to co-operate with the 

Army went by the board. In 1944 the 

107 Von Rohden, Development and planning in the 

German Air Force, Parts 1-3. Von Rohden Collection at the Air Cniversity, Maxwell Field, Alabama. 

A microfilm of the material in this collection is in 

the Library of Congress. Washington, D. C. Generalmajor Hans-Detleff Herhudt von Rohden was the 

director of the Historical Section of the Luftwaffe 

High Command during the final years of the war. 

Luftwaffe depended for the most part on 

two fightertypes: the Focke-Wulf 190 and 

the Messerschmitt 109. The attack plane, 

the twin-engined Junkers 88, was available in such small quantities that the tactical air commands were equipped mainly 

with the standard interceptor aircraft. 

Not only did this mean less offensive 

power in land warfare but, more important, it entailed competition between the 

demands for air support and the demands 

for the defense of Germany against the 

ever intensified Combined Bomber Offensive. Th us the Germans faced the same 

dilemma in the allocation of air forces 

that they did in the division of their 

ground troops between the west and east. 

In both cases the compromise effected between the rival claims resulted only in establishing inferiority to the enemy on all 

fronts. And this, in turn, produced a 

spiral of attrition and increasing inferiority, spinning inevitably to disaster. 

In the beginning of 1944, when it was 

already too late, Reich Minister Albert 

Speer tried to halt the spiral by concentrating on fighter production. Under the 

impetus of the Speer program monthly 

production of fighters rose steadily in 

1944 despite all the Allied air forces could 

do to destroy aircraft and ball bearing factories. In the three months before D Day 

between seven and eight thousand fighters 

were produced. Since losses continued to 

mount, the net gain was only about a 

thousand planes. But even this gain was 

not reflected in a stronger air force. Increase in the number of available aircraft 

only emphasized the critical shortage of 

qualified pilots. This in turn resulted primarily from a lack of gasoline which compelled a progressive shortening of the 

pilot-training period from about 260 
266 

hours in 1942 to 110 and even in some 

cases to 50 in 1944.108 The green pilots 

accelerated the deterioration of the Luftwaffe as a whole, since their inexperience 

increased their own losses and the losses 

of their planes. Moreover the planes 

themselves, mass produced in haste, were 

inferior. During 1943 an average of 500 

aircraft a month had been lost or damaged because of mechanical or pilot failures. In February 1944 the losses from 

these causes soared to 1,300, accounting, 

in short, for about half the month's 

new production. This was unusual, but 

losses through accidents continued to be 

as important as losses through enemy action. In May, for instance, 712 aircraft 

were destroyed or damaged by the Allies, 

while 656 were lost in flying accidents.109 

On D Day there were about 400 fighter 

planes in the west under Third Air 

ForceYO But only about haH of these were 

available to oppose Allied air forces supporting the invasion. The 400 planes were 

grouped under II Fighter Corps and divided between two subordinate commands, the 4th Fighter Division with 

headquarters at Metz and the 5th Fighter 

Division located near Paris. The mission 

of the 4 th Division was to intercept Allied 

heavy bombers entering or leaving Ger108 Luftwaffe Historical Section, Beurteilung des 

Krieges, 14 Aug 44. Von Rohden Collection. This 

report was based on observations of a Lt. Col. Alewyn 

who visited the west between 15 and 30 July 1944. 

109 Notes for a study on Strength and Losses of the 

GAF in the Von Rohden Collection. 

110 Notes by Von Rohden from Lagekarten, Third 

Air Force, in Von Rohden Collection; Beurteilung 

des Krieges, 14 Aug 44. Cf. German Air Force Order 

of Battle charts. 31 May and 10 June 1944. prepared 

by the Air Historical Branch of the Air Ministry, 

London. from German documents in their possession, 

MS. Hist Div files. British figures for 10 June are 

just over 400. On 31 May the number of operational 

fighter planes is given as 278. See Chart 3, p. 245. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

many. Thus tactically its planes belonged 

to the Reich defensive system. In case of 

invasion they were to be diverted to intercept Allied planes over the invasion area, 

but with bases so far from the scene of operations they were unlikely to be very effective, and would not be on hand on D 

Day.lll 

Despite the accepted thesis that the first 

hours of the landings would be the critical 

period for the defense of France, the Luftwaffe made no comprehensive plans to be 

on hand in strength during those hours, 

mostly because with its limited supply of 

planes and pilots it could not afford to 

hoard reserves in idleness while waiting 

for the Allies to strike. In December 1943 

the II A ir Corps was transferred to France 

from Italy to take over control of all the 

fighter aircraft to be used in support of 

the German Army. On D Day, however, 

the II Air Corps was still only a headquarters without any planes. In case of invasion, it was to get ten wings (Geschwader) 

from Germany. Actually only about six 

wings arrived, and these trickled in with 

the result that they could never be employed in a concentrated effort. None 

were on hand on 6 June. The wings earmarked for II Air Corps were then just 

being refitted in Germany. The majority 

of the pilots were new graduates of the accelerated training programs. Not only did 

they have no battle experience; they were 

barely able to handle their planes. Most of 

them were not familiar with France and 

did not know how to read maps. The commander of the II Air Corps) Generalleutnant Alfred Buelowius, aware of their 

inexperience, proposed that he send 

111 MS # B-013 (Hentschel). Generalmajor Karl 

A. F. Hentschel was commanding general of the 5th 

Fighter Division. 
GERMAN DEFENSE MEASURES, 1944 267 

planes out to guide the reinforcements 

into the flying fields prepared for them. 

Responsibility for the movement, however, rested with the German Home Air 

Command (Luftflotte Reich) and Buelowius was not consulted. The result was 

that on D Day the units were scattered 

and lost on their flights from Germany 

and many were forced to make emergency 

landings. Few arrived at their assigned 

bases,u2 

Thus for one reason or another the 

planes that should have been in France on 

6 June to shield Rundstedt's army against 

intolerable Allied air supremacy were not 

112 MS # B-620 (Buelowius). 

there. The 50 to 150 planes that did fly to 

the attack in the critical hours of the defense could achieve nothing, and the German Army faced the massed blows of Allied combined arms alone.1l3 

113 Again reports of the number of planes vary. 

CofS II Fighter Corps estimated he had only fifty 

planes. See Survey, 18 Nov 44, Some Aspects of the 

German fighter effort during the initial stages of the 

invasion of North-West Europe, Translation No. 

VII/19 by Air Historical Branch, London. Hist Div 

files. Von Rohden's calculations all come out nearer 

150, based on Luftwaffe Historical Section reports, 

especially Ueberblick ueber den Luftkrieg, Karlsbad, 

1944. See notes for a study of Strength and Losses of 

the GAF in the Von Rohden Collection. About 1,000 

planes were brought into France between 6 June 

and 7 July but the net gain was only about 250. See 

Beurteilung des Krieges, 14 Aug 44. 
SITUATION I N EUROPE 6 June 1944 

_ AXIS-DOMINATED ARE"A 

c===J AREA UNDER ALLIED CO,.TROL 

c:z::::::J NEUTR"L COUNTRIES 

c:> CROSS-CI-U.NNEl ATTACK 

100 300 400 ~OO 

ALGERIA CI') 

MAP I 
CHAPTER VIII 

The Sixth of June 

The Invasion Is Launched 

On 8 May General Eisenhower set D 

Day for Y plus 4, or 5 June. The plans 

were made (though changes would be introduced up to the last minute), the 

troops were trained, the preparatory softening up of the enemy was well under 

way. What remained was to get the men 

on ships and give the order to go. The 

vastly complicated process of organizing 

and equipping the assault units for embarkation began in April. It followed in 

general the pattern worked out in British 

exercises in the fall of 1943 which broke 

down the mounting into a series of movements bringing the troops successively 

nearer embarkation and at the same time 

providing for their equipment and assault 

organization. Unless the troops were already stationed near the south coast of 

England, they were moved first to concentration areas where they received special 

equipment, waterproofed their vehicles, 

and lost certain administrative overhead 

considered unessential during the assault. 

The second move brought them to marshaling ar.eas located close to the embarkation points. There, final supplies were issued for the voyage, maps distributed, 

briefing for the operation accomplished, 

and the units broken down into boatloads 

to await the final move down to the ships.1 

1 Information on mounting and training from 

[Clifford Jones] NEPTUNE: Training, Mounting, The 

Artificial Ports (The Administrative and Logistical 

History of the ETO: Part IV), MS, pp. 275ff. Hist 

Div files. 

Force U (seaborne units of the VII 

Corps) was marshaled in the Tor Bay area 

and east of Plymouth; Force 0 (1st Division), in the area of Dorchester; Force 

B (29th Division), near Plymouth and 

Falmouth; and the early build-up divisions, the 9th Infantry and 2d Armored 

Divisions, near Southampton. Marshaling 

areas for the airborne units were as follows: glider troops in the central counties 

between London and the Severn River; 

paratroopers of the lOlst Division in the 

Newbury-Exeter area; paratroopers of 

the 82d Division in the eastern half of 

England, north of London.2 (Map VI) 

About 54,000 men, including the temporary housekeeping services of the entire 

5th Armore{l Division, were required to 

establish and maintain installations for 

mounting the seaborne assault forces 

alone, and to perform services necessary 

to make them ready for sailing. To cook 

their meals, more than 4,500 new army 

cooks were trained during the first three 

months of 1944. To transport them and 

haul their supplies, over 3,800 trucks were 

operated by the Southern Base Section. 

Through the first five months of 1944 

individual and group assault training had 

continued, supplemented from January 

on by large-scale exercises designed to test 

not only assault techniques but co-ordination between the joint armies, smoothness 

of staff work in all phases of the operation, and techniques of mounting, mar2 The latter was the principal area of Eighth AF 

installations. 
270 

shaling, loading, and unloading. These 

exercises culminated in two dress rehearsals for the invasion: exercise TIGER 

for Force U (VII Corps units) held at 

the end of April; the series of exercises, 

FABIUS) for Force 0 (1st Division), Force 

B (29th Division), and British assault 

and follow-up forces conducted in the 

early part of May. 

The assault exercises were held at Slapton Sands on the coast of Devon southwest of Dartmouth under conditions 

simulating as closely as possible those expected in the actual operations. As a result of the exercises certain minor technical improvements were made, but the 

basic organization and the techniques as 

worked out at the Assault Training Center were unchanged. 

Amid all the simulation there came one 

serious note of war. One of the convoys 

of exercise TIGER was attacked by two 

German E-boat flotillas totaling nine 

boats.3 Losses were heavier than those 

suffered by Force U during the actual invasion. Two LST's were sunk and one 

damaged. About 700 men lost their lives.4 

The loss of three LST's to the OVERLORD 

assault lift was particularly critical in 

view of the general shortage of landing 

craft. General Eisenhower reported to 

the Combined Chiefs of Staff that the 

sinkings reduced the reserve of LST's 

3 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.-30.IV. 

44,27 Apr 44. 

4 Jones, NEPTUNE, p. 258. Navy figures were 638 

killed and 89 wounded. See Report by Allied Naval 

Cbmmander-in-Chief Expeditionary Force on Operation NEPTUNE (London, 1944), I, 33, cited hereafter as ANCXF Report. Jones, historian for engineer 

units that were chiefly involved in the disaster, gives 

749 killed, and bases his calculations on after action 

reports of the units and detailed casualty breakdowns. Even so, he feels his figures may be incomplete. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

to nothing. 5 The Germans realized that 

they had sunk landing craft but guessed 

that the craft had been participating in 

an exercise.6 The incident passed without repercussions. 

After the TIGER and FABIUS rehearsals 

the assault troops returned to the marshaling areas to complete their lastminute preparations and to wait. Troops 

of Force U had almost a month of waiting. It was a trying time for the men and 

a dangerous time for the fate of the invasion. Although troops were not briefed 

on operation OVERLORD until the last 

week in May, the fact that they were concentrated and ready to go and that they 

had just practiced the invasion maneuver with the organization actually to be 

used would have been sufficient information in the hands of enemy agents to 

jeopardize the operation. All troops were 

therefore sealed in the marshaling areas 

behind barbed wire and with a host of 

some 2,000 Counter Intelligence Corps 

men guarding them closely. The whole 

coastal area had been closed to visitors 

since April. Now, in addition, the camps 

themselves were isolated from all contact 

with the surrounding countryside. Camouflage discipline was more severely enforced during these weeks than at any 

time subsequently during actual operations. The German Air Force, though 

weak, was believed capable of damaging 

raids against troop concentrations and 

port areas. Actually, only one raid of 

any consequence did occur, when on the 

night of 30 May bombs were dropped in 

6 Diary of CinC, 28 Apr 44. 

6 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 16.-30.-

IV.44, 28 Apr 44. On the basis of a German broadcast, the ANCXF Report erroneously stated that the 

Germans were unaware of the nature of their success. ANCXF Report, 1,33. 
PREINVASION SCENES. Soldiers in mess line (above) in one of the marshaling 

camps in southern England, and (below) men and equipment being loaded on LST's 

at Brixham. 
272 

a camp near Falmouth, causing a few 

casualties to an ordnance battalion. The 

enemy continued to miss his opportunities to disrupt the final preparations. 

Loading of Force U, Force 0, and 

Force B began on 30 May, 31 May, and 

1 June, respectively, and all troops were 

aboard by 3 June. Force U craft were 

loaded mostly at Plymouth, Dartmouth, 

Tor Bay, Torquay, Poole, Salcombe, 

Brixham, and Yarmouth. They were divided into twelve convoys for the crossChannel movement depending on their 

missions, assembly points, and speed. 

Force 0 was split into five convoys and 

the craft loaded in a relatively concentrated area including the ports of Portland, Weymouth, and Poole.7 

Operation OVERLORD was ready. 

On 29 May the senior meteorologist 

for SHAEF, Group Captain J. M. Stagg 

of the RAF, had drawn an optimistic 

long-range forecast of the weather to be 

expected in the first week of June. On 

the basis of that forecast all preparations 

had been made. General Eisenhower 

cabled General Marshall on Saturday, 3 

June: "We have almost an even chance 

of having pretty fair conditions ... only 

marked deterioration . . . would discourage our plans." 8 But marked deterioration was already in the cards. That 

Saturday evening Group Captain Stagg 

again came before the Supreme Commander and his commanders in chief 

who were meeting at Southwick House 

north of Portsmouth, the headquarters 

of Admiral Ramsay. Group Captain 

Stagg had bad news. Not only would the 

7 ANCXF Report, Vol. III, Rpt, Comdr Assault 

Force 0, p. 5; Ibid., Rpt, Comdr Assault Force U, 

pp. 13-14. 

8 Cbl. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

weather on 5 June be overcast and 

stormy wiih high winds and a cloud base 

of 500 feet to zero, but the weather was 

of such a nature that forecasting more 

than twenty-four hours in advance was 

highly undependable. The long period 

of settled conditions was breaking up. It 

was decided, after discussion, to postpone decision for seven hours and in the 

meantime let Force U and part of Force 

o sail on schedule for their rendezvous 

for the 5 June D Day. 

At 0430 Sunday morning a second 

meeting was held at which it was predicted that the sea conditions would be 

slightly better than anticipated but that 

overcast would still not permit use of 

the air force. Although General Montgomery then expressed his willingness ~o 

go ahead with the operation as scheduled, 

General Eisenhower decided to postpone 

it for twenty-four hours. He felt that OVERLORD was going in with a very slim margin of ground superiority and that only 

the Allied supremacy in the air made it a 

sound operation of war. If the air could 

not operate, the landings should not be 

risked. A prearranged signal was sent 

out to the invasion fleet, many of whose 

convoys were already at sea.9 The ships 

turned back and prepared to rendezvous 

twenty-four hours later. 

On Sunday night, 4 June, at 2130 the 

high command met again in the library 

of Southwick House. Group Captain 

Stagg reported a marked change in the 

weather. A rain front over the assault 

area was expected to clear in two or three 

hours and the clearing would last until 

Tuesday morning. Winds then of 25 to 

9 The first ships actually sailed on 31 May. They 

were 54 "Corncobs" (Blockships) for the artificial 

harbors which weighed anchor from Oban. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 273 

ALLIED INVASION CHIEFS. Left to right: General Bradley, Admiral Ramsey, 

Air Chief Marshal Tedder, General Eisenhower, General Montgomery, Air Chief 

Marshal Leigh-Mallory, General Smith. This photograph was taken during a conference in early 1944. 

31 knots velocity would moderate. Cloud 

conditions would permit heavy bombing 

during Monday night and Tuesday 

morning although there would be considerable cloudiness Tuesday. The cloud 

base at H Hour might be just high 

enough to permit spotting for naval gunfire. 

All this was good news, but it indicated weather that might be barely tolerable rather than ideal for the assault. 

After listening to the forecast Admiral 

Ramsay reminded the commanders that 

there was only half an hour to make a 

decision, and that if Admiral Kirk's 

forces were ordered to sail for a D Day 

on Tuesday, 6 June, and were later recalled they would not be able to sail 

again for a \Vednesday rendezvous, the 

last day for two weeks on which light and 

tidal conditions would be suitable for 

the assault. 

Both Eisenhower and General Smith 

welcomed the break and felt the decision 

should be made to go in on Tuesday. 

The gamble that worried Smith was the 

possibility of not being able to spot naval 

fire but he thought it was still the best 

gamble to take. To call off the invasion 

now meant to wait until 19 June before 

it could be tried again. Troops would 

have to be disembarked with great risk 

to security, as well as to morale. The 19 

June date would mean acceptance of 

moonless conditions for the airborne 

drops. Finally, the longer the postponement, the shorter the period of good campaigning weather on the Continent. 

Still Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory 

was skeptical of the ability of the air force 

to operate effectively in the overcast predicted. Air Chief Marshal Tedder agreed 

that the operations of heavies and mediums were going to be "chancey." 
274 

General Eisenhower refused the pessimistic view. "We have a great force of 

fighter-bombers," he said, and then turning to General Montgomery he asked, 

"Do you see any reason for not going 

Tuesday"? 

"I would say-Go!" Montgomery replied. 

"The question," Eisenhower pointed 

out, "[is] just how long can you hang 

this operation on the end of a limb and 

let it hang there." 

The discussion continued a few more 

minutes. 

At 2145 Eisenhower announced his 

decision. ''I'm quite positive we must 

give the order. ... I don't like it, but 

there it is .... I don't see how we can 

possibly do anything else." 10 

There remained still a possibility that 

the weather might become so much worse 

that the decision would have to be reversed. A final meeting was held shortly 

after midnight. \Veather charts were 

studied again, but nothing had changed. 

The invasion was launched and through 

the choppy waters of the Channel the 

5,000 ships and craft of the largest fleet 

ever assembled held to their carefully 

plotted courses toward the transport 

areas off the enemy coast. 

\Vhen General Eisenhower left Southwick House before dawn of 5 June, he 

had made the last of a long series of 

planning and command decisions which 

through three and a half years had translated the idea of the cross-Channel attack 

into an operation of war. The war leaders, 

10 Account of the meeting from notes made by Air 

Vice Marshal James M. Robb, SHAEF CofS for Air. 

Direct quotes are as given by Robb in sgd rpt, Mon 

A.M., 5 Jun 44. Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the high commanders, the planners with 

whom we have been so long concerned 

had no choice now but to sit back and 

wait. They had done what they could 

to insure that the men who crossed the 

Channel on 5 June 1944 should have the 

greatest possible chance of success at a 

cost as low as careful planning could set 

it. Long before the armada sailed, the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff had focused 

their attention far ahead of the battle of 

the beaches. The SHAEF staff similarly 

had long been working on plans for the 

later phases of the operation. The nearer 

H Hour approached, the more heavily 

and exclusively the responsibility for the 

inVaSiOn settled on the lower commanders. 

In the narrative to follow, the great 

names drop out. Even Eisenhower and 

Montgomery appear but seldom. In their 

place will be the corps and division commanders, the colonels, the lieutenants, 

and the privates. For the few will be substituted the many, as the battlefield, so 

long seen as a single conceptual problem, 

becomes a confused and disparate facta maze of unrelated orchards and strange 

roads, hedgerows, villages, streams and 

woods, each temporarily bounding for 

the soldier the whole horizon of the war. 

One may say of almost any successful 

operation that it carried out the plan, but 

this is to say little of how or why it succeeded. The Normandy assault was perhaps as thoroughly planned as any battle 

in the history of war. Nevertheless the 

fighting men went in trained to improvise battlefield solutions to the immediate problems facing them-how to take 

out an unseen machine gun in the hedgerows, how to outflank an enemy holed 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

up in a stone farmhouse. The fighting in 

these terms proceeded not according to 

plan but according to the trial and error 

of battle. It is to the narrative of this 

testing that we now turn. 

While the Allied invasion force 

steamed across the Channel, the Germans in France, so long schooled for this 

moment, had no direct knowledge that it 

was at hand. The enemy was all but 

blind. There had been no air reconnaissance during the first five days of 

J une. Naval patrols scheduled for the 

night of 5-6 June, along with the minelaying operations for that date, were canceled because of bad weather. 

The stages of alert among the various 

commands in the west varied, reflecting 

both the nebulous character of such intelligence as was available and the lack 

of command unity. On 1 and 2 June 

German agents who had penetrated Resistance groups picked up twenty-eight of 

the BBC prearranged signals ordering 

the Resistance to stand by for the code 

messages that would direct the execution 

of sabotage plans. The central SS intelligence agency in Berlin reported these 

intercepts on 3 June to Admiral Doenitz 

and warned that invasion could be considered possible within the next fortnight. At the admiral’s headquarters 

they were not taken too seriously. It was 

thought that perhaps an exercise was in 

progress.11 

eight hours.12 This was at 2215,13 precisely the hour at which the transport 

planes carrying troops of the U.S. 101st

Airborne Division began taking off from 

airfields in England. What happened 

next is not altogether clear. While Fifteenth Army put its troops on the highest 

alert, Army Group B apparently took no 

action. On the basis of past experience 

Rommel’s staff considered it unlikely 

that the intercepts warned of an imminent invasion. Rommel himself was in 

Herrlingen at his home, on his way to 

visit Hitler at Obersalzburg; he was not 

immediately called back. Army Group 

B did not alert Seventh Army. In fact 

the routine daily orders from Seventh 

Army headquarters to subordinate corps 

on the evening of 5 June actually canceled a planned alert for that night.14 

Perhaps the chief reason for the cancellation was that a map exercise, to which 

a number of division and lower commanders in Seventh Army had been invited, was scheduled for the morning of 

6 June at Rennes. Whatever the reason, 

it is apparent that General Dollmann believed on the night of 5 June that there 

was less cause for alarm than on many a 

previous night in May when his troops 

had been alerted. 

On the evening of 5 June OB WEST 

and Fifteenth Army independently intercepted the “B” messages which at this 

time Fifteenth Army at least understood 

to be warnings of invasion within fortyThe net effect on German preparedness of the intercepted warnings to the 

Resistance was therefore slight. Seventh 

Army was alerted only in the sense that 

it was in the same state of “defensive 

11Seekriegsleitung/I.Abt., KTB 1.-30.V1.44, 3 Jun I . 

12 Fifteenth Army, KTB 1.I.30.VI.44, 5 Jun 44. 

13Double British Summer Time. German clocks, 

set by Central European time, showed 2115. All 

times given in text are DBST. 

14Rad, 5 Jun 44, Seventh Army to XXV, LXXIV, 

and LXXXIV Corps. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

44. l.V.-5.VI.44. 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 275 

up in a stone farmhouse. The fighting in 

these terms proceeded not according to 

plan but according to the trial and error 

of battle. It is to the narrative of this 

testing that we now turn. 

While the Allied mvaSlOn force 

steamed across the Channel, the Germans in France, so long schooled for this 

moment, had no direct knowledge that it 

was at hand. The enemy was all but 

blind. There had been no air reconnaissance during the first five days of 

June. Naval patrols scheduled for the 

night of 5-6 June, along with the minelaying operations for that date, were canceled because of bad weather. 

The stages of alert among the various 

commands in the west varied, reflecting 

both the nebulous character of such intelligence as was available and the lack 

of command unity. On I and 2 June 

German agents who had penetrated Resistance groups picked up twenty-eight of 

the BBC prearranged signals ordering 

the Resistance to stand by for the code 

messages that would direct the execution 

of sabotage plans. The central SS intelligence agency in Berlin reported these 

intercepts on 3 June to Admiral Doenitz 

and warned that invasion could be considered possible within the next fortnight. At the admiral's headquarters 

they were not taken too seriously. It was 

thought that perhaps an exercise was in 

progress.ll 

On the evening of 5 June DB WEST 

and Fifteenth Army independently intercepted the "B" messages which at this 

time Fifteenth Army at least understood 

to be warnings of invasion within forty11 Seekriegsleitung/l.Abt., KTB 1.-30.VI.44, 3 Jun 

44. 

275 

eight hoursP This was at 2215,13 precisely the hour at which the transport 

planes carrying troops of the U.S. 10 I st 

Airborne Division began taking off from 

airfields in England. What happened 

next is not altogether clear. While Fifteenth A rmy put its troops on the highest 

alert, Army Group B apparently took no 

action. On the basis of past experience 

Rommel's staff considered it unlikely 

that the intercepts warned of an imminent invasion. Rommel himself was in 

Herrlingen at his home, on his way to 

visit Hitler at Obersalzburg; he was not 

immediately called back. A rmy Group 

B did not alert Seventh A rmy. In fact 

the routine daily orders from Seventh 

Army headquarters to subordinate corps 

on the evening of 5 June actually canceled a planned alert for that night.14 

Perhaps the chief reason for the cancellation was that a map exercise, to which 

a number of division and lower commanders in Seventh Army had been invited, was scheduled for the morning of 

6 June at Rennes. Whatever the reason, 

it is apparent that General Dollmann believed on the night of 5 June that there 

was less cause for alarm than on many a 

previous night in May when his troops 

had been alerted. 

The net effect on German preparedness of the intercepted warnings to the 

Resistance was therefore slight. Seventh 

A rmy was alerted only in the sense that 

it was in the same state of "defensive 

12 Fifteenth Army, KTB l.l.-30.vI.44, 5 Jun 44. 

13 Double British Summer Time. German docks, 

set by Central European time, showed 2115. All 

times given in text are DBST. 

14 Rad, 5 Jun 44, Seventh Army to XXV, LXXIV, 

and LXXXIV Corps. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.V.-5.VI.44. 
276 

readiness" that it had been in all through 

the spring. The Resistance messages of 

the evening of 5 June may have persuaded OB WEST that invasion was imminent, although there is evidence that 

Rundstedt's intelligence officer at least 

rejected the warning on grounds that it 

would be absurd for the Allies to announce their invasion in advance over 

the BBC. 15 In any case, a last-minute 

alert of the supreme headquarters in such 

vague terms was of little value for the 

command. It gave no indication of where 

or precisely when the Allies would strike; 

reconnaissance, moreover, could not be 

put out in time to answer these questions. 

As for the Navy, it was, on 5 June, 

thoroughly complacent. German naval 

experts had calculated that Allied landings would be possible only in seas of less 

than intensity 4,16 with a wind force up to 

24 knots and a visibility of at least three 

sea miles. These conditions were not 

being met on 5 JuneY Lacking weatherreporting stations to the west whence 

most of the Channel weather came, the 

German meteorologists were unable to 

make reliable predictions. IS Weather 

planes flew out over the North Sea daily 

to points west of Ireland, but the data 

15 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 1.-7.VI.-

44, 6 Jun 44. 

16 Wave heights between five and eight feet. 

17 Seventh and Fifteenth Army commanders 

thought the weather was not too adverse for inva· 

sion, but it is not clear what standards they applied. 

See the KTB's for the respective armies. The almost 

complete lack of co·ordination between Army, Navy, 

and Air Force headquarters makes generalization on 

German preparedness extremely difficult. 

18 One German meteorologist commented that commanders were virtually reduced to looking at the 

morning skies for their weather forecasts. See Interv 

with Maj Heinz Lettau, 5 Oct 49. Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

provided by their observations were of 

limited usefulness. The Germans could 

not have forecast the break in the 

weather which Group Captain Stagg reported to General Eisenhower.19 Although there is no evidence that meteorologists advised German commanders 

that invasibn on 6 June was impossible, 

it is clear that the generally unfavorable 

wind and sea conditions contributed to 

reducing the enemy's alertness.2o 

This was particularly true of the naval 

command. Lulled into a sense of security 

by the weather and the judgment that 

the Allies had not yet completed essential preparatory bombardment of the 

coastal fortifications, Admiral Krancke 

received reports of the SOE intercepts on 

5 June without alarm. Notice of the 

BBC affair was faithfully transcribed in 

his war diary for 6 June together with 

his assurances that nothing was likely to 

happen-all under the general heading: 

"Large-scale enemy landing in the Seine 

Bay." 21 

19 It is likely, however, that they would not have 

considered that the break made invasion possible, 

since weather conditions were still unsettled and the 

German Navy view was that at least five consecutive 

days of favorable weather would be necessary for 

the success of the landings. Rpt, Beitraege zur Frage 

der Landemoeglichkeiten an der Kueste des Kana/s, 

1 Jan 44. Seekriegsleitung/1.Abt., KTB Anlagen 1.1.-

30.VI.44. 

20 The story told by Captain Harry C. Butcher, 

My Three Years with Eisenhower (New York, 1946), 

pp. 646-47, concerning German weather predictions 

is erroneous. Major Lettau, far from being "the chief 

German meteorologist," was in fact attached to an 

antiaircraft outfit and had nothing to do with fore· 

casting invasion weather. He was with the 155th Flak 

Regiment, stationed in Amiens, and his job was to 

analyze flying conditions over England from data 

collected by radio sound stations. See interv cited n. 

18. 

21Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 1.-7.VI.-

44, 6 Jun 44. 
GERMAN FIELD COMMANDERS. Upper left, General von Schlieben; upper 

right, General Marcks; lower left, General Geyr von Schweppenburg; lower right, 

General Dallmann. 
278 

The Airborne Assault 

The time and place at least of the 

"large-scale landing" caught the Germans 

wholly by surprise. Seventh Army's first 

knowledge that anything was afoot was 

a series of reports in the early morning 

hours of 6 June that Allied paratroopers 

were dropping from the skies over Normandy. At 0130 Lt. Col. Hoffmann, commander of the 3d Battalion, 919th Regiment of the 709th Division, was at his 

headquarters in St. Floxel east of Montebourg. (Map VII) He heard aircraft 

approaching. The sound indicated great 

numbers, and, as he listened during the 

next hour, it seemed to him to swell 

louder and louder. At 0200 six airplanes 

flying, he thought, at about 500 feet 

approached the headquarters shelter and 

released parachutists in front of and 

above it. In a few minutes Hoffmann's 

staff and security guards were heavily 

engaged with paratroopers of the lOlst 

Airborne Division in one of the opening 

skirmishes of the battle for Normandy.22 

News of the landings spread fast. At 

0215 Seventh A rmy ordered the highest 

state of alarm through the LXXXIV 

Corps sector. The alarm was passed at 

once by wire to all Army, Navy and Air 

Force units in the corps area. At 0220 

Naval Commander Normandy (Konteradmiral Walther Hennecke)23 reported 

paratroopers near the Marcouf battery. 

During the next five minutes additional 

reports came in of landings in the sector 

of the 716th and 711 th Divisions. Before 

22 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.1.-30. Vl.44. 

23 Naval district commander for the Normandy 

coast, under Admiral Kanalkueste who had the whole 

Channel coast command. See naval command chart, 

p.245. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

three o'clock LXXXIV Corps had taken 

its first prisoner. The situation was still 

obscure, but, as reports piled in, something of the extent and scale of the operation became visible. Generalmajor Max 

Pemsel, Seventh Army chief of staff, had 

already (by 0300) concluded that the 

long-heralded major invasion had begun, 

and had correctly located the points of 

main effort near Carentan and Caen.24 

His judgment, however, was at this time 

a minority report. Field Marshals Rundstedt and Sperrle and Admiral Krancke 

as well as Rommel's chief of staff, Generalleutnant Hans Speidel, all thought 

they were probably experiencing the 

diversionary operation which had been 

expected in the Seventh A rmy area 

while the Allies prepared to strike the 

main blow against Fifteenth A rmy. But, 

whatever the larger estimate of the situation, local measures could be and were 

promptly taken. The 91st Division in 

reserve in the Cotentin was released to 

Seventh Army, attached to LXXXIV 

Corps, and, together with the 709th Division, was ordered to counterattack. There 

was actually little else to be done. All 

units in the Cotentin had been briefed 

to expect airborne operations. The meeting engagement was inevitably the individual problem of these units. 

The situation on the American side 

was similar. The first actions of all airborne units in the Cotentin on D Day 

were attempts by small groups of men to 

carry out in the fog of the battlefield 

their own small portions of the assigned 

plan. There could be little over-all direction from above. And, in fact, little in24 He reversed himself later in the day to agree 

with higher command estimates. Tel Msgs. Seventh 

Army, KTB Anlagen IJ.-30.VI.44. 
THE SIXTH OF JlJ~E 279 

PARACHUTE TROOPS marching onto airfield on evening of 5 June. 

formation got through to corps and army 

as to what was happening. 25 

By the revised VII Corps field order of 

28 May both U.S. airborne divisions were 

to land in the eastern half of the peninsula between Ste. Mere-Eglise and Carentan, establishing a beachhead from which 

the corps would push west and north to 

the capture of Cherbourg. The six parachute regiments of the two divisions, 

which together with organic supporting 

units numbered over 13,000 men, were 

loaded in 822 transport planes at nine 

airfields in England. They began taking 

off before midnight to fly routes calculated to bring the first serials in from the 

west side of the Cotentin Peninsula and 

over the designated drop zones between 

0115 and 0130. The main flights were 

preceded by pathfinder planes that were 

25 See First Army G-3 Jnl. 

to land paratroopers to mark the drop 

zones. Glider reinforcements would be 

brought in at dawn and again at dusk on 

landing zones that the paratroopers were 

expected to have cleared of the enemy. 

The whole airborne operation was by far 

the largest and most hazardous ever undertaken, and thousands of American 

lives depended on its success.26 

26 Allied airborne operations required 1,087 transport aircraft including lift for the pathfinders but 

excluding aircraft used to tow gliders. See AEAF 

Memo, Operation "NEPTUNE," Employment of British and American Airborne Forces, 27 May 44. 

SHAEF G-3 file 24533jOps (Future Operations). 

Pathfinders of the 101st Airborne Division began 

dropping at 0015; the first serial of combat troops 

was scheduled to drop at 0119. See Leonard Rapport 

and Arthur Norwood, Jr., Rendezvous with Destiny 

(Washington, 1948), pp. 73, 94. 

Records of airborne operations in the Cotentin are 

very sketchy; those of the 101st Airborne Division 

in particular are all but useless_ The narrative following is based on a set of comprehensive interviews 
280 

The pnmary mISSIon of the 10 I st 

Airborne Division was to seize the western edge of the flooded area back of the 

beach between St. Martin-de-Varreville 

and Pouppeville. Its secondary mission 

was to protect the southern flank of VII 

Corps and be prepared to exploit southward through Carentan. The latter task 

was to be carried out by destroying two 

bridges on the main Carentan highway 

and the railroad bridge west of it, by 

seizing and holding the la Barquette lock, 

and finally by establishing a bridgehead 

over the Douve River northeast of 

Carentan. 

Two parachute regiments less one battalion, the 502d and the 506th (-), were 

assigned the primary mission. The 502d 

Parachute Infantry, with the 377th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion attached, 

was to drop near St. Martin-de-Varreville, 

destroy the enemy coastal battery there, 

secure the two northern beach exits, and 

establish a defensive line tying in the 

division's north flank with the 82d Airborne Division to the west. The 506th 

Infantry would seize the two southern 

exits. 

The four battalion serials of the 502d 

Infantry came in ten mi~utes apart led 

by the 2d Battalion and regimental headquarters. The leading planes, scattered 

by clouds and flak, dropped the majority 

conducted during July 1944 by Col. s. L. A. Marshall 

with officers and men of the airborne units. Colonel 

Marshall, subsequently European Theater Historian, 

developed the information thus secured in a number of battalion and regimental studies which in 

mimeographed form are in the Historical Division 

files. The airborne material is exploited in greater 

detail than here in [R. G. Ruppenthal] Utah Beach 

to CheTbourg (Washington, 1948), to which the 

author is generally indebted for the bulk of the 

story of U.S. VII Corps operations during June 1944. 

See Bibliographical Note. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of the 2d Battalion outside their assigned 

zone. (Map VIII) The battalion as a result spent most of the day assembling 

and, as a unit, took no part in the D-Day 

fighting. The regiment's planned artillery support did not materialize. Only 

one of the six howitzers of the 377th 

Field Artillery Battalion was recovered 

after the drop, and the fifty men of the 

battalion who assembled during the day 

fought as infantry in scattered actions.27 

The commander of the 3d Battalion, 

502d, Lt. Col. Robert G. Cole, dropped 

east of Ste. Mere-Eglise. (See Map VII . ) 

He began then to make his way toward 

St. Martin-de-Varreville. Out of the 

darkness, toy "crickets" snapped as paratroopers identified themselves and began 

assembling in groups. The groups were 

generally miscellaneous at first. The men 

looked only for company and leadership. 

Seventy-five men, including some paratroopers from the 82d Airborne Division, 

gathered in this way under Colonel Cole 

and moved steadily toward the coast. 

Except for an encounter with a small 

enemy convoy on the way, in which some 

Germans were killed and ten taken 

prisoner, the group had no trouble reaching its objective. Discovering that the 

guns of the St. Martin coastal battery 

had been removed and that the position 

was deserted, Cole went on to Audouville-la-Hubert where his men established themselves at the western end of 

the causeway without a fight. 28 About 

27 377th FA Bn AAR. 

28 Bombing had not injured the six Russian 122-

mm. guns at the St. Martin emplacement but had 10 

damaged the fire control setup that the guns were 

moved before the invasion. See MS # B-260 (Generalmajor Gerhard Triepel, gen. Schulze). Triepe1 

during the first half of June commanded the 1261st 

Army Coastal Artillery Regiment; in the latter half, 

he was artillery commander of LXXXI" Corps. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 281 

two hours later, at 0930, the enemy began retreating across the causeway from 

the beach. The paratroopers, lying in 

wait, shot down fifty to seventy-five and 

at 1300 made contact with the 8th Infantry (4th Division). They had suffered no casualties. Cole, having completed his mission, remained in the area 

to collect and organize his battalion. By 

the end of the day he had about 250 men. 

With this group he was ordered into 

regimental reserve near Blosville for the 

next day’s operations. 

The 1st Battalion, 502d Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. Patrick J. Cassidy), had 

a much harder fight for its objectives. 

Colonel Cassidy, landing about in the 

center of the battalion zone near St. Germain-de-Varreville, collected a small 

force mostly of his own men and moved 

toward the stone buildings on the eastern edge of Mesieres which were thought

to be occupied by the German unit manning the St. Martin coastal battery. Without opposition the battalion secured the 

crossroads west of St. Martin near which 

the building stood. Taking stock of his 

position there, Colonel Cassidy found 

that both the northern exits for which 

the regiment was responsible were clear. 

He then made contact with a group of 

forty-five men of the battalion who had 

assembled north of his own position and 

ordered them to establish a defensive line 

at Foucarville. The situation to the west 

of St. Martin, however, remained obscure. Colonel Cassidy decided to keep a 

portion of his force (nominally a company) in reserve to block any enemy attempt to break through from the west to 

the beaches. A group of about fifteen 

men was sent to clean out the buildings 

on the eastern edge of Mesieres This 

fight was conducted almost singlehandedly by S/Sgt. Harrison Summers. 

Summers rushed the buildings one by 

one, kicked in the doors, and sprayed 

the interiors with his Tommy gun. On 

occasion he had the assistance of another 

man, but it was his drive and initiative 

that kept the attack going. When the 

last building was cleared in the afternoon, about 150 Germans had been 

killed or captured.29

Near the close of this action Lt. Col. 

John H. Michaelis, regimental commander, arrived in the area with 200 

men. Cassidy was thus free to complete 

his D-Day mission to cover the north 

flank of the regiment and tie in with the 

82d Airborne Division on the left. While 

the fight near Mesieres was in progress 

the men of the 1st Battalion whom Colonel Cassidy had sent to Foucarville in the 

morning had succeeded in establishing 

four road blocks in and around the town 

and had trapped and largely destroyed a 

four-vehicle enemy troop convoy. Despite this early success the road blocks 

were threatened all day with being overrun by a superior enemy force that occupied prepared positions on a hill to 

the northwest. 

The American situation was not immediately improved by Cassidy’s move 

north, since he came up west of Foucarville in order to carry out the plan of 

tying in at Beuzeville-au-Plain with the 

82d Airborne Division. He ran into 

trouble there. The company ordered to 

Beuzeville-au-Plain mistook the hamlet 

of le Fournel for its objective and there 

became involved in three separate pla29Summers was awarded the DSC. Details of the 

action from interviews by Col. S. L. A. Marshall. Hist 

Div files. 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

two hours later, at 0930, the enemy began retreating across the causeway from 

the beach. The paratroopers, lying in 

wait, shot down fifty to seventy-five and 

at 1300 made contact with the 8th Infantry (4th Division). They had suffered no casualties. Cole, having completed his mission, remained in the area 

to collect and organize his battalion. By 

the end of the day he had about 250 men. 

With this group he was ordered into 

regimental reserve near Blosville for the 

next day's operations. 

The 1st Battalion, 502d Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. Patrick J. Cassidy), had 

a much harder fight for its objectives. 

Colonel Cassidy, landing about in the 

center of the battalion zone near St. Germain-de-Varreville, collected a small 

force mostly of his own men and moved 

toward the stone buildings on the eastern edge of Mesieres which were thought 

to be occupied by the German unit manning the St. Martin coastal battery. Without opposition the battalion secured the 

crossroads west of St. Martin near which 

the building stood. Taking stock of his 

position there, Colonel Cassidy found 

that both the northern exits for which 

the regiment was responsible were clear. 

He then made contact with a group of 

forty-five men of the battalion who had 

assembled north of his own position and 

ordered them to establish a defensive line 

at Foucarville. The situation to the west 

of St. Martin, however, remained obscure. Colonel Cassidy decided to keep a 

portion of his force (nominally a company) in reserve to block any enemy attempt to break through from the west to 

the beaches. A group of about fifteen 

men was sent to clean out the buildings 

on the eastern edge of Mesieres. This 

281 

fight was conducted almost singlehandedly by S/Sgt. Harrison Summers. 

Summers rushed the buildings one by 

one, kicked in the doors, and sprayed 

the interiors with his Tommy gun. On 

occasion he had the assistance of another 

man, but it was his drive and initiative 

that kept the attack going. When the 

last building was cleared in the afternoon, about 150 Germans had been 

killed or captured. 29 

N ear the close of this action Lt. Col. 

John H. Michaelis, regimental commander, arrived in the area with 200 

men. Cassidy was thus free to complete 

his D-Day mission to cover the north 

flank of the regiment and tie in with the 

82d Airborne Division on the left. While 

the fight near Mesieres was in progress 

the men of the 1 st Battalion whom Colonel Cassidy had sent to Foucarville in the 

morning had succeeded in establishing 

four road blocks in and around the town 

and had trapped and largely destroyed a 

four-vehicle enemy troop convoy. Despite this early success the road blocks 

were threatened all day with being overrun by a superior enemy force that occupied prepared positions on a hill to 

the northwest. 

The American situation was not immediately improved by Cassidy's move 

north, since he came up west of Foucarville in order to carry out the plan of 

tying in at Beuzeville-au-Plain with the 

82d Airborne Division. He ran into 

trouble there. The company ordered to 

Beuzeville-au-Plain mistook the hamlet 

of Ie Fournel for its objective and there 

became involved in three separate pla29 Summers was awarded the DSC. Details of the 

action from interviews by Col. S. L. A. Marshall. Hist 

Div files. 
282 

toon fights which proceeded in some confusion until dark. The troops then 

withdrew to the south where they remained under enemy pressure during 

the night. Since contact was not made 

with the 82d Airborne Division, Cassidy 

committed the reserve company on the 

left and moved up some spare riflemen to 

fill the gap between Ie Fournel and the 

road blocks around Foucarville. Even 

so the whole line remained very weak, 

and the regimental commander, having 

already decided to pass the 2d Battalion 

through the 1st on the following day, 

ordered Colonel Cassidy to pull back and 

dig in. 

During the night the Germans facing 

the battalion's right flank at Foucarville 

unexpectedly decided to surrender, apparently because the increasing volume 

of American machine gun and mortar 

fire led them to overestimate the battalion's strength. Eighty-seven Germans 

were taken prisoner and about fifty more 

shot down as they attempted to escape. 

Here as elsewhere in the lOlst Airborne Division's early contacts with the 

enemy, it seems that the German dispersion of units in small packets to garrison 

villages and strong points took no account of the splintering effect of airborne 

landings in their midst, even though the 

enemy command expected just such 

landings. The isolated German units, 

apparently out of contact with their 

parent outfits, ignorant of what was occurring as well as of what German countermeasures were in the making, were prone 

to fancy themselves about to be overwhelmed whenever American fire was 

brought to bear on them with any persistence. The attackers at least had the 

psychological advantage of knowing the 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

large things that had been planned, even 

though they seldom knew what was actually happening beyond the field or 

village in which they found themselves. 

The two beach exits south of the zone 

of the 502d Infantry were the responsibility of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (Col. Robert F. Sink). The 506th 

(less the 3d Battalion) was to land between Hiesville and Ste. Marie-du-Mont 

and seize the western edge of the inundated area between Audouville-la-Hubert 

and Pouppeville. The 3d Battalion, 

dropping just south of Vierville and 

charged with defending the Douve River 

line in the regiment's sector, was to seize 

two bridges at Ie Port and establish a 

bridgehead there for subsequent exploitation southward. 

Like the 502d, the 506th experienced 

a badly scattered drop, but had rather 

better luck in assembling rapidly. Within two hours of landing, about ninety 

men of regimental headquarters and 

fifty men of the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. 

William L. Turner) had assembled in 

the regimental zone. Colonel Sink established his command post at Culoville. 

At the same time the 2d Battalion (Lt. 

Col. Robert L. Strayer), despite a landing 

completely out of its zone in the sector 

of the 502d Parachute Infantry to the 

north, succeeded in assembling rapidly 

about 200 of its men. Strayer had the 

principal regimental mission of securing 

the southern beach exits at Houdienville and Pouppeville. Before dawn his 

men headed south toward their objectives. They ran into opposition on the 

same road over which the I st Battalion, 

502d Parachute Infantry, had passed 

shortly before. Delayed all morning by 

enemy machine guns, they did not reach 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

their first objective, Houdienville, until 

early afternoon, after the seaborne troops 

were already through the exit and proceeding inland. 

Meanwhile Colonel Sink, at Culoville, 

knowing nothing of the 2d Battalion's 

movements, decided to send his reserve, 

the 1 st Battalion under Colonel Turner, 

to carry out a part of the mission. Turner's "battalion" of fifty men was ordered 

to Pouppeville. Again relatively light 

enemy opposition succeeded in harassing 

the march and delaying for several hours 

Turner's arrival on his objective. 

In the course of the delay a third unit 

was sent on the same mission by the division commander, Maj. Gen. Maxwell 

Taylor,30 who had no knowledge of the 

two previous moves. The 3d Battalion, 

501st Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. Julian 

Ewell), had been designated to land as 

division reserve with the additional task 

of protecting the glider landing zone 

northwest of Hiesville. Although three 

planes of the 3d Battalion serial were 

shot down with the loss of three-quarters 

of their personnel and other planes were 

scattered by fog and flak, enough carried 

out their scheduled drops so that about 

300 men of the battalion and of the division headquarters were able to assemble 

quickly and establish the division command post as planned near Hiesville. 

From there Colonel Ewell, with a group 

of about forty men from the line companies and some miscellaneous head30 General Taylor, commissioned in the Corps of 

Engineers from West Point in 1922, transferred to 

the Field Artillery in 1926. As chief of staff of the 

82d Division in 1942 he assisted in organizing the 

first airborne divisions. In 1943 he went overseas as 

artillery commander of the reorganized 82d Airborne 

Division. After serving through the Sicilian and 

Italian campaigns he received command of the IOlst 

Airborne Division in March 1944. 

283 

quarters personnel, was sent at 0600 to 

clear the Pouppeville beach exit. 

At about 0800 Ewell's men reached 

Pouppeville and attacked to clean it out. 

The enemy force of approximately sixty 

to seventy men of the I058th Regiment 

(9Ist Division) 31 did not offer determined resistance, but it was nevertheless 

a slow task for the numerically inferior 

Americans to fight them house to house. 

It was noon before the local German 

commander surrendered. The Americans 

had suffered eighteen casualties, while 

inflicting twenty-five on the enemy and 

taking thirty-eight prisoners. The rest 

of the enemy in Pouppeville retreated 

toward the beach where they were caught 

by the advancing U.S. seaborne forces, 

and at last surrendered to the 8th Infantry. The first contact between seaborne and airborne forces was made at 

Pouppeville between Colonel Ewell's 

men and the 2d Battalion, 8th Infantry 

(Lt. Col. Carlton O. MacNeely). 

Throughout D Day Colonel Sink at the 

506th regimental headquarters felt 

wholly isolated and almost alone on the 

Cotentin Peninsula. Most of the time 

he was out of touch with his own battalions and with the division; he had 

little information about the enemy, and 

his headquarters was involved in scattered fights for its own security. The 

regiment unknowingly had set up in the 

midst of a small hornet's nest. In the Ste. 

Marie-du-Mont area was the entire 2d 

Battalion of the 191 st A rtillery Regiment 

which had been committed to coastal defense in the 709th Division sector.32 The 

battalion headquarters was in Ste. Marie 

31 Probably of the 3d Battalion, whose headquar· 

ters was at St. Come·du-Mont. 

82 MS # D-330 (Blumentritt). 
284 

and the three batteries, each with four 

lO5-mm. howitzers, were all in the immediate vicinity. Four of the pieces were 

captured near Holdy by groups of the 1st 

Battalion, 506th Infantry. The enemy 

battalion headquarters was overrun by 

combined action of the 506th Infantry 

and elements of the 4th Division later 

in the day.33 For the most part, however, 

Colonel Sink had no men to spare either 

to clear the enemy from his immediate 

vicinity or even to reconnoiter to make 

contact with other friendly units. He believed it necessary to keep together his 

handful of men to protect the rear of 

the units engaged in clearing the causeways and to provide a nucleus for concentration of the regiment. The group 

maintained itself, fighting off enemy riflemen who twice during the day closed in 

among the surrounding hedgerows. In 

the evening, with forces of the 1st and 

2d Battalions, Colonel Sink controlled 

about 650 men. 

The hedgerows, which bottled up 

Colonel Sink's men in apparent isolation 

despite the nearness of friendly units, 

were to become the most important 

single preoccupation of American fighting men during their next two months 

in Normandy and would remain as their 

most vivid memory of the land. These 

hedgerows, ubiquitous throughout the 

Cotentin and the bocage country, were 

earth dikes averaging about four feet in 

height and covered with tangled hedges, 

bushes, and even trees. Throughout the 

entire country they boxed in fields and 

orchards of varying sizes and shapes, few 

larger than football fields and many 

much smaller. Each hedgerow was a po33 Another of the batteries was captured still later 

by the 8th Infantry. See below, p. 329. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tential earthwork into which the defenders cut often-elaborate foxholes, 

trenches, and individual firing pits. The 

dense bushes atop the hedgerows provided ample concealment for rifle and 

machine gun positions, which could subject the attacker to devastating hidden fire 

from three sides. Observation for artillery and mortar fire was generally limited 

to a single field, particularly in the relatively flat ground of the beachhead areas. 

Each field thus became a separate battlefield which, when defended with determination, had to be taken by slow costly 

advances of riflemen hugging the hedgerows to close with the enemy with rifle 

and grenade. Both Americans and Germans complained that the hedgerows 

favored the other side and made their 

own operations difficult. In fact, the 

country was ideal for static defense and 

all but impossible for large co-ordinated 

attacks or counterattacks. The chief burden of the fighting remained with the 

individual soldier and the advance of his 

unit depended substantially on his own 

courage and resourcefulness, and above 

all on his willingness to move through 

machine gun and mortar fire to root the 

enemy out of his holes. 

The lOlst Airborne Division within 

a relatively few hours of landing had 

secured the western edge of the inundated area west of UTAH Beach. The task 

was accomplished, not quite according to 

plan, but on time and with much smaller 

cost than anyone had thought possible 

before the operation.34 The remaining 

34 Total D-Day casualties calculated in August 1944 

amounted to 1,240 including 182 known killed and 

501 missing and presumed captured or killed. See 

32d MRU Rpt, Analysis of Battle Casualty Reports 

Received from lOlst Airborne Division, 13 Aug 44. 

FUSA file CC 21, dr 4, item 704. 
HEDGEROW COUNTRY. Aerial view (above) of typical hedgerow terrain in 

Normandy,' and (below) infantry crouching behind the bushes atop hedgerow. 
CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

part of the division’s D-Day task was to 

seize and occupy the line of the Douve 

River on either side of Carentan, initially to protect the southern flank of VII 

Corps and later to drive southward 

through Carentan to weld together the 

VII and V Corps beachheads. 

The 3d Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry, was to drop south of Vierville, 

seize two bridges over the Douve at le 

Port, and establish a bridgehead on the 

south bank of the river. Its mission came 

perilously near failure at the outset. The 

enemy, fully alerted before the drop, 

not only put up a heavy antiaircraft barrage but illuminated the drop zone by 

setting fire to an oil-soaked building near 

by. Paratroopers that landed in the area 

were greeted by a concentration of machine gun bullets and mortar shells. 

Others, experiencing delayed drops, came 

down in or near the swamplands east of 

the drop zone. 

The battalion S-3, Capt. Charles G. 

Shettle, landing near Angoville-auPlain, collected two officers and twelve 

men and then proceeded at once across 

the flat marshy river plain toward his 

objective. By the time he reached the 

bridge at Brevands at 0430 he had picked 

up a total of thirty-three men, and was 

there reinforced by twenty more a little 

later and by another forty during the 

night of 6-7 June. Shettle’s group established themselves first on the southeast bank of the river but could not hold 

the position in the face of increasing 

enemy machine gun fire. They therefore 

withdrew across the river and dug in on 

the northwest bank. During the day the 

enemy did not counterattack; in the 

middle of the night he made only a halfhearted push toward the bridge, from 

which he readily backed off when the 

Americans opened fire. The situation at 

Brevands on D Day paralleled that on the 

northern flank where the 502d Parachute 

Infantry was also holding a tenuous line 

facing superior enemy forces. Both defenses succeeded chiefly by grace of the 

enemy’s reluctance to leave his prepared 

positions and attack, and his confusion 

as to American strength and intentions. 

It is worth observing, however, that the 

Carentan canal was the boundary between the 709th and 352d Divisions. The 

latter, located to the south, would not 

attack across the canal without orders 

from corps. Corps, in fact, had ordered 

the reserve unit, the 6th Parachute Regiment, to make such an attack from the 

south but it did not at once come into 

action.35 

Completion of the IOlst Division’s defense of the Douve River line west to St. 

Come-du-Mont was the task of the 501st 

Parachute Infantry (Col. Howard R. 

Johnson) less the 3d Battalion. The regiment’s missions in detail were to seize 

the lock at la Barquette, blow the bridges 

on the St. Come-du-Mont-Carentan

road, take St. Come-du-Mont if possible, 

and destroy the railroad bridge to the 

west. Of these objectives the lock at la 

Barquette had a special importance for 

the planners. 

The purpose of the lock was to permit 

the controlled flow of the tide up the 

river channel so as to maintain a depth 

sufficient for barge navigation as far upstream as St. Sauveur-le Vicomte. If the 

lock were destroyed the swamplands of 

the Douve and Merderet would suffer 

erratic tidal flooding. On the other 

35 See below, pp. 293 ff. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

hand, partial obstruction of the lock 

would permit controlled flooding of the 

same area by backing up the river flow. 

The latter kind of inundation had been 

effected by the Germans before D Day. 

Capture of the lock, it was believed, was 

tactically important in order that VII 

Corps might control the Douve and Merderet inundations, which together constituted a barrier to military movement 

across the whole eastern half of the base 

of the peninsula. The importance was 

stressed even though it was recognized 

that flooding and draining of the area 

were slow processes and that the natural 

swamps and flat bottomlands, crisscrossed 

with drainage ditches, in themselves 

formed a convincing obstacle to vehicle 

movement and a grave hindrance to infantry maneuver. 

Just before D Day the drop zone for 

the 50Ist Parachute Infantry (and the 

3d Battalion, 506th) had been shifted 

about a mile and a half southeast-from 

the vicinity of Beaumont to east and 

south of Angoville-au-Plain-in order to 

bring the paratroopers down nearer their 

objective and avoid the antiairlanding 

obstacles which last-minute reconnaissance had discovered on the original drop 

zone. The change does not seem to have 

been responsible for the inaccuracy of 

the drop. The scattering of the 1st Battalion planes resulted from the same conditions of fog and enemy antiaircraft fire 

which had affected all the other airborne 

units and was certainly no more serious. 

\Vhat was serious, however, was the loss 

in the drop of the entire battalion command. The commanding officer was 

killed; the staff and all the company 

commanders were missing from the first 

critical battles. 

287 

Colonel Johnson, the regimental commander, by good fortune landed about 

where he was supposed to and, in the 

process of moving southward toward la 

Barquette, managed to collect some ISO 

men of miscellaneous units with whom 

he set out to accomplish his mission. The 

first step went well. Before the enemy 

had been fully alerted, a portion of the 

force crossed the lock and dug in on the 

far side. They seemed relatively secure 

there as the enemy made no attempt to 

press in on them. Colonel Johnson therefore decided to try to get the Douve 

bridges to the west. With fifty men he 

first went north to Basse Addeville, where 

he had ascertained that a considerable 

number of paratroopers had assembled 

under Maj. Richard J. Allen, the regimental S-3. Although Allen's men were 

already in contact with the enemy to 

the north and west, it proved possible to 

assemble about fifty of them in the early 

afternoon to return with Colonel Johnson to la Barquette. Met by intense 

enemy artillery, mortar, and small arms 

fire, chiefly from the rear, the force called 

for naval fire support through a naval 

shore fire control officer who had initially 

joined Major Allen's unit at Addeville. 

Salvos from the 8-inch guns of the 

Quincy adjusted on enemy positions 

around St. Come-du-Mont caused almost 

immediate slackening of the enemy fire. 

At about 1500 Major Allen was ordered 

to bring the rest of his force to the lock 

and he joined Colonel Johnson an hour 

or two later.36 

36 The account here follows that of Col. S. L. A. 

Marshall, who interviewed a number of the officers 

and men, including Colonel Johnson, soon after the 

action. See Marshall's account in The Fight at the 

Lock, mimeo MS. Hist Div files. Some doubt has 

subsequently arisen as to whether Johnson reached 
288 

Even with this support, however, it 

proved impossible to advance westward 

to the Douve bridges. The 3d Battalion 

of the I058th Regiment held St. Comedu-Mont and the surrounding ground in 

force and strongly resisted with fire every 

move in that direction. The opposition 

here in the sector of the 91st Division 

and immediately to the south where the 

6th Parachute Regiment held Carentan 

and the road and rail bridges was much 

more determined than anywhere in the 

coastal sector held by the 709th Division. 

The unexpected strength of the enemy 

in the Carentan-St. Come-du-Mont area 

had been discovered by the 2d Battalion, 

50lst Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. 

Robert A. Ballard), shortly before Colonel Johnson tried unsuccessfully to move 

westward. Colonel Ballard had assembled parts of his lettered companies and 

his battalion staff between Angoville-auPlain and les Droueries. Since his assigned mission was the destruction of the 

Douve bridges above Carentan, he began 

at once an attack toward St. Come-duMont. The companies, of about thirty 

men each, ran into strong opposition in 

the hamlet of les Droueries, which they 

had attacked frontally in the belief that 

not more than an enemy platoon faced 

them. After they were turned back initially, a renewed flanking attack was 

meeting some success when Colonel Balthe lock during the morning before he made con· 

tact with "Jajor Allen. See Lawrence Critchell, Four 

Stars of Hell (New Yo~k, 1947) , pp. 52-54. In view 

of Colonel Johnson's death, the issue cannot be 

finally settled. The evidence for Critchell's version 

does not seem conclusive. See Leonard Rapport and 

Arthur Norwood, Jr., Rendezvous with Destiny 

(Washington, 1948), p. Ill. Rapport tried unsuccessfully to resolve the difficulty through extensive 

correspondence with survivors, 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

lard was ordered by Colonel Johnson to 

move to la Barquette to participate in 

the drive from that point toward the Carentan highway. The 2d Battalion disengaged but, in attempting to move south 

through Addeville, was stopped almost 

immediately by heavy fire from the same 

enemy force that had opposed the attack 

on les Droueries. Ballard's men remained 

during the night in close contact with 

the enemy. In the meantime, Colonel 

Johnson, abandoning for the time the 

attempt to get to the Douve bridges, consolidated the position at la Barquette, 

deepening the southern bridgehead, 

pushing out his flanks, and maintaining 

contact with the 3d Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry, on the east. Patrols during the nigh t of 6-7 June were sent out to 

try to find the 506th Regiment and division headquarters, but they did not succeed and the southern line remained isolated and precariously held by groups 

equivalent to about three companies instead of three battalions as planned. 

By the end of D Day the IOlst Airborne Division had assembled only about 

2,500 of the 6,600 men who had dropped 

during the early morning hours.37 They 

were distributed in mixed units of varying size. But despite the handicaps of 

scattered landings and heavy losses in 

both men and equipment the division 

had carried out the most important of 

its D-Day tasks. Above all, the paratroopers had succeeded in clearing the way for 

the move of the seaborne forces inland. 

This was the task which had been considered so vital to the whole Allied invasion plan as to warrant the extraordinary 

87 See above, n. 34. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

risk of airborne landings in heavily defended enemy territory. If the division's 

defensive line north and south was weak, 

that weakness was for the moment balanced by the enemy's failure to organize 

concerted counterattacks. 

The position of the 82d Airborne Division (Maj. Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway) 38 on the west was cause for far 

greater concern both to General Ridgway 

and to the Allied command. Landing on 

the edge of the assembly area of the German 91s1 Division, it met more determined opposition in the early stages. It 

suffered more seriously also from scattered drops which left two of its regiments 

unable to assemble in sufficient force to 

carry out their missions. 

By the revised plan of 28 May, Ridgway's division was ordered to drop astride 

the Merderet River, clear the western portion of the beachhead area between the 

sea and the Merderet and from the Douve 

River north to Ste. Mere-Eglise, and establish a bridgehead on the west bank of 

the Merderet. One parachute regiment 

(the 505th) was to capture Ste. MereEglise, secure crossings of the Merderet 

near la Fiere and Chef-du-Pont, and establish a defensive line north from Neuville-au-Plain to Beuzeville-au-Plain to tie 

in with the 502d Parachute Infantry of 

the 101st Airborne Division. The other 

two regiments (507th and 508th), drop38 General Ridgway, a 1917 graduate of the U.S. 

Military Academy, served with the War Plans Divi· 

sion of the War Department from 1939 to 1942. He 

then became assistant division commander of the 82d 

Division at its activation in March 1942 and com· 

mander three months later. When that division was 

reorganized as the 82d Airborne Division he continued to command and led it in the Sicilian and 

Italian campaigns. 

289 

ping west of the river, were to consolidate 

the two 505th bridgeheads and push out 

a defensive line about three miles westward, anchored on the south at the crossroads just west of Pont l'Abbe and thence 

extending north in an arc through Beauvais. The 507th Parachute Infantry would 

defend the line of the Douve, destroying 

bridges at Pont l'Abbe and Beuzeville-IaBastille. Both regiments would be prepared to attack west in the direction of St. 

Sauveur-le Vicomte. 

Only one of the 82d Airborne Division's missions was carried out according 

to plan: the capture of Ste, Mere-Eglise. 

Success at Ste. Mere-Eglise was due in part 

to the exceptionally good drop of the 

505th Parachute Infantry northwest of 

the city. (Map IX) Most of the regiment's 

planes, though initially scattered like the 

others, were able to circle back and release the paratroopers over the drop zone 

which pathfinders had clearly marked. In 

addition the regiment had the good fortune to come down in an area devoid of 

enemy. The 3d Battalion (Lt. Col. Edward C. Krause), which was to take the 

town of Ste. Mere-Eglise, rapidly assembled about a quarter of its men and moved 

out in the early morning hours. Counting 

on speed and surprise, Colonel Krause ordered his men to enter the town without 

a house-to-house search and to use only 

knives, bayonets, and grenades while it 

was still dark so that enemy gunfire could 

be spotted. The enemy was caught off 

balance and before dawn the town had 

fallen-the first prize for American arms 

in the liberation of France. Resistance 

had been slight: when Ste. Mere-Eglise 

was cleared Krause's men counted only 

ten enemy dead and about thirty prisoners. The battalion cut the main Cher-
290 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

bourg communications cable and established a perimeter defense of the town. 

The 2d Battalion, 505th Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. Benjamin H. Vandervoort), in the meantime had assembled 

half of its men and was moving northward 

to establish the regimental defense line 

through Neuville-au-Plain and Bandienville. (See Map VII. ) At 0930 the enemy 

counterattacked Ste. Mere-Eglise from 

the south and the regimental commander, 

Cal. William E. Ekman, ordered his 2d 

Battalion back to aid in the defense. Before turning back Colonel Vandervoort 

detached a platoon under Lt. Turner B. 

Turnbull and sent it to organize a defense at Neuville which was reported to 

be lightly held by the enemy. Turnbull 

moved through the town without opposition and deployed his men on the high 

ground north of the town. He was hardly 

in position before the enemy attacked 

with a force outnumbering the defenders 

about five to one. The platoon fought 

stubbornly and for eight hours held its 

ground. The small action had a significance which Turnbull did not realize at 

the time. The fight at Neuville kept the 

enemy in the north at arm’s length while 

the defenders of Ste. Mere-Eglise beat off 

the simultaneous enemy attack from the 

south. The cost of the platoon’s gallant 

stand was heavy. Only sixteen of the fortytwo men who had gone to Neuville-auPlain survived to be withdrawn late in 

the afternoon to rejoin their battalion. 

In Ste. Mere-Eglise the 2d Battalion of 

the 505th on its arrival at about 1000 took 

over the northern half of the perimeter 

defense, permitting the 3d Battalion to 

strengthen its position on the south. Two 

companies were held in reserve inside the 

town. By agreement between the battalion commanders, Colonel Krause took 

charge of the defense. The first enemy 

thrust up the Carentan road, made in 

strength of about two companies supported by some armor, was repulsed. 

Krause then ordered a counterattack. 

Company I with eighty men was instructed to move out south, turn east, and 

hit the flank of the enemy, whose main positions were astride the highway. The attack, however, hit only a single enemy 

convoy moving southward. Having destroyed the convoy with grenades, Company I returned to Ste. Mere-Eglise The 

enemy made no further serious effort during the day to dislodge the Americans.39

The prompt occupation of Ste. MereEglise and its defense were a boon for 

which the 82d Airborne Division had increasing reason to be grateful as the day’s 

actions along the Merderet River developed. The establishment of bridgeheads over the Merderet was the mission 

of the 1st Battalion of the 505th Parachute 

Infantry, attacking from the regiment’s 

drop zone east of the river. Ultimate success in this mission, however, depended 

on the ability of the 507th and 508th Parachute Infantry Regiments to occupy the 

west bank of the river in force. The 507th 

and 508th drop zones lay in the triangle 

at the confluence of the Douve and Merderet Rivers-an area of about twelve 

square miles-and along the outer perimeter of the VII Corps planned beachhead. 

Presence of the enemy in the scheduled 

drop zones prevented the pathfinders 

from marking them, and the pilots of the 

two regimental serials, looking in vain 

for the markers, in most cases delayed 

39For extraordinary heroism in the capture and 

defense of Ste. Mere-Eglise Colonels Krause and 

Vandervoort were awarded the DSC. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 291 

flashing the jump lights until they had 

overshot the zones. Both regiments were 

thus widely dispersed and many paratroopers, heavily laden with equipment, 

dropped in the swamplands along the 

river. 

Absorbed naturally with the basic problem of assembling, these paratroopers 

tended to collect along the embankment 

of the main railroad from Cherbourg to 

Carentan, both because it was high dry 

ground and because it was a recognizable 

terrain feature. By following this embankment south, they crossed the river and arrived in the vicinity of la Fiere with the 

river between them and their objectives. 

The only large group which, under command of Brig. Gen. James A. Gavin, Assistant Division Commander, tried to 

push down along the edge of the swamps 

on the west bank of the river was delayed 

in starting until dawn by vain efforts to recover equipment from the swamps. With 

daylight, enemy fire west of the river became intense. Gavin therefore had to give 

up the attempt and moved his men on 

down the embankment to join the others 

west of Ste. Mere-Eglise.40 

By the middle of the morning 500 to 

600 men of miscellaneous units had 

gathered at la Fiere, which was one of the 

two known crossings of the Merderet in 

the 82d Airborne Division zone. The la 

Fiere crossing was an exposed narrow 

causeway raised a few feet above the river 

flats and extending 400 to 500 yards from 

the bridge over the main river channel to 

40 General Gavin, a graduate of West Point in 

1929, took command of the 505th Parachute Infantry in July 1942 and led that regiment into combat in Sicily a year later. He commanded the same 

regiment in the parachute landing on Salerno Bay in 

September 1943 and the following month became assistant division commander. 

the gently rising hedgerow country of the 

west shore. 

Two of the first groups on the scene, 

portions of Company A of the 505th and 

a group mostly of the 507th Parachute Infantry under Lt. John H. Wisner, had 

tried to rush the bridge in the early morning but were repulsed by machine gun 

fire. When General Gavin arrived, he decided to split the la Fiere force and sent 

seventy-five men south to reconnoiter another crossing. Later, receiving word that 

the bridge at Chef-du-Pont was undefended, he took another seventy-five men 

himself to try to get across there. The 

groups remaining at la Fiere made no

progress for several hours. Then General 

Ridgway, who had landed by parachute 

with the 505th, ordered Col. Roy Lindquist, the commanding officer of the 

508th Parachute Infantry, to organize the 

miscellaneous groups and take the 

bridge.41 

In the meantime west of the river about 

fifty men of the 2d Battalion, 507th Parachute Infantry, had collected under the 

battalion commander, Lt. Col. Charles J. 

Timmes. Shortly after the drop, Timmes 

had passed through Cauquigny, the tiny 

village at the west end of the la Fiere

causeway. But he did not stay. Hearing 

firing in the direction of Amfreville, he 

reckoned that paratroopers were attacking the village from the north and decided 

to support the attack by advance from the 

east. His estimate proved wrong; the 

enemy firing was actually directed against 

his own group. Unable to proceed toward 

the village Timmes withdrew his men to a 

41 By the original plan Ridgway was supposed to 

come in by glider just before dawn, but this was 

changed a few days before D Day. See Ltr, Ridgway 

to Maj Gen Harry J. Malony, 12 Nov 48. Hist Div 

files. 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

flashing the jump lights until they had 

overshot the zones. Both regiments were 

thus widely dispersed and many paratroopers, heavily laden with equipment, 

dropped in the swamplands along the 

rIver. 

Absorbed naturally with the basic problem of assembling, these paratroopers 

tended to collect along the embankment 

of the main railroad from Cherbourg to 

Carentan, both because it was high dry 

ground and because it was a recognizable 

terrain feature. By following this embankment south, they crossed the river and arrived in the vicinity of la Fiere with the 

river between them and their objectives. 

The only large group which, under command of Brig. Gen. James A. Gavin, Assistant Division Commander, tried to 

push down along the edge of the swamps 

on the west bank of the river was delayed 

in starting until dawn by vain efforts to recover equipment from the swamps. With 

daylight, enemy fire west of the river became intense. Gavin therefore had to give 

up the attempt and moved his men on 

down the embankment to join the others 

west of Ste. Mere-Eglise.40 

By the middle of the morning 500 to 

600 men of miscellaneous units had 

gathered at la Fiere, which was one of the 

two known crossings of the Merderet in 

the 82d Airborne Division zone. The la 

Fiere crossing was an exposed narrow 

causeway raised a few feet above the river 

flats and extending 400 to 500 yards from 

the bridge over the main river channel to 

40 General Gavin, a graduate of West Point in 

1929, took command of the 505th Parachute Infantry in July 1942 and led that regiment into combat in Sicily a year later. He commanded the same 

regiment in the parachute landing on Salerno Bay in 

September 1943 and the following month became assistant division commander. 

291 

the gently rising hedgerow country of the 

west shore. 

Two of the first groups on the scene, 

portions of Company A of the 505th and 

a group mostly of the 507th Parachute Infantry under Lt. John H. Wisner, had 

tried to rush the bridge in the early morning but were repulsed by machine gun 

fire. When General Gavin arrived, he decided to split the la Fiere force and sent 

seventy-five men south to reconnoiter another crossing. Later, receiving word that 

the bridge at Chef-du-Pont was undefended, he took another seventy-five men 

himself to try to get across there. The 

groups remaining at la Fiere made ,no 

progress for several hours. Then General 

Ridgway, who had landed by parachute 

with the 505th, ordered Col. Roy Lindquist, the commanding officer of the 

508th Parachute Infantry, to organize the 

miscellaneous groups and take the 

bridgeY 

In the meantime west of the river about 

fifty men of the 2d Battalion, 507th Parachute Infantry, had collected under the 

battalion commander, Lt. Col. Charles J. 

Timmes. Shortly after the drop, Timmes 

had passed through Cauquigny, the tiny 

village at the west end of the la Fiere 

causeway. But he did not stay. Hearing 

firing in the direction of Amfreville, he 

reckoned that paratroopers were attacking the village from the north and decided 

to support the attack by advance from the 

east. His estimate proved wrong; the 

enemy firing was actually directed against 

his own group. Unable to proceed toward 

the village Timmes withdrew his men to a 

41 By the original plan Ridgway was supposed to 

come in by glider just before dawn, but this was 

changed a few days before D Day. See Ltr, Ridgway 

to Maj Gen Harry J. Malony, 12 Nov 48. Hist Div 

files. 
292 

position along the river east of Amfreville and began to dig in. \Vhen the position was organized about midmorning, he 

sent a patrol of ten men back to Cauquigny to establish a fire position to dominate 

the west end of the la Fiere causeway. The 

patrol set up a machine gun in the 

CaufJuigny church, and awaited developments.42 

At noon the forces around la Fiere 

gathered for a co-ordinated three-company attack. In two hours one company 

under Capt. F. V. Schwarzwalder succeeded in carrying the attack across the 

causeway, and established contact with 

Timmes' patrol. The way was then open 

to consolidating the bridgehead and completing one of the most important of the 

82d Airbome Division's missions. The 

initial success, however, was not followed 

up. Probably because it was difficult in 

the hedgerow country for any unit to tell 

quickly what was going on beyond its immediate limited observation, the first 

crossing hy about seventy-five men was 

nut immediately reinforced. Furthermore 

Schwarzwalder's company, instead of 

holding on the west bank, decided to proceed on to AmfreYille to join the 2d Battalion, 507th Parachute Infantry, to 

which most of the men belonged. As 

Schwarzwalder moved Ollt, the enemy 

began to react to the initial American attack with artillery, small arlIlS fire, and at 

last a tank sally.4:l It was in the middle of 

this coullterattack that belated American 

reinforcements arrived on the west bank 

and were immediately disorganized and 

42 See S. L. A. Marshall, La Fil-re Bridgehead, 

mimeo ;'.IS. Hist Div flieS. The account in Ruppenthal, Utah Bea.h, p. 38, differs slightly. 

4J Undouhtedly units of the lOath Panzer Replacement Battalion equipped with light Russian and 

French tanks. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

beaten back. The bridge was lost. Colonel 

Timmes' group east of Amfre\'ille reinforced by Schwarzwalder's company was 

isolated under heavy and continuing 

enemy pressure which effectively prevented it for the next two days from any 

further active attempts at accomplishing 

the division's mission. The enemy tried 

to follow up his advantage with attacks 

across the causeway. These netted him 

only temporary footholds on the east bank 

but during the day compelled the Americans to hring back most of the troops sent 

earlier to probe out crossings of the river 

to the south. 

\Vhile the la Fiere bridge was won and 

lost, the attempt to cross at Chef-duPont about two miles south had reached 

a temporary deadlock, as a relatively 

sTIlall number of Germans dug in along 

the causeway tenaciously resisted all efforts to dislodge them.44 Late in the afternoon, after most of the paratroopers had 

been recalled to strengthen the la Fiere 

position, the understrength platoon left 

at Chef-du-Pont under Capt. Roy E. 

Creek was threatened with annihilation 

by an enemy counterattack. Under heavy 

direct fire from a field piece on the opposite bank and threatened by German 

infantry forming for attack on the south, 

Creek's position seemed desperate. At that 

moment a glider bearing an antitank gun 

landed fortuitously in the area. With this 

gun the enemy was held off while about a 

hundred paratroopers, in response to 

Creek's plea for reinforcements, came 

down from la Fiere. The reinforcements 

gave Creek strength enough to beat off 

44 Their tenacity may in part have been caused by 

the shooting on two occasions of enemy soldiers who 

stood lip apparently with the idea of surrendering. 

See Marshall, La Fiere Bridgehead. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 293 

the Germans, clear the east bank, and 

finally cross the river and dig in. This position, however, did not amount to a 

bridgehead and Creek’s tenuous hold on 

the west end of the causeway would have 

meant little but for the action of the 508th 

Parachute Infantry west of the river. 

Elements of the 508th, amounting to 

about two companies of men under command of Lt. Col. Thomas J. B. Shanley, 

commanding officer of the 2d Battalion, 

were the most important of at least four 

groups of paratroopers who assembled 

west of the Merderet but who for the most 

part, being forced to fight for survival, 

could contribute little toward carrying 

out planned missions. Dropped near 

Picauville, Colonel Shanley gathered a 

small force of paratroopers-too small to 

proceed with his mission of destroying the 

Douve bridge at Pont l’Abbe. He tried

during the day to join other groups in the 

vicinity with whom he had radio contact, 

but under constant enemy pressure he was 

unable to effect a junction until late in 

the day. It had then become apparent to 

him that he was engaged with an enemy 

force of at least battalion strength, and he 

decided to withdraw to the battalion assembly area on Hill 30. In fact, the Germans, elements of the 1057th Regiment, 

had been pushing eastward in this area 

most of the day under orders to counterattack in order to wipe out American 

parachutists west of the Merderet. Colonel Shanley’s resistance undoubtedly 

helped save the forces at la Fiere and Chefdu-Pont. Once he was firmly established 

on Hill 30, he formed a valuable outpost 

against continuing German attacks and 

a few days later would be in position to 

contribute substantially to establishing 

the Merderet bridgehead. For Colonel 

Shanley’s success three enlisted men have 

received a large share of the credit. They 

were Cpl. Ernest T. Roberts, Pvt. Otto 

K. Zwingman, and Pvt. John A. Lockwood who, while on outpost duty in 

buildings at Haut Gueutteville, observed 

the forming of a German counterattack 

by an estimated battalion of infantry with 

tank support. They stayed at their posts 

holding off the enemy attack for two 

hours and allowing the main body of 

Shanley’s force to establish an all-around 

defense at Hill 30.45 

As reports of the airborne landings 

came in to the German Seventh Army 

headquarters and the extent of the landings became apparent, General Dollmann 

ordered a series of moves designed to seal 

off the airhead and destroy it. (Map 2) 

The 709th Division with the 1058th Regiment (91st Division) attached was ordered to clear the area east of the Merderet.46 At the same time the 91st Division 

counterattacked from the west using the 

1057th Regiment and the 100th Panzer 

Replacement Battalion in an attempt to 

wipe out paratroopers who had landed 

west of the inundated area. The 6th Parachute Regiment under control of the 91st 

Division was to attack through Carentan 

from the south.47 Finally at the end of the 

45All three were captured. Pvt Zwingman was 

killed in December 1944 while still a prisoner. The 

three men were awarded DSC’s. 

46Seventh Army KTB 1.I.-30 .V1.44, 6 Jun 44. 

Schlieben denies that the 1058th Regiment was attached division to his and in fact the regiment’s action on D Day does not seem to have been directed 

at first by the 709th Division. MS # B-845 (Schlieben) . 

47Again the subordination ordered by Seventh 

Army was apparently not effected. Von der Heydte 

directed the operations of his regiment without any 

orders from the 91st Division. MS # B-839 (von der 

Heydte) . 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

the Germans, clear the east bank, and 

finally cross the river and dig in. This position, however, did not amount to a 

bridgehead and Creek's tenuous hold on 

the west end of the causeway would have 

meant little but for the action of the 508th 

Parachute Infantry west of the river. 

Elements of the 508th, amounting to 

about two companies of men under command of Lt. Col. Thomas J. B. Shanley, 

commanding officer of the 2d Battalion, 

were the most important of at least four 

groups of paratroopers who assembled 

west of the Merderet but who for the most 

part, being forced to fight for survival, 

could contribute little toward carrying 

out planned missions. Dropped near 

Picauville, Colonel Shanley gathered a 

small force of paratroopers-too small to 

proceed with his mission of destroying the 

Douve bridge at Pont I'Abbe. He tried 

during the day to join other groups in the 

vicinity with whom he had radio contact, 

but under constant enemy pressure he was 

unable to effect a junction until late in 

the day. It had then become apparent to 

him that he was engaged with an enemy 

force of at least battalion strength, and he 

decided to withdraw to the battalion assembly area on Hill 30. In fact, the Germans, elements of the I057th Regiment, 

had been pushing eastward in this area 

most of the day under orders to counterattack in order to wipe out American 

parachutists west of the Merderet. Colonel Shanley'S resistance undoubtedly 

helped save the forces at la Fiere and Chefdu-Pont. Once he was firmly established 

on Hill 30, he formed a valuable outpost 

against continuing German attacks and 

a few days later would be in position to 

contribute substantially to establishing 

the Merderet bridgehead. For Colonel 

293 

Shanley's success three enlisted men have 

received a large share of the credit. They 

were Cpl. Ernest T. Roberts, Pvt. Otto 

K. Zwingman, and Pvt. John A. Lockwood who, while on outpost duty in 

buildings at Haut Gueutteville, observed 

the forming of a German counterattack 

by an estimated battalion of infantry with 

tank support. They stayed at their posts 

holding off the enemy attack for two 

hours and allowing the main body of 

Shanley's force to establish an all-around 

defense at Hill 30.45 

As reports of the airborne landings 

came in to the German Seventh Army 

headquarters and the extent of the landings became apparent, General Dollmann 

ordered a series of moves designed to seal 

off the airhead and destroy it. (Map 2) 

The 709th Division with the I058th Regiment (9Ist Division) attached was ordered to clear the area east of the Merderet. 46 At the same time the 9Ist Division 

counterattacked from the west using the 

I057th Regiment and the IOOth Panzer 

Replacement Battalion in an attempt to 

wipe out paratroopers who had landed 

west of the inundated area. The 6th Parachute Regiment under control of the 9Ist 

Division was to attack through Carentan 

from the south.47 Finally at the end of the 

45 All three were captured. Pvt Zwingman was 

killed in December 1944 while still a prisoner. The 

three men were awarded DSC's. 

46Seventh Army KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44, 6 Jun 44. 

Schlieben denies that the l058th Regiment was at· 

tached to his division and in fact the regiment'S ac· 

tion on D Day does not seem to have been directed 

at first by the 709th Division. MS # B-845 (Schlie· 

ben) . 

47 Again the subordination ordered by Seventh 

Army was apparently not effected. Von der Heydte 

directed the operations of his regiment without any 

orders from the 91st Division. MS # B-839 (von der 

Heydte) . 
TO PONT L' ABBE GUEUTTEVILLE HILL 30 AREA 

MERDERET RIVER CROSSING at Chef-du-Pont. Village of les Me1ieux is in 

lower right-hand corner of picture. 
CAPONNET TO CHEF-DU-PONT LA FIERE BRIDGE 
MAP 2 

GERMAN COUNTERATTACK IN THE COTENTIN. R eproduction 0/ a captured OB WEST map dat ed 6-7 June 1944. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

day the Seventh Army Sturm Battalion 

was ordered to move against the American 

bridgehead from the vicinity of Cherbourg, attacking in the direction of Ste. 

Mere-Eglise. A regiment of the 243d Division was ordered to move by night to 

Montebourg. 48 By means of these moves 

and concentric counterattacks Dollmann 

was sure at first that he could cope with 

the Cotentin landings without moving in 

any additional forces. It was only in the 

evening that his optimism waned, as the 

91st Division reported that its counterattack was making very slow progress because of the difficulties of maneuvering 

in the hedgerow country. In fact the attack had scarcely materialized at all except 

in local actions along the Merderet. 

Similarly the l058th Regiment, apparently harassed by scattered American 

paratroopers, could not get moving in its 

attack toward Ste. Mere-Eglise. By evening its advance elements were still north 

of N euville-au-Plain. Generalleutnant 

Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben, commander 

of the 709th Division, ordered it to resume the attack on Ste. Mere-Eglise the 

next morning. He attached to it two motorized heavy artillery battalions, the 

456th and 457th (each with two lSO-mm. 

guns and a battery of Russian I 22-mm. 

guns), and the company of self-propelled 

guns of the 709th Antitank Battalion.49 

For the general sluggishness of German 

reactiort in the Cotentin, there seem to be 

several explanations. In the first place two 

of the three division commanders, von 

Schlie ben and Generalleutnant Wilhelm 

48 The regiment, nominally the 922d, contained 

a battalion of the 922d, a battalion of the 920th, and 

the division's EngineeT Battalion. MS # B-845 

(Schlieben) . 

• 0 MS # B-845 (SchUeben); MS # B-260 (Triepel) . 

297 

Falley (of the 91st Division), together 

with some of the subordinate commanders, were at Rennes attending a war game 

when the invasion struck. Schlie ben did 

not get back to his headquarters near 

Valognes until noon. Falley on his return 

was killed by paratroopers. To the uncertainty caused by the commanders' ab~ 

sence was added the confusion of disrupted communications. Von Schlieben, 

for instance, during the day had no contact with two of his battalions in the thick 

of the fighting, the 1st Battalion, 919th 

Regiment, in the UTAH Beach area, and 

the 795th Georgian Battalion near 

Turqueville. In attempting counterattacks against scattered U.S. riflemen the 

Germans experienced the same difficulties 

with the hedgerow country that the 

Americans did. Finally the LXXXIV 

Corps headquarters, far away in St. La, 

could not exercise effective control and 

co-ordinate the action of the three divisions in the peninsula. On the other hand 

communications were not set up to enable 

the division commanders to effect their 

own co-ordination.50 

The experience of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment illustrates in striking fashion 

the confusion and lack of co-ordination 

in the initial German reactions and 

throws a strange half-light on the D-Day 

battles in the Cotentin. The commander 

of the regiment, Major Friedrich-August 

Freiherr von der Heydte, was at his command post north of Periers when the Allied landings began. But telephone lines 

to the 91st Division and to LXXXIV 

Corps were broken during the night by 

open action of the French Resistance. It 

was not until about 0600 that von der 

~o MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 
298 

Heydte was able to reach General Marcks 

at LXXXIV Corps headquarters by a 

private line and get his orders, which were 

to attack with his regiment through 

Carentan and clean out the rear area of 

the 709th Division between Carentan and 

Ste. Mere-Eglise. Von der Heydte arrived 

in Carentan in the morning and found 

no Allied troops and very few Germans. 

He got in touch with his battalions and 

ordered them to assemble southwest of 

Carentan. He then climbed the church 

steeple in St. Come and looked around. 

The picture before him was, he said, 

overwhelming. He could see the Channel 

and the armada of Allied shi ps, covering 

the water to the horizon. He could see 

hundreds of small landing craft plying to 

the shore unloading men and tanks and 

equipment. Yet, for all that, he got no impression of a great battle in progress. It 

was then about noon. The sun was shining. Except for a few rifle shots now and 

then it was singularly quiet. He could see 

no Allied troops. The whole scene reminded him of a summer's day on the 

Wannsee. 51 

It was apparently his impression that 

no seaborne U.S. troops had come inland 

in the direction of St. Come. In accordance with that impression he made his dispositions. He ordered his battalions to 

come up to St. Come; the 2d Battalion 

was then instructed to proceed to Ste. 

Mere-Eglise and attack and destroy any 

enemy encountered. The 1st Battalion 

was to move to the high ground near Ste. 

Marie-du-Mont and protect the regiment 

from any enemy thrusts inland from the 

51 This paragraph and the following two are from 

von der Heydte's report, MS # B-839. The Wannsee 

is a lake near Berlin, a favorite place for Berliners 

to spend a Sunday. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

sea. The 3d Battalion was to return to 

Carentan to provide the regiment with a 

defense in depth, and the attached 3 d Battalion) 1058th Regiment) was to remain 

with von der Heydte in St. Come-duMont. The 1st and 2d Battalions moved 

out at about 1900. By midnight the 1st 

Battalion had marched apparently without serious trouble through the territory 

occupied by the lOlst Airborne Division 

and reached the vicinity of Ste. Marie-duMont. The 2d Battalion moved north and 

possibly reached the vicinity of Fauville. 

Both battalions sent a number of American prisoners back to the regimental headquarters. 

During the night the landing of U.S. 

glider reinforcements impressed von der 

Heydte as new large-scale airborne landings. They cut off the 2d Battalion from 

the regiment and from the 1 st Battalion. 

(In reality, both battalions were already 

cut off by the advance of the 8th Infantry 

inland, but this development was apparently unknown to von der Heydte.) 

He ordered the battalions to maintain 

contact with each other and pull back to 

form a crescent defense of St. Come. Only 

the 2d Battalion acknowledged receipt of 

the order and reported that it was not in 

touch with the 1st Battalion. As for the 

1st Battalion) it set out on the morning of 

7 June to rejoin the regiment, moving 

south toward Carentan. It never got there, 

for at the Douve River it ran into the 

lOlst Airborne Division units and surrendered almost to a man. 52 

The experience of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment was typical of the inability of 

the German forces to concentrate against 

the landings, even when, as in the case of 

52 See below, Ch. IX. 
CROSSING THE CHANNEL. Columns of LCI (L)'s (above) heading for the 

French coast, and troops on deck of LCI (L) (below) on D-Day morning. 
300 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the 82d Airborne Division, they were 

scattered and relatively weak. Thanks to 

this failure, the 82d was able to maintain 

itself while it gradually built back its 

strength. At the end of D Day, the division was strongly ensconced in the vicinity of Ste. Mere-Eglise but was precariously situated outside the main VII Corps 

beachhead. It had no contact with the 

101st Airborne or 4th Infantry Divisions. 

It had assembled only a fraction of its own 

men. Planned seaborne reinforcements 

had not arrived. The bulk of the glider reinforcements (the 325th Glider Infantry) 

were not due until the next morning. At 

the end of the day, the division reported 

that it controlled only 40 percent of its 

combat infantry and 10 percent of its artillery.53 The first estimate sent on to VII 

Corps indicated total casualties of about 

four thousand.54 The bulk of these, however, were the missing paratroopers scattered far and wide in enemy territory. Revised calculations in August 1944 showed 

D-Day losses of 1,259 including 156 

known killed and 756 missing, presumed 

captured or killed.“5 

Hitting the Beaches

While U.S. airborne troops dropped on 

the Cotentin and British paratroopers 

landed near Caen. the invasion fleet was 

bringing the main body of the Allied 

armies to the shores of Normandy. The 

assault convoys, after turning back for the 

5382d Div AAR. At noon, 8 June, the division reported still only 2,100 effective--r less than a third 

of its combat strength. 

54See Phantom Intercept in 21 A Gp Sitrep 4. 

SHAEF G-l file 704/G, 21 A Gp Casualty Rpts, Vol. I. 

55 32d MRU Rpt, Analysis of Battle Casualty Reports received from 82d Airborne Division, 13 Aug 

44. FUSA file CC 21, dr 4, item 704. 

day’s postponement, reassembled during 

the morning of 5 June and sailed again 

for the transport areas 22,000 to 23,000 

yards off the French coast in the Bay of the 

Seine. Behind mine sweepers which 

cleared and marked ten lanes through 

old enemy mine fields in the Channel, the 

huge convoys, under constant air umbrella of fighter squadrons flying at 3,000 

to 5,000 feet, made an uneventful voyage 

unmolested by the enemy either by air or 

sea.56 H Hour for U. S. beaches was 0630. 

The weather was still cause for concern. 

During the passage a gusty wind blowing 

from the west at fifteen to twenty knots 

produced a moderately choppy sea with 

waves in mid-Channel of from five to six 

feet in height. This was a heavy sea for 

the small craft, which had some difficulty 

in making way. Even in the assault area it 

was rough for shallow-draft vessels, 

though there the \t:ind did not exceed fifteen knots and the waves averaged about 

three feet. Visibility was eight miles with 

ceiling at 10,000 to 12,000 feet. Scattered clouds from 3,000 to 7,000 feet covered about half the sky over the Channel 

at H Hour becoming denser farther inland. Conditions in short were difficult 

though tolerable for both naval and air 

forces.57

Most serious were the limitations on air 

operations. Heavy bombers assigned to hit 

the coastal fortifications at OMAHA Beach 

had to bomb by instruments through the 

overcast. With concurrence of General 

Eisenhower the Eighth Air Force ordered 

a deliberate delay of several seconds in its 

release of bombs in order to insure that 

they were not dropped among the assault 

craft. The result was that the 13,000 

56 ANCXF Report, Vol. III, Annex D, p. 44. 

57 Prov Eng Spec Brig AAR. 

300 

the 82d Airborne Division, they were 

scattered and relatively weak. Thanks to 

this failure, the 82d was able to maintain 

itself while it gradually built back its 

strength. At the end of D Day, the d~visian was strongly ensconced in the vicinity of Ste. Mere·Eglise but was precariously situated outside the main VII Corps 

beachhead. It had no contact with the 

lOIst Airborne or 4th Infantry Divisions. 

It had assembled only a fraction of its own 

men. Planned seaborne reinforcements 

had not arrived. The bulk of the glider reinforcements (the 325th Glider Infantry) 

were not due until the next morning. At 

the end of the day, the division reported 

that it controlled only 40 percent of its 

combat infantry and 10 percent of its artillery.u3 The first estimate sent on to VII 

Corps indicated total casualties of about 

four thousand. 54 The bulk of these, however, were the missing paratroopers scattered far and wide in enemy territory. Revised calculations in August 1944 showed 

D-Day losses of 1,259 including 156 

known killed and 756 missing, presumed 

captured or killed. 55 

Hitting the Beaches 

\Vhile U.S. airborne troops dropped on 

the Cotentin and British paratroopers 

landed near Caen, the invasion fleet was 

bringing the main body of the Allied 

armies to the shores of I\' ormandy. The 

assault convoys, after turning back for the 

5382d Div AAR. At noon, 8 June, the division reported still only 2,100 effectives----Dr less than a third 

of its combat strength. 

54 See Phantom Intercept in 21 A Gp Sitrep 4. 

SHAEF G-I file 704/6, 21 A Gp Casualty Rpts, Vol. 1. 

5532d MRU Rpt, Analysis of Battle Casualty Reports received from 82d Airborne Division, 13 Aug 

44. FUSA file CC 21, dr 4, item 704. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

day's postponement, reassembled during 

the morning of 5 June and sailed again 

for the transport areas 22,000 to 23,000 

yards off the French coast in the Bay of the 

Seine. Behind mine sweepers which 

cleared and marked ten lanes through 

old enemy mine fields in the Channel, the 

huge convoys, under constant air umbrella of fighter squadrons flying at 3,000 

to 5,000 feet, made an uneventful voyage 

unmolested by the enemy either by air or 

sea.f;6 H Hour for U. S. beaches was 0630. 

The weather was still cause for concern. 

During the passage a gusty wind blowing 

from the west at fifteen to twenty knots 

produced a moderately choppy sea with 

waves in mid-Channel of from five to six 

feet in height. This was a heavy sea for 

the small craft, which had some difficulty 

in making way. Even in the assault area it 

was rough for shallow-draft vessels, 

though there the wind did not exceed fifteen knots and the waves averaged about 

three feet. Visibility was eight miles with 

ceiling at 10,000 to 12,000 feet. Scattered clouds from 3,000 to 7,000 feet covered about half the sky over the Channel 

at H Hour becoming denser farther inland. Conditions in short were difficult 

though tolerable for both naval and air 

forcesY 

l\fost serious were the limitations on air 

operations. Heavy bombers assigned to hit 

the coastal fortifications at OMAHA Beach 

had to bomb by instruments through the 

overcast. \Vith concurrence of General 

Eisenhower the Eighth Air Force ordered 

a deliberate delay of several seconds in its 

release of bombs in order to insure that 

they were not dropped among the assault 

craft, The result was that the 13,000 

56 A;,\,CXF Report, Vol. III, Annex D, p. 44. 

57 Prov Eng Spec Brig AAR. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

bombs dropped by 329 B-24 bombers did 

not hit the enemy beach and coast defenses at all but were scattered as far as 

three miles inland. Medium bombers 

visually bombing UTAH Beach defenses 

from a lower altitude had slightly better 

results, although about a third of all 

bombs fell seaward of the high-water 

mark and many of the selected targets 

were not located by pilots. Of 360 bombers dispatched by IX Bomber Command, 

293 attacked UTAH Beach defenses and 67 

failed to release their bombs because of 

the overcast. On the whole the bombing 

achieved little in neutralizing the coastal 

fortifica tions. 

At about 0230 the Bayfield) headquarters ship for Task Force U (Rear Adm. 

Don P. Moon) and VII Corps (Maj. Gen. 

J. Lawton Collins), dropped anchor in the 

transport area off UTAH Beach. Twenty 

minutes later the Ancon) flagship of Admiral Hall and headquarters ship for 

Task Force 0 and V Corps, reached the 

OMAHA Beach transport area. Unloading 

of assault troops into the LCVP's that 

would take them to the beaches began. 

Up to this point there had been virtually no enemy reaction. The German 

radar stations still in operation had failed 

to pick up either the air or the sea approach. Because of bad weather Admiral 

Krancke had no patrol boats in the Channel during the night, nor did he order 

them out after he heard of the airborne 

landings. Tidal conditions would not permit them to leave the harbors before daylight and, besides, Krancke was still not 

sure that a major attack was in progress. 

Shortly after three o'clock, however, 

Naval Commander Normandy reported 

sighting ten large craft lying some seven 

miles off the coast north of Port-en-Bes301 

sin. This news, in conjunction with an increasingly sharp definition of the extent 

of the airborne landings, at last convinced 

Admiral Krancke that he was confronting 

a large-scale landing. He gave such orders 

as he could. The Western Defense Forces 

were to patrol the coastal waters; the 

Landwirt submarines were to be alerted; 

the 8th Destroyer Flotilla was to move up 

from Royan to Brest; the 5 th Torpedo 

Boat Flotilla was to reconnoiter the Orne 

estuary area; and the 9th Torpedo Boat 

Flotilla was to patrol off Cap de la Hague. 

The torpedo boats of the 5th Flotilla left 

Le Havre at 0430, but an hour out of port 

they met six Allied warships escorted by 

15 to 20 destroyers. After firing torpedoes 

at the Allied vessels, the small German 

boats were attacked from the air. They 

succeeded in driving off the attackers with 

antiaircraft fire, but then had to return to 

Le Havre to replenish their load of torpedoes and ammunition. Two torpedo 

boat flotillas reconnoitering out of Cherbourg were forced by heavy seas to return 

to port at dawn. This virtually concluded 

German naval activity for the day. Admiral Krancke wrote in his diary: "It was 

only to be expected that no effective blow 

could be struck at such a superior enemy 

force." 58 He made plans, however, to attack the Allied fleet that night. 

German coastal batteries began sporadic firing at 0535, or only fifteen minutes before Allied naval bombardment 

opened prearranged counterbattery fire. 

Projectiles from Allied battleships and 

cruisers and destroyers continued to thunder over the heads of the troops making 

the final run-in to shore until a feW' minutes before the touchdown. Beach drench58 Marinegruppenkommando West, KTB 1.-7.VI.-

44,6 Jun 44. 
302 

ing was then taken up by the close-support 

craft. Although the time schedule went 

generally according to plan on both 

American beaches, the volume of fire 

laid down on vital targets was considerably less at OMAHA than expected. Most 

enemy coastal defenses were sited to cover 

the beaches rather than the sea approaches. They were therefore well concealed from observation from the sea and 

were correspondingly difficult to hit. The 

beach drenching seems generally to have 

missed its targets; a large percentage of 

the rockets overshot their marks. 59 

Naval gunfire coupled with the air 

bombardment, however, had one important effect at OMAHA Beach which was not 

at first apparent to the assaulting troops. 

The Germans credit the Allied bombardment with having detonated large mine 

field areas on which they counted heavily 

to bar the attackers from penetrating inland between the infantry strong points. 

Preparatory fire seems also to have 

knocked out many of the defending rocket 

pits. But it was supporting naval gunfire 

after H Hour which made the substantial 

contribution to the battle, in neutralizing 

key strong points, breaking up counterattacks, wearing down the defenders, and 

dominating the assault area. 

In the VII Corps zone the 4th Division 

(Maj. Gen. Raymond O. Barton)60 

planned to land in column of regiments 

on a two-battalion front of about 2,200 

59 Notes by Col B. B. Talley, Asst CofS, V Corps. 

Hist Div files. Talley also says the rocket-carrying 

LST's did not come up on line and consequently 

did not fire their rockets simultaneously as planned. 

60 General Barton had been chief of staff at headquarters of the 4th Division in 1940. In June 1942 

he took command of the 4th Motorized Division, 

which subsequently became the 4th Infantry Division, and in January of 1944 arrived with his unit in 

the European theater. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

yards. The 8th Infantry (Col. James A. 

Van Fleet), with the 3d Battalion of the 

22d Infantry attached, would make the 

initial assault. It would first occupy the 

high ground along the road between Ste. 

Marie-du-Mont and les Forges and would 

be prepared to move with the bulk of its 

force thereafter westward across the Merderet River in the zone of the 82d Airborne Division. One battalion would be 

left in the area west of St. Martin to protect the division's north flank until the 

arrival of the 22d Infantry. The 22d Infantry (Col. Hervey A. Tribolet), next 

infantry unit to land, beginning at H 

plus 85 minutes, would turn north from 

the beaches to seize the causeway across 

the inundations at les Dunes de Varreville. Continuing the push northwest, the 

regiment would capture Quineville and 

occupy the high ground at Quineville 

and Fontenay-sur-Mer. In the center of 

the beachhead the 12th Infantry (Col. 

Russell P. Reeder), landing after H plus 

4 hours, would advance with two battalions abreast to seize the high ground 

between Emondeville and the Merderet 

River. One battalion of the regiment was 

at first designated as division reserve to 

pass to division control in the vicinity of 

Turqueville. By the late May change of 

plan, following the alteration of the airborne missions, the battalion was instead 

released to regimental control and the 

12th Infantry was assigned the additional 

mission of seizing a crossing over the Merderet at Ie Port Brehay just southwest of 

the regiment'S main objective area. One 

regiment (the 359th Infantry) of the 90th 

Division, the first follow-up division, was 

attached to the 4th Division to begin landing on D Day.61 It would assemble in re61 4th Div FO I, 12 May 44. 
TROOPS ON UTAH BEACH. The troops wading ashore (above) were photographed shortly after H Hour. Note DD tanks on beach. Soldiers (below) take 

shelter behind sea wall while awaiting orders to move inland. 
304 

serve near Foucarville. In May, enemy activity was observed on the St. Marcouf 

Islands flanking UTAH Beach on the north. 

It was therefore decided to land detachments of the 4th and 24th Cavalry Squadrons two hours before H Hour to clean 

out what was suspected to be an enemy 

observation post or mine field control 

point. 

The airborne troops had done their job 

well and the 4th Division therefore had 

little difficulty getting ashore. The cavalry 

detachments (132 men) found the St. 

Marcouf Islands unoccupied though 

heavily mined. From mines and a concentration of enemy artillery that hit the 

islands in the afternoon the cavalry units 

lost two men killed and seventeen 

wounded. 62 The small craft (LCVP's) 

carrying the first waves of the 1st and 2d 

Battalions of the 8th Infantry were 

launched in relatively sheltered water and 

had no serious trouble with the wind and 

surf. At H Hour there was no enemy opposition. The thirty-two DD tanks supposed to land in the first wave were delayed by the loss of a control vessel that 

struck a mine. All but four, which were 

lost when the LCT carrying them hit a 

mine, were beached approximately fifteen minutes late. But, as it turned out, 

the assault troops had no immediate need 

for them. 

Leading elements of the two assault battalions touched down approximately on 

time but almost 2,000 yards south of 

where they were supposed to land. The 

error was probably caused in part by the 

obscuring of landmarks by smoke and 

dust raised by the naval bombardment 

and in part by the southeast coastal cur624th Cav Gp AAR. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

rent. In any case it turned out to be fortunate since it brought troops in on 

beaches much less heavily defended than 

those designated in the plan. Although 

the mislanding meant that the tasks assigned to each assault section could not be 

carried out as planned, the lack of serious 

enemy opposition permitted reconnaissance and speedy reorganization for improvised maneuver.63 After company-size 

task forces had reduced the very lightly 

defended field fortifications covering the 

two middle beach exits, both assault battalions began their advance across the 

flooded area. The 1 st crossed toward Audouville-la-Hubert; the 2d turned south 

to pick up the Pouppeville road. (Map 3) 

The first infantry wave was followed by 

engineer and naval demolition parties to 

clear the underwater obstacles. The obstacles were all dealt with dryshod and 

were so much sparser than expected that 

the original plan of blowing fifty-foot 

gaps was abandoned in favor of clearing 

the entire beach on the first tide. The job 

was completed in an hour. Engineers 

then proceeded to their next tasks of 

blowing gaps in the sea wall behind the 

beach and clearing mine fields. Enemy 

opposition consisted only of intermittent 

shelling. 

'While engineers worked on the beach, 

the 3d Battalion, 8th Infantry, supported 

by tanks of the 70th Tank Battalion, and 

the 3d Battalion, 22d Infantry, were landing and moving out. ''''ell before H plus 

3 hours the beach area had been cleared 

and landings were virtually routine, harassed only by sporadic enemy artillery fire. 

63 Brig. Gen. Theodore Roosevelt. assistant division 

commander, who went ashore with the first wave and 

helped organize [he attack inland, was awarded the 

Medal of Honor for gallantry displayed in his leadership under fire. 
THE SIXTH OF JeNE 

4TH INFANTRY DIVISION 

6 June 1944 

-----+- AXIS OF ADVANCE 

7lT71TTTTTm NIGH, POSITIONS, 6 JUNE 

<=) GUDER LANDING ZONE W 

• GERMAN RESISTANCE NEST 

Con/our mtervol 10 meters 

MAP 3 

~·"'7 Hlesvtl/e "',.'1 

0'" i .!; , I 

Early success and extraordinarily light 

casualties on UTAH Beach contrasted 

sharply with the difficulties experienced 

during those first critical three hours at 

OMAHA. The German LXXXIV Corps 

and Seventh A rmy believed through most 

of D Day that the OMAHA assault had been 

stopped at the water's edge. It was late in 

the morning before General Bradley 

aboard the Augusta could have contra305 

dieted that view and much longer before 

the Allied command could feel secure 

about the V Corps beachhead.64 

Leading the attack of General Gerow's 

V Corps was the 1st Division (Maj. Gen. 

Clarence R. Huebner) assaulting with 

two regiments abreast, the 116th Infantry 

(attached from the 29th Division) on the 

64 First Army G-3 In!. 
STE M/\RIE-l)[l-MONT EXIT 2 DOUVE RIVER 

AERIAL VIEW OF UTAH BEACH ON D-DAY MORNING. 
MERDERET RIVER EXIT 3 STE. MERE-EG LISE 
308 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

right, the 16th Infantry on the left.65

Each regiment was to land two battalion 

landing teams at H Hour with initial missions to clear the beach defenses and seize 

and secure that portion of the beachhead 

maintenance line in their respective 

zones. (Map X ) The beachhead maintenance line roughly followed the ridge 

of high ground parallel to the main 

coastal road and was in most places from 

two to three miles inland. From this line 

the assault regiments, supported by the 

18th Infantry landing after H plus 3 

hours and the 26th Infantry landing on 

order of the Commanding General, V 

Corps, would punch out toward the DDay phase line. Occupation of that phase 

line would mean securing a coastal strip 

five or six miles deep astride the Bayeux 

highway. 

The 116th Infantry was responsible for 

capturing the Pointe du Hoe coastal battery. On the assumption that the six partially casemated 155-mm. guns would not 

have been destroyed by pre-D-Day bombardment and the heavy naval fire directed on them just before H Hour, two 

Ranger battalions were attached to the 

116th Infantry with the special H-Hour 

mission of taking out the guns. Three 

companies of Rangers from the 2d 

Ranger Battalion were to land at the foot 

of the cliff which the fortified battery surmounted, scale the cliff by means of rope 

ladders, and attack the German position. 

Another company, landing on the 116th 

Infantry main beaches to the east, would 

attack the fortifications at Pointe et Raz 

de la Percee and then continue westward 

to cover the flank of the Ranger force at 

Pointe du Hoe. The rest of the Rangers 

would land at Pointe du Hoe, provided 

the initial landings succeeded; otherwise 

they would come in on the 116th beaches 

and assist the right battalion of the 116th 

in attacking westward. 

The whole right flank of the V Corps 

assault forces would thus swing due west 

almost immediately on landing while the 

left battalion of the 116th and the 16th 

signed to War Department staff duty: in the War 

Plans and Organization Section (1923-24) , in the of65 Maj. Gen. Leonard T. Gerow was graduated 

fice of the Assistant Secretary of War (1926-29) in 

from the Virginia Military Institute in 1911. Between 

the War Plans Division (1935-39), and as Assistant 

Chief of Staff with duty in the War Plans Division 

1920 and 1940 he was on four separate occasions as- 

(1940-41). He commanded the 29th Division in 

1942 and took command of V Corps in July 1943. 

General Huebner enlisted in 1910 and was commissioned in the infantry in 1916. He went overseas as 

commander of a company of the 28th infantry in 

1917 and served with the 1st Division at Luneville, 

Beaumont, Cantigny, and in the Aisne-Marne, St. 

Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne offensives. He was twice 

wounded and received the DSC with cluster, the 

DSM, and Silver Star. In 1940 he was chief of the 

Training Branch of the Operations and Training 

Division of the War Department and in 1942 Director of the Training Division, Headquarters SOS. 

In August 1943 he took command of the 1st Division 

in North Africa. 

Isigny itself might fall either to the 116th 

or to the 115th Infantry.66 The latter regiment, landing on corps order, would 

Infantry pushed south. It was hoped to 

initially leapfrog the 116th to organize 

clear the coast as far as Isigny by the end 

the high ground around Longueville. 

of D Day. It even seemed possible that 

Perhaps the most important job assigned to the first assault waves was the reduction of enemy positions defending the 

roads leading from the beach inland. The 

gently sloping sand of OMAHA Beach was 

backed by an embankment of loose stones, 

or shingle, in places as much as fifteen 

yards wide. In the Vierville sector the 

66See above, p. 187. 

308 

right, the 16th Infantry on the left. 65 

Each regiment was to land two battalion 

landing teams at H Hour with initial missions to clear the beach defenses and seize 

and secure that portion of the beachhead 

maintenance line in their respective 

zones. (Map X ) The beachhead maintenance line roughly followed the ridge 

of high ground parallel to the main 

coastal road and was in most places from 

two to three miles inland. From this line 

the assault regiments, supported by the 

18th Infantry landing after H plus 3 

hours and the 26th Infantry landing on 

order of the Commanding General, V 

Corps, would punch out toward the DDay phase line. Occupation of that phase 

line would mean securing a coastal strip 

five or six miles deep astride the Bayeux 

highway. 

The I I 6th Infantry was responsible for 

capturing the Pointe du Hoe coastal battery. On the assumption that the six partially casemated ISS-mm. guns would not 

have been destroyed by pre-D-Day bom66 Maj. Gen. Leonard T. Gerow was graduated 

from the Virginia Military Institute in 1911. Between 

1920 and 1940 he was on four separate occasions as· 

signed to War Department staff duty: in the War 

Plans and Organization Section (1923-24), in the of· 

fice of the Assistant Secretary of War (1926-29), in 

the War Plans Division (1935-39), and as Assistant 

Chief of Staff with duty in the War Plans Division 

(1940-41). He commanded the 29th Division in 

1942 and took command of V Corps in July 1943. 

General Huebner enlisted in 1910 and was commis· 

sioned in the infantry in 1916. He went overseas as 

commander of a company of the 28th Infantry in 

1917 and served with the 1st Division at Luneville, 

Beaumont, Cantigny, and in the Aisne-Marne, St. 

Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne offensives. He was twice 

wounded and received the DSC with cluster, the 

DSM, and Silver Star. In 1940 he was chief of the 

Training Branch of the Operations and Training 

Division of the War Department and in 1942 Di· 

rector of the Training Division, Headquarters SOS. 

In August 1943 he took command of the 1st Division 

in North Africa. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

bardment and the heavy naval fire directed on them just before H Hour, two 

Ranger battalions were attached to the 

116th Infantry with the special H-Hour 

mission of taking out the guns. Three 

companies of Rangers from the 2d 

Ranger Battalion were to land at the foot 

of the cliff which the fortified battery surmounted, scale the cliff by means of rope 

ladders, and attack the German position. 

Another company, landing on the 116th 

Infantry main beaches to the east, would 

attack the fortifications at Pointe et Raz 

de la Percee and then continue westward 

to cover the flank of the Ranger force at 

Pointe du Hoe. The rest of the Rangers 

would land at Pointe du Hoe, provided 

the initial landings succeeded; otherwise 

they would come in on the I I 6th beaches 

and assist the right battalion of the 116th 

in attacking westward. 

The whole right flank of the V Corps 

assault forces would thus swing due west 

almost immediately on landing while the 

left battalion of the 116th and the 16th 

Infantry pushed south. It was hoped to 

clear the coast as far as Isigny by the end 

of D Day. It even seemed possible that 

Isigny itself might fall either to the 116th 

or to the 11Sth Infantry.66 The latter regiment, landing on corps order, would 

initially leapfrog the 116th to organize 

the high ground around Longueville. 

Perhaps the most important job assigned to the first assault waves was the reduction of enemy positions defending the 

roads leading from the beach inland. The 

gently sloping sand of OMAHA Beach was 

backed by an embankment of loose stones, 

or shingle, in places as much as fifteen 

yards wide. In the Vierville sector the 

66 See above, p. 187. 
THE SlXTH OF JUNE 

shingle piled up against a part-masonry, 

part-wood sea wall. On the rest of the 

beach there was no wall, but the shingle 

lay against a sand embankment or dune 

line. Both the shingle and the dune line 

were impassable for vehicles. Behind the 

beach rose scrub-covered bluffs 100 to 170 

feet high of varying steepness and merging east and west with the cliffs, which at 

Pointe et Raz de la Percee and east of 

Colleville marked the extremities of the 

other hand, the 1st Division had precise 

information on the location of these defenses and every provision was made to 

give the assaulting infantry the heavy fire 

support needed to knock them out. (Map 

XI ) 

At H minus 50 minutes, two companies 

of DD tanks (741st Tank Battalion) destined for the 16th Infantry beaches were 

launched 6,000 yards offshore and almost 

immediately began to founder. Of the 

7,000-yard crescent beach. The bluffs thirty-two .tanks launched only five 

were cut by five draws. Through four of reached shore.69 These were the first of 

these ran unimproved roads, one connect- the casualties to the weather. There were 

ing with the main coastal highway at Vier- others. The assaulting infantry was transville-sur-Mer, two at St. Laurent, and one ferred from transports to LCVP’s ten to 

at Colleville.67 The fifth draw northeast 

of Colleville was steep and contained only 

a trail, but it was considered capable of 

development as a vehicle exit. The plan 

assumed these exits would be open to 

traffic at least by H plus 2 hours when the 

heavy flow of vehicular reinforcements 

was scheduled to begin. The importance 

of the beach exits was, of course, as obvious to the Germans as to the Allies and 

local coastal defenses were grouped to 

deny their use to the attackers.6s On the 

67 The road that passes through les Moulins will 

be called hereafter the les Moulins Exit. The St. 

Laurent Exit will refer to the road immediately 

east which leads up the valley of the Ruguet River. 

Note that the towns of Vierville, St. Laurent, and 

Colleville in this sector all bear the suffixes “surMer.” Only in the case of Vierville will the suffix 

be retained in order not to confuse it with the 

other Vierville in the UTAH Beach sector. 

68German coastal defense works were of four 

classes depending on size and complexity. The smallest and most usual was the resistance nest (Widerstandsnest), a single self-contained defensive position 

manned by one or two squads sometimes though not 

necessarily with heavy weapons. When several resistance nests were combined for co-ordinated defense of a larger sector the defense was called a 

strong point (Stuetzunkt) Strong points in general 

were manned by at least a platoon of infantry with 

eleven miles offshore. At least ten of the 

ferrying craft were swamped on the way 

in. More serious for the operation was the 

sinking of much of the artillery. The attempt to ferry guns ashore in DUKW’s 

through the heavy seas proved disastrous. 

All but one of the 105-mm. howitzers of 

the 111 th Field Artillery Battalion were 

heavy weapons and a local reserve. Strong points 

might be grouped in a Stuetzpunktgruppe either for 

command unity or for defense of a small fortified 

area. None of these strong point groups existed in 

the invasion area. Finally, certain strategically important places like ports, submarine pens, and 

mouths of large rivers were organized into defensive 

areas (Verteidigungsbereiche) garrisoned by units 

whose size was conditioned by the size and importance of the area and the forces available. All had 

both local reserves within the defensive area and 

reserves in general support stationed outside. See 

Grundiegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers West 

NT. 7, Begriflsbestimmungen in der Kuestenverteidigung, 28 May 42. OKW/ WFSt, Op. (H.), Grundlegende Befehle West 28.IV.42-7.V.44. 

69 Three of the five were beached by an LCT 

which could not lower its ramp at sea. For details 

of the difficulties in the initial landings at OMAHA 

see [Charles H. Taylor] Omaha Beachhead (Washington, 1945). The narrative of U.S. V Corps operations is largely based on Taylor’s study. See Bibliographical Note. 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

shingle piled up against a part-masonry, 

part-wood sea wall. On the rest of the 

beach there was no wall, but the shingle 

lay against a sand embankment or dune 

line. Both the shingle and the dune line 

were impassable for vehicles. Behind the 

beach rose scrub-covered bluffs 100 to 170 

feet high of varying steepness and merging east and west with the cliffs, which at 

Pointe et Raz de la Percee and east of 

Colleville marked the extremities of the 

7,000-yard crescent beach. The bluffs 

were cut by five draws. Through four of 

these ran unimproved roads, one connecting with the main coastal highway at Vierville-sur-Mer, two at St. Laurent, and one 

at Colleville. 67 The fifth draw northeast 

of Colleville was steep and contained only 

a trail, but it was considered capable of 

development as a vehicle exit. The plan 

assumed these exits would be open to 

traffic at least by H plus 2 hours when the 

heavy flow of vehicular reinforcements 

was scheduled to begin. The importance 

of the beach exits was, of course, as obvious to the Germans as to the Allies and 

local coastal defenses were grouped to 

deny their use to the attackers. 68 On the 

67 The road that pass,~s through les Moulins will 

be called hereafter the les Moulins Exit. The St. 

Laurent Exit will refer to the road immediately 

east which leads up the vaHey of the Ruguet River. 

Note that the towns of Vierville, St. Laurent, and 

Colleville in this sector all bear the suffixes "surMer." Only in the case of Vierville will the suffix 

be retained in order not to confuse it with the 

other Vierville in the UTAH Beach sector. 

6S German coastal defense works were of four 

classes depending on size and complexity. The smallest and most usual "-as the resistance nest (W iderstandsnest), a single self-contained defensive position 

manned by one or two squads sometimes though not 

necessarily with heavy weapons_ When several resistance nests were combined for co-ordinated defense of a larger sector the defense was called a 

strong point (Stuetzpullkt) _ Strong points in general 

were manned by at least a platoon of infantry with 

309 

other hand, the 1st Division had precise 

information on the location of these defenses and every provision was made to 

give the assaulting infantry the heavy fire 

support needed to knock them out. (Map 

XI ) 

At H minus 50 minutes, two companies 

of DD tanks (741st Tank Battalion) destined for the 16th Infantry beaches were 

launched 6,000 yards offshore and almost 

immediately began to founder. Of the 

thirty-two tanks launched only five 

reached shore.69 These were the first of 

the casualties to the weather. There were 

others. The assaulting infantry was transferred from transports to LCVP's ten to 

eleven miles offshore. At least ten of the 

ferrying craft were swamped on the way 

in. More serious for the operation was the 

sinking of much of the artillery. The attempt to ferry guns ashore in DUKW's 

through the heavy seas proved disastrous. 

All but one of the 105-mm. howitzers of 

the III th Field Artillery Battalion were 

heavy weapons and a local reserve. Strong points 

might be grouped in a Stuetzpunktgruppe either for 

command unity or for defense of a small fortified 

area. None of these strong point groups existed in 

the invasion area. Finally, certain strategically important places like ports, submarine pens, and 

mouths of large rivers were organized into defensive 

areas (Verteidigungsbereiche) garrisoned by units 

whose size was conditioned by the size and importance of the area and the forces available. All had 

both local reserves within the defensive area and 

reserves in general support stationed outside. See 

Grundlegender Befehl des Oberbefehlshabers West 

Nr. 7, Begriffsbestimmungen in der Kuestenverteidigung, 28 May 42. OKW /WFSt, Op. (H.), Grundlegende Befehle West 28.lV.42-7.V.44. 

69 Three of the five were beached by an LCT 

which could not lower its ramp at sea. For details 

of the difficulties in the initial landings at OMAHA 

see [Charles H. Taylor] Omaha Beachhead (Wash· 

ington, 1945) . The narrative of U.S. V Corps operations is largely based on Taylor's study. See Bibli· 

ographical Note. 
\IER \'ILLE AND DRA \V LES MOULINS DRAW 

AERIAL VIEW OF OMAHA BEACH ON D PLUS l. 

Note the five draws leading up from the beach. 

ST LAURENT DR 
COLLEVILLE ORA W COLLEVILLE NUMBER 5 DRAW 
TERRAIN ON OMAHA BEACH. Bluffs west of Vierville Draw (top). In distance 

is Pointe et Raz de la Percee Concrete casemate in bluff is sited to cover beach. 

Hamel au Pretre (center) as seen from Vierville Draw. Les Moulins area (bottom) 

as seen from the east. 

TERRAIN ON OMAHA BEACH. Bluffs west of Vierville Draw (toP). In distance 

is Pointe et Raz de la Percee. Concrete casemate in bluff is sited to cover beach. 

Hamel au Prt:tre (center) as seen from Vierville Draw. Les Moulins area (bottom) 

as seen from the east. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

sunk. Six of the lOS's belonging to the 7th 

Field Artillery Battalion suffered the 

same fate. Five of the six howitzers of the 

16th Infantry Cannon Company were also 

swamped. In addition to these wholesale 

losses the 58th Armored Field Artillery 

Battalion, whose guns were mounted on 

LCT's and had taken part in the ini tial 

beach drenching, lost three of its pieces 

when the craft carrying them hit mines. 

In short, the artillery that was planned to 

support the infantry attack particularly in 

the advance inland did not reach the 

shore. 

The weather contributed also to navigational difficulties. Mist mixed with the 

smoke and dust raised by the naval bomLardment obscured landmarks on the 

coast; in addition a lateral current of from 

two to three knots tended to carry craft 

eastward of their touchdown points. The 

actual errors in landing caused thereby 

were considerably less than at UTAH) in 

most cases amounting to not more than a 

few hundred yards. On the other hand, 

they proved much more serious for the 

tactical situation, partly because the 

errors were not constant, with the result 

that units became scattered on the final 

approach. Since the men had been briefed 

only for their particular areas, they were 

confused by the changed picture. The 

difficulties were compounded by the 

heavier enemy opposition which had the 

effect of isolating boat sections only a few 

hundred yards apart and at first made reassembly and reorganization for improvised missions almost impossible. 

Naval gunfire had temporarily neutralized some of the enemy batteries and fortifications but most of them were still able 

to fire at the incoming troops as soon as 

the bombardment was forced to lift in313 

land. The 1st Division men in the hrst 

LCVP's could hear machine gun bullets 

splatter against the steel ramps of their 

craft before they grounded. Debarking in 

water sometimes up to their necks, the 

troops on some sectors of the beach were 

met with a hail of bullets that drove some 

to seek shelter under the surf, others to 

scramble over the sides of the craft. Control of boat sections was thus often lost 

before the men were even started in to 

the beach. The troops, overladen with 

heavy clothing and equipment, waded 

slowly through the surf and through fire 

that increased as they approached the 

beach. Some stopped to rest or seek shelter 

behind obstacles. Some lay at the water's 

edge and were able eventually to crawl 

in with the tide. But casualties generally 

were heavier among those who delayed in 

getting up onto the beach. Many of the 

wounded were drowned in the rising tide. 

The first wave should have landed nine 

companies evenly spaced along the beach. 

Because of withering enemy fire and mislandings, however, the right wing all but 

disintegrated; two companies bunched in 

front of les Moulins, and the remainder 

of the landings (elements of four companies) clustered in the Colleville sector. 

One company was carried so far to the east 

that it landed an hour and a half late. 

The two right-flank companies (Company C of the 2d Ranger Battalion, and 

Company A of the 116th Infantry) landed 

as scheduled in front of the Vierville 

draw. One craft foundered and one was 

hit four times by mortar fire. Men from 

the remaining craft struggled to shore. Intense small arms fire took toll of about 

two-thirds of Company A and more than 

half of the Ranger company before any 

reached the comparative shelter of the sea 
ASSAUL T LANDINGS, OMAHA BEACH. LC VP's unloading infantry in the 

surf (above), and (below) men of the 1st Division, loaded with equipment, heading 

for the shore. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

wall or the base of the cliff. Of the sixteen tanks scheduled to land in this sector 

just ahead of the infantry, only eight 

survived enemy artillery to reach the 

shore. All had been brought in on LCT's 

as 1 1 6th Infantry officers decided the sea 

was too rough to launch the DD's. 

In the eastern part of the 116th Infantry zone the initial landings had not gone 

much better. A 1,OOO-yard gap separated 

the troops who touched down there from 

the remnants of the two companies on the 

right. The two companies of tanks that 

landed first were brought in on LCT's 

without losses. This initial success was not 

shared by the infantry. Only two of the 

three companies of the 2d Battalion, 

116th Infantry, landed within the regimental zone. One of these companies lost 

a quarter of its men to enemy fire during 

the forty-five minutes which it took them 

to cross the beach to the protection of the 

shingle bank. The remainder had better 

luck in landing in front and just west of 

les Moulins where the bluff was obscured 

by smoke fires and enemy fire was sporadic 

and inaccurate. Even these men were 

somewhat disorganized and the officers 

who survived with them were confused by 

the knowledge that they had landed east 

of their designated beaches. 

The experience of the 16th Infantry on 

the left flank of the division duplicated 

that of the l16th, as scattered landings 

and heavy casualties left the first boat sections incapable of undertaking their primary assault missions. In the 16th's zone, 

however, one soft spot was discovered. 

Four boat sections of the 2d Battalion, 

16th Infantry, landing between the St. 

Laurent and Colleville exits, crossed the 

beach with only two casualties from 

enemy fire. The local defense of this sector 

315 

of the beach was the Colleville strong 

point, which was planned as three mutually supporting resistance nests. Of these 

the field fortified position atop the bluff 

midway between the two draws was unoccupied in February 1944 and seemingly 

remained unoccupied on D Day.70 Apparent German negligence that left the 

beach northwest of Colleville without immediate defense was balanced at first by 

Allied ill fortune in landing so few men 

there. Except for those four boat sections 

of the 2d Battalion the first wave of the 

16th Infantry (Companies E and F) 

touched down immediately in front, or 

east, of the occupied fortifications of the 

Colleville strong point and was there 

caught in machine gun fire as intense as 

that which decimated the l16th Infantry. 

Many of the men of Company E, hard hit 

and exhausted in their efforts to wade 

ashore, flopped on the sand and crawled 

in ahead of the tide; nearly half of them 

did not survive. Because of the swamping 

of most of the DD tanks and immediate 

enemy destruction of five of the company 

of mediums beached from LCT's, the 

16th Infantry had initially only a third 

of the planned armor support. Those 

tanks available went into action on the 

beach between the St. Laurent and Colleville exits. 

The heavy losses and disorganization of 

the first wave had repercussions on each 

succeeding wave through the morning of 

D Day. The first serious effect of the failure to neutralize enemy beach defenses 

was the inability of the 6th Special Engineer Brigade and naval demolition parties 

to blow gaps in the beach obstacles as 

70 Ltr, OB WEST, O.Qu. to OKH/Generalquartiermeister, 4 Feb 44. OKH/Generalquartiermeister, 

Stuetzpunktbevorratung an der Atlantik- und Kanalkueste. 
FIRST AID ON THE BEACH. Soldiers of the 16th Infantry (above) being 

treated for injuries, and wounded soldier (below) receiving plasma. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

planned. Weather conditions also played 

a hand in hindering the engineers from 

accomplishing their mission. Half the 

demolition teams were delayed in landing and only a third of them touched 

down on their appointed sectors. Since 

the rest were carried eastward by the 

coastal current, the 116th Infantry zone 

received substantially less than the scheduled effort. But enemy fire also took a 

heavy toll of both men and equipment. 

Of sixteen bulldozers only three could be 

put into operation on the beach, and one 

of these was prevented from maneuvering 

freely by riflemen who sheltered behind 

it. So many of the marking buoys and 

poles were lost that only one of the six 

gaps blown by 0700 could be marked. 

Casualties to the engineers amounted to 

about 40 percent for the day and were certainly very much higher for the first 

groups ashore. In half an hour after H 

Hour the tide, rising at the rate of about 

four feet an hour, had covered the obstacles to an extent that made further 

clearance impossible;71 remnants of the 

engineers joined the infantry behind the 

shingle to wait for the next tide. Fifteen 

officers and men of the demolition parties 

from private to colonel were awarded the 

Distinguished Service Cross for carrying 

out their missions under incredible difficulties: a colonel had his craft come close 

to shore and directed it under heavy fire 

up and down along the beach so that he 

could observe what had to be done, then 

came ashore, issued new orders to expedite the clearance, and supervised the 

work under fire; a lieutenant, though 

wounded in the legs while coming ashore, 

refused evacuation, directed his team in 

71 About 80 yards of sand would be covered each 

hour. 

317 

demolishing the obstacles until the tide 

covered them, and returned to the job 

when the tide permitted and was again 

wounded; an enlisted man operated a 

tankdozer until it was knocked out of action and then crossed the fire-swept beach 

to mount a deserted bulldozer and continue his job.72 

The second group of assault waves, consisting of five separately timed landings, 

was to complete the build-up of the two assault regiments by H plus 1 hour and 

bring in the 31st Chemical Battalion, two 

combat engineer battalions whose principal task would be to clear mine fields 

for the advance inland, naval shore fire 

control parties, and advance elements of 

artillery, medical, and antiaircraft units. 

In the' zone of the 116th Infantry, the remaining three companies of the 1st Battalion were to come in behind Company 

A on the right. On the left the heavy 

weapons company of the 2d Battalion 

would land to complete that unit and 

would be followed by the 3d Battalion. 

The right flank, however, continued to 

be an area of particular misfortune. Only 

scattered sections of the reinforcing units 

managed to land there and they were hit 

by the same destructive fire that had virtually knocked Company A out of the 

battle. The battalion headquarters company, including the beach master for the 

1st Battalion sector, landed at the base of 

the cliff west of the rifle companies and 

under such severe enemy small arms fire 

that it was unable to move most of the day. 

The heavy weapons company, scattered 

and hard hit on the approach, took two 

hours to assemble survivors. It salvaged 

only three mortars, three machine guns, 

72 For a complete list of the DSC winners, see App. 

I, below. 
318 

and a few rounds of ammunition. Only 

one company of the 1st Battalion survived as an organized group capable of 

pursuing its assault missions. This was 

Company C, which mislanded 1,000 yards 

east of its planned beach within the area 

of the bluffs covered by the smoke of a 

brush fire. With few casualties and equipment virtually intact, the company waded 

in on a front of not more than a hundred 

yards and reorganized in the shelter of the 

sea wall. 

Next to land in the 116th zone were the 

Rangers. The 5th Ranger Battalion together with two companies of the 2d 

Rangers had waited offshore for news of 

the assault on Pointe du Hoe, which 

would determine whether they landed 

there or came in on the 116th Infantry 

zone. The Pointe du Hoe assault, however, had been delayed forty minutes by 

the eastward drifting of the craft carrying 

the Rangers. There was therefore no news 

at all, and the Ranger reinforcements, 

concluding that the assault must have 

failed, proceeded with the alternative 

plan. The 5th Ranger Battalion followed 

Company C, 116th Infantry, and shared 

the relatively easy assault in landing too 

far east. But the two companies of the 2d 

Ranger Battalion came in about where 

planned on the fire-swept right flank behind elements of Companies A and B. 

Only between a third and a half of the two 

65-man companies survived to take shelter at the head of the beach. 

In the 2d Battalion zone, the second 

wave brought in the heavy weapons company and battalion headquarters. Company H suffered such losses and disorganization that it could be of little immediate 

help in supplying mortar or machine gun 

support. The battalion commander, Maj. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Sidney V. Bingham, Jr., coming ashore 

near les Moulins, organized a few sections 

of Company F 'which had landed in the 

first wave and attempted an assault on 

the enemy positions in the draw. 73 The 

attempt made with only a handful of men 

was unsuccessful, but in the meantime the 

3d Battalion was landing bunched up 

astride the regimental boundary just east 

of les Moulins. It was somewhat disorganized by the intermingling of units but 

suffered little from enemy fire in crossing 

the beach. 

At the end of the first hour the 1 I 6th 

Infantry had at least a nucleus of force 

which could be organized for attack 

against the enemy's beach positions. Most 

hopeful was the situation roughly in the 

center of the regimental zone just west of 

les Moulins where enemy fire masked 

by smoke was light and ineffective, and 

where shortly after 0730, by great good 

fortune, the regimental command group 

with Col. Charles D. W. Canham and 

Brig. Gen. Norman D. Cota, the assistant 

division commander, came ashore. 

The experience of the 16th Infantry's 

later waves was similar to that of the 

116th. Losses were lighter but the confusion and intermingling of units on the 

beaches became more serious. The two 

remaining companies (G and H) of the 

2d Battalion followed by the 1 st Battalion landed about where planned, due 

north of Colleville. The 3d Battalion 

completed landing on the left shortly 

after 0800. The 3d Battalion headquarters, however, landed to the west and 

could not join its troops for several 

hours. The 16th Infantry suffered another misfortune when the regimental 

executive officer, coming in with the first 

73 Major Bingham was awarded the DSC. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 319 

section of the headquarters, was killed an overextended static division as extogether with thirty-five of his men. The petted, General Huebner’s troops hit on 

commander, Col. George A. Taylor, did the front of a full attack infantry division, 

not arrive until 0815 with the second the 352d, whose presence in the coastal 

headquarters section. zone had been missed by Allied intelliCommand was generally one of the gence even though it had been in place 

gravest problems faced by assault units, for almost three months.75 

not only because officer casualties were To the German officer in command of 

high and mislanding of command groups the fortifications at Pointe et Raz de la 

had left many units leaderless, but also Percee it looked in these first hours as 

because of extreme difficulties of com- though the invasion had been stopped on 

munication. Three-quarters of the 116th the beaches. He noted that the Americans 

Infantry’s radios were destroyed or useless.74 Furthermore, in the confusion of 

the mixed units, which were under heavy 

fire in some places, their men huddled 

along the shingle embankment or sea wall 

and generally shaken by the shock of the 

first few minutes of severe action, it would 

have been impossible for any commander 

to exercise control over more than a small 

group of men on a relatively narrow sector of the front. 

In these first few hours on OMAHA 

Beach, the OVERLORD operation faced its 

gravest crisis. Deprived of the expected 

air support by accident of weather and 

preceded by a generally ineffective beach 

drenching, the 1st Division had gone in 

against the one sector of the Normandy 

coast that had anything like the kind of 

cordon defense which Field Marshal 

Rommel counted on to hold and smash 

the Allies on the beaches. Instead of attacking in the sector of one regiment of 

74 Carrying heavy communications equipment 

through the surf under enemy fire was a formidable task that took many lives. Five men of the 16th 

Infantry were decorated for their heroic work in 

struggling ashore with vital radios and wire despite 

serious wounds. T/5 John J. Pinder, Jr., received a 

posthumous award of the Medal of Honor for his 

intrepidity in recovering two radios and other 

equipment, while suffering two severe wounds. On 

his third trip into the fire-swept surf he was killed. 

were lying on the shore seeking cover be75 Reasons for this failure remain one of the more 

interesting mysteries of the war. Allied intelligence 

had otherwise a remarkably detailed and accurate 

picture of the German defenses and troop dispositions. It was unquestionably difficult to get reliable 

information from agents in the coastal zone since all 

persons whom the Germans allowed to remain in 

these areas were carefully screened. In this connection 

the short distance of the move of the 352d Division 

from St. Lo to the coast may have contributed to 

concealing it, although a similar inching forward 

of the 21st Panzer Division was found out. Another 

interesting surmise is suggested by the fact that one 

agent known to be active in the zone of the 352d 

Division as late as May was working in the Grandcamp area which happened to be the sector of the 

3d Battalion of the 726th Regiment of the 716th 

Division. That the 726th Regiment had been attached to a new division could easily have been unknown to him. In May the Germans shot down a 

carrier pigeon carrying a message from this agent. 

The message was a report of the location of the 3d 

Battalion of the 1716th Artillery Regiment, also in 

the Grandcamp area and also a 716th Division unit, 

attached to the 352d. See MS # B-022 (Ziegelmann) . 

Brigadier Williams, G-2 of 21 A Gp, has said since 

the war that just before the invasion he did find 

out about the 352d's presence on the coast but was 

unable to inform the troops. See Interv, Pogue with 

Williams, London, 31 May 47. This is partially confirmed by 21 Army Group Weekly Neptune Review 17 of 4 June which warned: “It should not be 

surprising if we discovered that it (the 716 Division) had two regiments in the line and one in 

reserve while on its left 352d Division had one regiment up and two to play. . . .” The fact remains 

noteworthy that for almost two and a half months 

the Allies were unaware of the true position of the 

352d Division. 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

section of the headquarters, was killed 

together with thirty-five of his men. The 

commander, Col. George A. Taylor, did 

not arrive until 0815 with the second 

headquarters section. 

Command was generally one of the 

gravest problems faced by assault units, 

not only because officer casualties were 

high and mislanding of command groups 

had left many units leaderless, but also 

because of extreme difficulties of communication. Three-quarters of the 116th 

Infantry's radios were destroyed or useless.74 Furthermore, in the confusion of 

the mixed units, which were under heavy 

fire in some places, their men huddled 

along the shingle embankment or sea wall 

and generally shaken by the shock of the 

first few minutes of severe action, it would 

have been impossible for any commander 

to exercise control over more than a small 

group of men on a relatively narrow sector of the front. 

In these first few hours on OMAHA 

Beach, the OVERLORD operation faced its 

gravest crisis. Deprived of the expected 

air support by accident of weather and 

preceded by a generally ineffective beach 

drenching, the 1st Division had gone in 

against the one sector of the Normandy 

coast that had anything like the kind of 

cordon defense which Field Marshal 

Rommel counted on to hold and smash 

the Allies on the beaches. Instead of attacking in the sector of one regiment of 

74 Carrying heavy communications equipment 

through the surf under enemy fire was a formid· 

able task that took many lives. Five men of the 16th 

Infantry were decorated for their heroic work in 

struggling ashore with vital radios and wire despite 

serious wounds. T /5 John J. Pinder, Jr., received a 

posthumous award of the Medal of Honor for his 

intrepidity in recovering two radios and other 

equipment, while suffering two severe wounds. On 

his third trip into the fire·swept surf he was killed. 

319 

an overextended static division as expected, General Huebner's troops hit on 

the front of a full attack infantry division, 

the 352dJ whose presence in the coastal 

zone had been missed by Allied intelligence even though it had been in place 

for almost three months. 75 

To the German officer in command of 

the fortifications at Pointe et Raz de la 

Percee it looked in these first hours as 

though the invasion had been stopped on 

the beaches. He noted that the Americans 

were lying on the shore seeking cover be75 Reasons for this failure remain one of the more 

interesting mysteries of the war. Allied intelligence 

had otherwise a remarkably detailed and accurate 

picture of the German defenses and troop disposi· 

tions. It was unquestionably difficult to get reliable 

information from agents in the coastal zone since all 

persons whom the Germans allowed to remain in 

these areas were carefully screened. In this connection 

the short distance of the move of the 352d Division 

from St. L6 to the coast may have contributed to 

concealing it, although a similar inching forward 

of the 21st Panzer Division was found out. Another 

interesting surmise is suggested by the fact that one 

agent known to be active in the zone of the 352d 

Division as late as May was working in the Grand· 

camp area which happened to be the sector of the 

3d Batta/ion of the 726th Regiment of the 716th 

Division. That the 726th Regiment had been at· 

tached to a new division could easily have been unknown to him. In May the Germans shot down a 

carrier pigeon carrying a message from this agent. 

The message was a report of the location of the 3d 

Batta/ion of the 1716th Artillery Regiment, also in 

the Grandcamp area and also a 716th Division unit, 

attached to the 352d. See MS # B-022 (Ziegelmann). 

Brigadier Williams, G-2 of 21 A Gp, has said since 

the war that just before the invasion he did find 

out about the 352d's presence on the coast but was 

unable to inform the troops. See Interv, Pogue with 

Williams, London, 31 May 47. This is partially confirmed by 21 Army Group Weekly Neptune Review 17 of 4 June which warned: "It should not be 

surprising if we discovered that it (the 716th Di"i· 

sion) had two regiments in the line and one in 

reserve while on its left 352d Division had one regiment up and two to play .... " The fact remains 

noteworthy that for almost two and a half months 

the Allies were unaware of the true position of the 

352d Division. 
320 

hind the obstacles, that ten tanks and a 

"great many other vehicles" were burning. The fire of his own positions and the 

artillery, he thought, had been excellent, 

causing heavy losses. He could see the 

wounded and dead lying on the sand.76 

Sketchy reports to V Corps and First 

Army must have painted very much the 

same picture for the American command. 

From a DUKW cruising 500 to 1,000 

yards offshore, Col. Benjamin B. Talley, 

the assistant chief of staff of V Corps, radioed General Gerow what he could observe of the progress of the landings. Observation was difficult, and on the whole 

Colonel Talley refrained from reporting 

mere pessimism. However, he had to report something of the evident disorganization. He could see that the beaches 

were jammed with infantrymen and that 

enemy artillery and machine gun fire was 

still effective. He sent a message to that 

effect about 0930. What particularly concerned him was the fact that reinforcing 

waves were being held up by the continued enemy opposition and the LCT's 

were milling around offshore like "a stampeded herd of cattle," although some of 

the more daring commanders took their 

craft into the hail of enemy fire and 

beached them. This situation seemed to 

Talley to continue without alleviation 

until midmorning, and it was the situation conveyed to Generals Gerow and 

Bradley.77 

76 MS # B-432 (Ziegelmann). 

77 Talley Notes, cited n. 59. The milling of the 

landing craft offshore was actually caused at least 

as much by an order from the 7th Naval Beach Battalion at about 0830 to suspend the landing of 

vehicles pending clearance of some beach exits. This 

fact seems to have been unknown to Talley. See 

beloW. next section. Cf. Taylor. Omaha Beachhead, 

p. 79. Talley was awarded the DSC for his liaison 

work on 6 June. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Already, however, as Talley sent forward his discouraging reports, the crisis 

was bit by bit dissolving. Among the 

groups of scared, tired riflemen huddled 

along the beach were a few intrepid leaders-officers, noncoms, and privates on 

whose individual backs the big responsibility at the moment lay. They began by 

example and exhortation to prod the 

men to get up, leave such poor shelter as 

they had found, and walk or crawl across 

the beach flat and up the hills where the 

enemy was dug in with rifles, mortars, and 

machine guns. From the larger perspective the combined weight of Allied arms 

was gradually wearing down the defenders. The 916th Regiment in the center of 

the 352d Division sector, while reporting 

that the landings had been frustrated, 

added that its own casualties were mounting chiefly from the heavy Allied naval 

fire and that consequently reinforcements 

were needed. Reinforcements, however, 

could not immediately be spared since 

they were much more urgently needed 

elsewhere. 

The gravest immediate threat for the 

Germans arose to the east of V Corps 

where the British assault cracked through 

the coast defenses in some places during 

the first few hours. (Map XII ) The British Second Army attacked with three divisions abreast under control of 1 and 30 

Corps. Immediately on the flank of the 

American attack, the British 50th Division landed two infantry brigades supported by tanks of the 8th Armoured 

Brigade and assault teams of the 79th 

Armoured Division and the 47th Royal 

Marine Commando. The troops touched 

down approximately on time at 0725. 

Opposition was heavy at certain points, 

but on the whole it was much less deter-
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 321 

mined than at OMAHA. In the 50th Division zone ie Hamel, strongly defended by 

the Ist Battalion, 916th Regiment, resisted until late in the day. To the east, 

however, the British division’s left brigade struck a soft spot in the German defenses. The strong point at la Riviere held 

out only a few hours and when it fell at 

about 1000 its defenders, the 441st Ost 

Battalion, attached to the 716th Division, 

broke and pulled out, leaving the road to 

Bayeux open. This development, however, was not known to the British. Opposition continued to be reported south of 

Buhot, at Ryes, St. Sulpice, and Summervieu. It was always difficult in the early 

stages of the assault properly to distinguish enemy delaying action from major 

opposition or to discover where the holes 

were in the German defense. The 50th 

Division, moreover, still had only its 

assault forces ashore. Rising tide had prevented effective clearance of underwater 

obstacles. Enemy opposition and mines 

delayed the opening of beach exits. 

Caught in the resulting congestion, the 

two follow-up brigades of the 50th Division were two hours late in landing. 

\vhen they did arrive, they found their 

assembly areas still not entirely cleared 

of enemy. Elements of the 352d Division, 

in fact, were still on the Meuvaines ridge 

after midday.78

From the German point of view the 

crumbling of the 441st Ost Battalion was 

immediately critical. The gap had to be 

plugged at once. The 915th Regiment reinforced (LXXXZl’ Corps reserve) had 

been stationed near Bayeux and had often 

practiced just the maneuver now required-counterthrust, toward Crepon.

7s Facts on British action furnished by the British 

Cabinet Office Hist Sec. 

But earlier in the morning (at 0400) the 

915th had been ordered to the CarentanIsigny area to attack reported large-scale 

enemy airborne landings between the 

Vire and Douve Rivers. The report was 

discovered to be unfounded at just about 

the time the hole in the 716th Division 

opened up. Threatened with having his 

whole right flank rolled up, Generalleutnant Dietrich Kraiss, the commanding 

general of the 352d Division, secured 

corps approval for the return of the 915th 

Regiment. But an hour was consumed trying to reach the regiment. Then it had to 

countermarch almost twenty miles from 

a point nearly five miles west of the ForCt 

de Cerisy. The march was made partly on 

foot, partly by bicycle and French motor 

vehicles which suffered numerous mechanical breakdowns. Another three 

hours passed before even a portion of the 

unit was in position to attack. That delay 

proved crucial, for in those hours much 

happened to change the situation on 

OMAHA completely.‘79

The D-Day Beachhead 

First Army’s assault plans provided that 

the initial task of clearing the beaches be 

carried out by assault sections organized 

by boatloads. Troops were then to proceed inland to various assembly areas 

where they would be reorganized in battalions and regiments to carry out their 

subsequent D-Day missions of securing 

and consolidating the corps beachheads. 

On OMAHA Beach the troops of V Corps 

in order to reach their assembly areas had 

to cross a beach flat, varying in width from 

a few yards at each end to about 200 yards 

in the center, and climb steep bluffs be79MS # B-432 (Ziegelmann) 

THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

mined than at OMAHA. In the 50th Division zone Ie Hamel, strongly defended by 

the 1st Battalion, 916th Regiment, resisted until late in the day. To the east, 

however, the British division's left brigade struck a soft spot in the German defenses. The strong point at la Riviere held 

out only a few hours and when it fell at 

about 1000 its defenders, the 441st Ost 

Battalion, attached to the 716th Division, 

broke and pulled out, leaving the road to 

Bayeux open. This development, however, was not known to the British. Opposition continued to be reported south of 

Buhot, at Ryes, St. Sui pice, and Summervieu. It was always difficult in the early 

stages of the assault properly to distinguish enemy delaying action from major 

opposition or to discover where the holes 

were in the German defense. The 50th 

Division, moreover, still had only its 

assault forces ashore. Rising tide had prevented effective clearance of underwater 

obstacles. Enemy opposition and mines 

delayed the opening of beach exits. 

Caught in the resulting congestion, the 

two follow-up brigades of the 50th Division \Vere two hours late in landing. 

When they did arrive, they found their 

assembly areas still not entirely cleared 

of enemy. Elements of the 352d Division, 

in fact, were still on the Meuvaines ridge 

after midday.78 

From the German point of view the 

crumbling of the 441 st Ost Battalion was 

immediately critical. The gap had to be 

plugged at once. The 915th Regiment reinforced (LXXXIV Corps reserve) had 

been stationed near Bayeux and had often 

practiced just the maneuver now required-counterthrust, toward Crepon. 

78 Facts on British action furnished by the British 

Cabinet Office Hist Sec. 

321 

But earlier in the morning (at 0400) the 

915 th had been ordered to the CarentanIsigny area to attack reported large-scale 

enemy airborne landings between the 

Vire and Douve Rivers. The report was 

discovered to be unfounded at just about 

the time the hole in the 716th Division 

opened up. Threatened with having his 

whole right flank rolled up, Generalleutnant Dietrich Kraiss, the commanding 

general of the 352d Division, secured 

corps approval for the return of the 915th 

Regiment. But an hour was consumed trying to reach the regiment. Then it had to 

countermarch almost twenty miles from 

a point nearly five miles west of the Foret 

de Cerisy. The march was made partly on 

foot, partly by bicycle and French motor 

vehicles which suffered numerous mechanical breakdowns. Another three 

hours passed before even a portion of the 

unit was in position to attack. That delay 

proved crucial, for in those hours much 

happened to change the situation on 

OM AHA completely.79 

T he D-Day Beachhead 

First Army's assault plans provided that 

the initial task of clearing the beaches be 

carried out by assault sections organized 

by boatloads. Troops were then to proceed inland to various assembly areas 

where they would be reorganized in battalions and regiments to carry out their 

subsequent D-Day missions of securing 

and consolidating the corps beachheads. 

On OMAHA Beach the troops of V Corps 

in order to reach their assembly areas had 

to cross a beach flat, varying in width from 

a few yards at each end to about 200 yards 

in the center, and climb steep bluffs be7~ MS # B-432 (Ziegelmann). 
322 

hind. (See Map XI. ) Al though the beach 

flat offered only patches of tall marsh grass 

for concealment, the bluffs had irregularities that could provide cover for individual riflemen. The plan called for clearing 

five exit roads from the beach and an advance inland generally along the axis of 

these roads. But despite naval bombardment and tank fire from the beach on enemy positions defending these roads all 

remained active during the first two hours 

of the assault. Movement off the beach, 

in consequence, at first took place between the exits. It began before 0800 in a 

number of independent actions by groups 

of men, never more than of company size 

and often much smaller. Some of the attacks had tank fire support; others were 

materially aided by the bold action of 

destroyers which came within a few hundred yards of the beach and delivered direct fire wherever they could observe enemyactivity.80 

Certainly the first troops to move inland were the Ranger companies at Pointe 

du Hoe, though their action was independent of the main landings at OMAHA 

and was, in fact, part of the fire support 

plan rather than of the assault proper. 

Forty minutes late, the three companies 

of the 2d Ranger Battalion under command of Lt. Col. James E. Rudder 81 

made landfall under close-in supporting 

fire of the U.S. destroyer Satterlee and the 

British destroyer Talybont. The Satterlee} having delivered effective prelimi80 Admiral Hall, commander of Task Force 0, 

paid special tribute to U.S. destroyers Carmick, Doyle, 

McCook, Thompson, Frankford, Harding, Emmons, 

and Baldwin, and British Hunt class destroyers 

Melbreak, Talybont, and Tanatside. ANCXF Report, 

Vol. III, Rpt, Comdr Assault Force 0, p. 56. 

81 Colonel Rudder was awarded the DSC for extraordinary heroism in continuing to lead his battalion despite being twice wounded. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

nary fire, stayed in the area near shore and 

watched over the Ranger action most of 

the day. By 1730 it had expended 70 percent of its ammunition in missions in aid 

of the Rangers and was relieved by the 

Barton and ThomjJson. The Satterlee's 

fire was particularly effective during the 

first moments of the assault when it forced 

the enemy to take cover while the Rangers scaled the cliff with ropes and ladders.82 Enemy fire, reduced by the naval 

shellings, remained light after the Rangers reached the top of the cliff and began 

moving inland in groups of three or four 

across a desert cratered by concentrated 

aerial and naval bombardment. In disparate and confused actions the Rangers 

speedily carried out their primary mission. Patrols found the ISS-mm. gun emplacements deserted. The guns themselves were discovered farther inland in a 

camouflaged field position. They were, 

curiously enough, unmanned and unguarded. The handful of Rangers who 

stumbled on them were therefore able to 

destroy them easily. Thus far the Rangers, 

despite thirty to forty casualties in the 

landings, had not had a hard fight. Their 

difficulties began later in the day with the 

first of a series of counterattacks by the 

1st Battalion} 914th Regiment} that would 

keep them in a state of siege for two days, 

and reduce their combat effectives to 

about ninety.83 

82 The 352d. Division, anticipating commando as· 

saults on the cliffs, had laid 240·mm. shells hooked to 

trip wires, along the crest at 100·yard intervals. They 

were designed to roll down and explode over the 

water with an effective radius of about 650 yards. 

These shells caused no difficulty for the Rangers al· 

though they hindered beach clearance parties later 

on. See Talley Notes, cited n. 59; MS # B-432 

(Ziegelmann) . 

83 For a detailed account of the Ranger action, see 

Charles H. Taylor, "Pointe du Hoe," Small Unit 

Actions (Washington, 1946) . 
RANGERS SCALING THE CLIFFS AT POINTE DU HOE 
324 

Apart from the Ranger movements at 

Pointe du Hoe, the principal areas of 

penetration inland were four, two in each 

regimental zone. The ll6th Infantry with 

the 5th Ranger Battalion made successful 

independent attacks inland on both sides 

of the les Moulins draw. On the west side 

Company C, urged on by Colonel Canham and General Cota, left the protection 

of the sea wall and, after blowing a gap in 

the concertina wire along the beach road, 

crossed the 150 yards of beach Rat to the 

bluffs.84 Men were lost to machine gun 

fire in this initial attack but, once they 

gained the hillside, smoke concealed their 

moves and small folds in the ground gave 

them good protection from enemy bullets. They found no Germans atop the 

bluff and proceeded a couple of hundred 

yards inland before fire from the Ranks 

caused them to halt. Company C was 

closely followed by the 5th Ranger Battalion which sent its men forward by platoons as they landed. The command 

group of General Cota was established 

shortly after 0830 near the crest of the hill 

and began the task of reorganizing disordered units. 

At approximately the same time the 3d 

Battalion, 1 1 6th Infantry, in a series of 

simultaneous; independent advances by 

straggling columns of twenty to thirty 

men, left the beaches east of les Moulins 

and arrived by various routes on the high 

ground. Meeting no resistance on the 

crest, the sections, coagulating haphazardly into larger groups, began moving 

southwest generally toward St. Laurent 

and their designated assembly area beyond. 

84 Both General Cota and Colonel Canham were 

awarded the DSC for extraordinary heroism shown 

during their D-D'a)' leadership under fire. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Penetrations in the 16th Infantry zone 

were made between the St. Laurent and 

Colleville exits and up the draw on the 

extreme eastern Rank of the beach. The 

former breach was opened up by two companies of the 2d Battalion, 16th Infantry. 

Company G and a section of Company E 

made separate attacks at about the same 

time and only a few yards apart. After 

blowing gaps through the wire beyond 

the shingle embankment the two groups 

crossed the Rats and converged on the 

lower slopes of the bluff. But despite some 

effort to co-ordinate the advance the 

"companies" continued independently, 

threading their way through mine fields 

that took some casualties and slowed the 

advance. Company G, covered by the fire 

of their 60-mm. mortars and light machine guns emplaced on the beach, gained 

the top of the bluff against only light enemy opposition and pushed inland. Company E (consisting of twenty-three men 

under 2d Lt. John M. Spalding) on 

reaching the top of the hill turned west 

and attacked the rear of the enemy fortifications defending the east side of the St. 

Laurent exit. It was a typical coastal position including pillboxes and a maze of 

communicating trenches. The garrison, 

men of the 916th Regiment) caught by 

surprise and demoralized by naval fire 

hitting just below the top of the bluff, 

fought a confused battle for about two 

hours before an officer was cornered and 

forced with a group of about twenty men 

to surrender. Although Lieutenant Spalding had too few men to mop up the area, 

his action was the first step in clearing a 

vehicle exit from the beach. In the meantime most of the 2d and 1st Battalions of 

the 16th Infantry had followed Company 

G's route up the bluffs, on order of Colo-
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

nel Taylor, regimental commander, who 

on his arrival on the beach at 0815 had 

begun organizing his men and pushing 

them forward. 

The 3d Battalion, 16th Infantry, at the 

same time had opened its own path inland at the draw northeast of Colleville. 

Under covering fire from tanks on the 

beach and naval guns, 3d Battalion units 

made a direct attack on the enemy strong 

point defending this draw and by 0900 

had, with surprisingly small losses, succeeded in subduing it.85 

Improvisation and courageous personal 

leadership in the first hours had taken 

considerable numbers of troops off the 

beach where for a time it had looked as 

though they might be stopped. However, 

the initial successes were limited by the 

fact that the infantry had very few heavy 

weapons, no supporting artillery, and, 

since the beach exits had not been 

cleared, little prospect of getting tank support or large-scale supplies or reinforcements. The beaches themselves remained 

under heavy enemy fire and on most sectors no gaps had been blown through the 

obstacles. The obstacles submerged by the 

rising tide materially increased the difficulties of approaching the beach. Landing craft became more and more congested offshore. When shortly after 1000 

the 18th Infantry began landing in column of battalions in the 16th Infantry 

zone, it must have looked to them as 

though little progress of any kind had 

been made in the assault. The enemy apparently still had control of the high 

ground above the beach; American troops 

still seemed pinned behind the shingle 

85 American losses were one killed and five 

wounded. Thirty-one German prisoners were takell 

at the strong point. See Combat Interv, 16th Inf. 

325 

embankment and vehicles were piled up 

along the narrow strip of beach. 

In breaking this deadlock during the 

next hour, naval intervention played an 

important part. At about 1030 two landing craft, LCT 30 and LCI (L) 544, 

steamed full ahead through the obstacles 

off the Colleville beaches, firing all weapons at enemy strong points guarding the 

Colleville draw. The craft continued to 

fire after beaching. Not only did their action prove that the obstacles could -be 

breached by ramming, but their fire, 

though failing to neutralize German positions in the CoUeviUe draw, had at least 

a heartening effect on the assault troops. 

At about the same time two destroyers 

approached to within 1,000 yards of the 

beach and shelled enemy positions from 

les Moulins eastward. Under cover of this 

fire engineers of the 37th and 146th Engineer Combat Battalions 86 bulldozed 

two gaps through the dune line on either 

side of the St. Laurent exit, filled the 

antitank ditch, and cleared the mine 

fields. The resistance east of this draw had 

already been neutralized by the 16th Infantry. While the engineers worked, 

heavy weapons of the 3d Battalion, 1 1 6th 

Infantry, contained other enemy defenses 

still in action. A pillbox west of the draw 

was reduced by skillfully directed destroyer fire at about 1130. The Germans 

in this last organized defense at the St. 

Laurent draw surrendered to the 2d Battalion of the 18th Infantry, which had begun landing at about 1000. Thus, in little 

over an hour, concerted bold action had 

wrought the most substantial improvement on the beach since H Hour. Reinforcements were coming ashore, and most 

86 Not the 149th, as given in Taylor, Omaha 

Beachhead, p. 82. 
326 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

important of all a road \vas at last open 

to rnove vehicles inland. 

In the meantime the battles inland 

were already being joined. The troops 

who gained the top of the bluffs by midmorning were scattered groups, a small 

percentage of the assault battalions, who 

were incapable of carrying out the D-Day 

advances as planned. Their objecti\res at 

first were simply to reach the various battalion assembly areas. Because of their 

small numbers and the difficulty of con 

trol in the hedgerow country their actions 

were fragmented, and because they completely lacked both armored and artillery 

support their movements could be, and 

constantly were, checked by small enemy 

prepared positions seldom held in even 

as much as company strength. 

Under the circumstances, this scattered 

resistance by small enemy groups constituted in sum a considerable obstacle to 

American advance. Furthermore, sporadic and un-co-ordinated as it seemed, it 

was in general the kind, though not quite 

the scale, of defense that the Germans 

had planned. Determined resistance in 

coastal positions, even though isolated or 

bypassed, did succeed at first in splintering the attacking forces so that only weak, 

disorganized elements could penetrate 

the hinterland. Continued, though relatively feeble, nodal defense inland during 

the day had the further effect of hindering 

reorganization and co-ordinated American action. So far the theory of coastal defense seemed justified in practice. That 

nothing came of this initial success was 

due, first, to the Germans’ lack of reserves 

with which to counterattack the relatively 

weak penetrations, and, second, to the 

fact that, while the American ground attack had locally and temporarily been 

splintered, the vast supporting nal,al and 

air power was practically unopposed. By 

dominating the battlefield, planes and naval guns smashed such German reserves as 

could be gathered for a counterthrust and 

so gave the fragmented V’ Corps infantry 

a chance to recover, rebuild, and again become a ground army superior in numbers 

and equipment to anything that the Germans could thereafter muster to meet 

them. 

Action during the remainder of D Day 

inland from OMAHA Beach took place in 

three general areas, Vierville-sur-Mer, St. 

Laurent, and Colleville. The three actions were generally unconnected and unco-ordinated. 

Attacks on Vierville-sur-Mer were made 

by elements of the 1st and 2d Battalions 

of the 116th Infantry and the 5th Ranger 

Battalion-something more than 600 men 

altogether. These units were reorganized 

near the edge of the bluff and started inland between 1000 and 1100. The plan 

was for the Rangers to bypass the town 

and attack from the south while the 116th 

advanced along the exit road. The Rangers reached the coastal highway but found 

further advance across the fields checked 

by enemy machine gun positions concealed among the hedgerows. After four 

hours of trying in vain to get around the 

enemy guns, they turned and entered 

Vierville in the early afternoon. The town 

had already been captured by the 116th,

which met little opposition in its frontal 

attack. At 1100 Vierville was clear, and 

Colonel Canham then tried to push the 

attack westward to make juncture with 

the Ranger force at Pointe du Hoe. His 

men, however, encountered the same kind 

of nettling opposition that had stopped 

the Rangers. Lacking heavy weapons to 

326 

important of all a road was at lasl open 

to move vehicles inland. 

In the meantime the battles inland 

were already being joined. The troops 

who gained the top of the bluffs by midmorning were scattered groups. a small 

percentage of the assault battalions. who 

were incapable of carrying out the D-Day 

advances as planned. Their objectives at 

first were simply to reach the various battalion assembly areas. Because of their 

small numbers and the difficulty of control in the hedgerow country their actions 

were fragmented, and because they completely lacked both armored and artillery 

support their movements could be, and 

constantly were, checked by small enemy 

prepared positions seldom held in even 

as much as company strength. 

Under the circumstances, this scattered 

resistance by small enemy groups constituted in sum a considerable obstacle to 

American advance. Furthermore, sporadic and un-co-ordinated as it seemed, it 

was in general the kind, though not quite 

the scale, of defense that the Germans 

had planned. Determined resistance in 

coastal positions, even though isolated or 

bypassed, did succeed at first in splintering the attacking forces so that only weak, 

disorganized elements could penetrate 

the hinterland. Continued, though relatively feeble, nodal defense inland during 

the day had the further effect of hindering 

reorganization and co-ordinated American action. So far the theory of coastal defense seemed justified in practice. That 

nothing came of this initial success was 

due, first, to the Germans' lack of reserves 

with which to counterattack the relatively 

weak penetrations, and, second, to the 

fact that, while the American ground attack had locally and temporarily been 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

splintered, the vast supporting naval and 

air power was practically unopposed. By 

dominating the battlefield, planes and naval guns smashed such German reserves as 

could be gathered for a counterthrust and 

so gave the fragmented V Corps infantry 

a chance to recover, rebuild, and again become a ground army superior in numbers 

and equipment to anything that the Germans could thereafter muster to meet 

them. 

Action during the remainder of D Day 

inland from OMAHA Beach took place in 

three general areas, Vierville-sur-Mer, St. 

Laurent, and Colleville. The three actions were generally unconnected and unco-ordinated. 

Attacks on Vierville-sur-Mer were made 

by elements of the I st and 2d Battalions 

of the I I 6th Infantry and the 5th Ranger 

Battalion-something more than 600 men 

altogether. These units were reorganized 

near the edge of the bluff and started inland between 1000 and 1100. The plan 

was for the Rangers to bypass the town 

and attack from the south while the 116th 

advanced along the exit road. The Rangers reached the coastal highway but found 

further advance across the fields checked 

by enemy machine gun positions concealed among the hedgerows. After four 

hours of trying in vain to get around the 

enemy guns, they turned and entered 

Vierville in the early afternoon. The town 

had already been captured by the 1 1 6th, 

which met little opposition in its frontal 

attack. At 1100 Vierville was clear, and 

Colonel Canham then tried to push the 

attack westward to make juncture with 

the Ranger force at Pointe du Hoe. His 

men, however, encountered the same kind 

of nettling opposition that had stopped 

the Rangers. Lacking heavy weapons to 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

support the attack, Colonel Canham decided to call it off and return to the defense of Vierville. He had few men to 

spare from that task since few reinforcements had landed in the area and the 

beach exit was not opened until evening. 

Although enemy beach defenses opposite 

Vierville had been largely neutralized by 

naval fire early in the afternoon, the engineers responsible for clearing the exit 

had scattered in the landing, losing threequarters of their equipment and many of 

their men. 

East of the les Moulins draw, the 3d 

Battalion, I I 6th Infantry, and scattered 

sections of the 2d Battalion fought inland 

toward St. Laurent and the 3d Battalion 

assembly area southwest. During the day 

confused and inconclusive fighting by 

small groups of men took place in country 

which, though relatively open, still provided the enemy with sufficient cover that 

the American troops could seldom locate 

their positions. The 116th Infantry was 

stopped short of St. Laurent. 

In the meantime northeast of the town 

another attack, by the 1 1 5th Infantry, was 

in progress. The 115th had been brought 

ashore ahead of schedule. Original plans 

had called for the rifle and heavy weapons 

companies of this regiment to be held as 

V Corps floating reserve to be employed 

on order of General Gerow. If all went 

according to plan in the initial assault, the 

I I 5th Infantry would be committed in 

the zone of the 1 I 6th to organize the high 

ground near Longueville and be prepared 

to capture Isigny. Alternative plans were 

made to have the 115th take over missions 

of the 116th in case any units of the latter 

regiment should fail in the assault. 87 IniS7 Notes on V Corps Plan, 17 May 44. Pre-Inv file 

670. Compare this use of a floating reserve with that 

327 

tially the 115th Infantry was to be on call 

between the first and second tides. But 

Maj. Gen. Charles H. Gerhardt, commanding the 29th Division, contended 

that this plan meant leaving the 116th 

Infantry without reinforcements for a 

dangerously long time.88 At the last minute, therefore, General Gerow decided to 

commit the 115th Infantry immediately 

in support of the 116th. At H Hour Admiral Hall on General Gerow's request 

gave the order to land the 115th beginning at H plus 4 hours. 

Like so many units, the 115th Infantry 

drifted eastward, and instead of coming in 

where scheduled on the beaches in the 

left portion of the 116th zone it landed on 

top of the 18th Infantry east of St. Laurent. The confusion on the crowded 

beaches and intermingling of 18th and 

115th units delayed the movement inland of both regiments. It was early afternoon when, under orders to carry out the 

primary mission in the Longueville area, 

the battalions of the 115th Infantry 

started for their assembly areas southwest 

of St. Laurent. The 2d Battalion attacked 

St. Laurent, estimated to be held by 

about a company of Germans, but could 

make no headway. At dusk the attack was 

halted and the battalion withdrawn to 

join the 1st, which had bypassed St. Laurent to the east and moved a few hundred 

yards south of the town. The 3d Battalion, 

on the regiment's left flank, had in the 

proposed by British Commanders following the 

Dieppe raid. See above, p. 191. 

BB Ltr. Gerhardt to Gen Malony, 2 Jan 47. Hist 

Div files. General Gerhardt was commissioned in the 

cavalry from West Point in 1917. He served with 

the 89th Division in the St. Mihiel and MeuseArgonne offensives in 1918. In May 1942 he became 

commander of the 91st Division and in July took 

command of the 29th Division in England. 
328 

meantime made even slower progress and 

drew up at dark still north of the St. Laurent-Colleville road. 

Between St. Laurent and Colleville a 

whole series of confused and generally 

un-co-ordinated actions were taking place 

during the remainder of D Day as parts of 

two battalions of the 16th Infantry, supported during the afternoon by the 18th 

Infantry, attempted to maneuver south to 

positions along the beachhead maintenance line. Company G, the first unit to 

move inland in this area, at first made 

rapid progress, but an attack against 

Colleville drew an enemy counterattack 

that put the company on the defensive for 

the rest of the day. Elements of the 1st 

Battalion fought separate actions in the 

same general area attempting to clean up 

isolated enem y riflemen and machine gun 

positions. 

As the 18th Infantry landed, Brig. Gen. 

Willard G. 'Wyman, the assistant division 

commander and senior army commander 

ashore, had diverted all three battalions 

to take over the missions of the 16th Infantry. The 2d Battalion, going to the 

assistance of the 2d Battalion, 16th Infantry, at Colleville, passed to the west of 

Company G and at dark halted just south 

and southeast of the town. The 3d Battalion, at first ordered to capture Formigny and Surrain, was held up so long 

by small arms harassing fire that its orders 

were changed and it was sent to the high 

ground south of the highway to tie in 

with 16th Infantry on the left and the 

11 5th on the right. The 1 st Battalion was 

directed into the same general area with 

orders to attack Surrain, but at dark was 

still north of the St. Laurent-Colleville 

road. 80 

89 18th lnf S-l Jnl. 6 Jun 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

The St. Laurent-Colleville sector was 

still considered weak. 'Vhen the 26th Infantry, the first of the follow-up forces, 

landed in the evening, two battalions 

were ordered to take defensive positions 

southeast of St. Laurent ready to attack 

toward Formigny. The remaining battalion backed up the left flank where the 

3d Battalion, 16th Infantry, with about 

one hundred men had managed to occupy 

le Grand Hameau. To help hold the position during the night seventeen tanks 

were moved up from the beach. 

While V Corps units struggled to find 

secure defenses for the night in their shallow lodgment VII Corps was pouring 

ashore almost unhindered. (See Map 3.) 

As the 8th Infantry battalions moved inland to their objectives they had oniy 

minor engagements with an enemy who, 

on the whole, showed little inclination 

to fight. The 3d Battalion was held up 

briefly north of Ste. Marie-du-Mont where 

it overran another of the batteries of the 

German 191st Artillery Regiment-the 

unit which earlier in the day had caused 

the 506th Parachute Infantry so much 

trou ble. The battalion then went on to 

the les Forges crossroads where it bivouacked for the night and where it was 

joined in the evening oy the 2d Battalion. 

The 1st Battalion had moved almost due 

west from the beaches and reached 

Turqueville by nightfall. 

The 8th Infantry, when it halted for 

the night, was confronted by an enemy 

salient which cut the Valognes-Carentan 

highway between Ste. Mere-Eglise and les 

Forges, extending northeast as far as 

Turqueville. It was enemy from this salient that had attacked Ste. Mere-Eglise 

during the morning. The 505th Para-
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

chute Infantry counterattack had caused 

only a slight enemy withdrawal southward. The Germans were able thereafter 

to consolidate on high ground at Fauville 

where they formed a strong barrier between the 8th Infantry and the 82d Airborne Division. 

Late in the afternoon a task force of 

infantry and tanks, belonging to the 82d 

Airborne Division and under command 

of Col. Edson D. Rafl, landed by sea with 

the mission of reinforcing their division 

in the Ste. Mere-Eglise area. Raff's men, 

including ninety men of the 325th Glider 

Infantry and a company of tanks of the 

746th Tank Battalion, followed the 3d 

Battalion, 8th Infantry, into the les Forges 

position. The infantry battalion had already decided not to attack northward 

that evening. Raff, however, was concerned not only with getting his tanks 

through to his division, but also with 

clearing the area north of les Forges. The 

meadows in this area were the division's 

glider landing zone. Here at dusk artillery 

units were to land. Raff's tanks and infantry made several jabs at the enemy to try 

to discover his dispositions but, after 

three tanks were lost to enemy high-velocity fire, the attempt to get through was 

abandoned. The enemy remained at full 

strength and still well concealed when, on 

schedule at 2100, about sixty gliders came 

in low over the area and cut loose for 

landings. The Germans reacted with intense automatic fire. Many of the gliders 

crashed, others came down within the 

enemy lines. Casualties were heavy. Remnants of the glider force including the 

pilots were collected by Colonel Raff and 

formed into a makeshift defense for the 

night. 

In the northern portion of the 4th Di329 

vision zone neither the 12th nor the 22d 

Infantry Regiment reached its D-Day objective. Delays were caused not by enemy 

opposition but by the difficulties of moving up through the marshes. The 22d was 

halted in the general area from Hamel de 

Cruttes on the coast to St. Germain-deVarreville. The 12th came up on the left 

of the 502d Parachute Infantry, which was 

holding the 101 st Division north flank 

near Beuzeville-au-Plain. 

General Bradley's right corps on UTAH 

Beach had its weaknesses at the end of 

D Day, but on the whole it was in a sound 

position, smaller than planned but better 

organized and stronger than might have 

been expected. The beach, though still 

under intermittent enemy artillery fire, 

was cleared and prepared for the orderly 

reception of reinforcements. The 4th Division was present in the beachhead virtually intact, organized and equipped for 

offensive action. Its casualties for the day 

were less than 200. If the position of the 

82d Airborne Division caused some concern, the force was at hand to consolidate it. 

The situation on the left at OMAHA was 

quite different. The main V Corps position at the end of the day was the narrow 

sector between St. Laurent and Colleville, 

a toehold on the enemy- shore nowhere 

more than a mile and a half deep. The 

right flank at Vierville-sur-Mer, held by 

elements of the 1 1 6th Infantry and the 

Rangers, was isolated from the main body 

although the beach exit was open and reinforcements thus could be brought in. 

All units were lacking vehicles, supplies, 

ammunition, artillery, and armored support necessary for further advance inland. 

No artillery could be landed during the 

morning. The elements of five battalions 
330 

which beached in the afternoon all suffered heavy losses of equipment, including a total of twenty-six guns. Two antiaircraft gun battalions scheduled to arrive 

on D Day could not come in until the following day. Only one artillery mission 

was fired on 6 June. The V Corps losses 

for the day were about 2,000 killed, 

wounded, and missing. 90 

The failure of the Germans to exploit 

the weakness of V Corps was the result 

quite simply of their own greater weakness. During the first few hours it looked 

as though the OMAHA assault had been 

stopped, and the chief concern of the 

352d Division was with its right flank 

which was threatened by the British penetration near Meuvaines. (See Map 

XII. ) To meet this the LXXXIV Corps 

reserve, the reinforced 915 th Regiment 

(Kampfgruppe Meyer) had been ordered 

to attack in the direction of Crepon. By 

1100 the division commander, General 

Kraiss, began to consider the situation in 

his center more serious in the light of 

90 This is frankly a guess, based on a number of 

estimates of various dates and various headquarters, 

none of which agree. Under the Army's present 

casualty reporting system, it is unlikely that accurate figures of D-Day losses by unit will ever be 

available. The V Corps History gives D-Day losses 

as 2,374, of which the 1st Division lost 1,190, the 

29th Division 743, and corps troops 441. The after 

action report of the 1st Division and the 29th Division history both scale down their own losses slightly . 

. See Joseph H. Ewing, 29, Let's Go (Washington, 

1948), p. 306. Source for the 1st Division report is 

its own G-I report of daily casualties; source for the 

29th Division figures is not given. On 8 June the 1st 

Division G-I issued a "corrected" casualty report 

for D Day and D plus I which reduced total losses 

reported for the two days from 1,870 to 1,036. See 

V Corps G-3 Jnl. Neither the original report nor the 

corrected one conforms to the division G-l's accounting in his monthly report of operations. See study 

of First Army casualties during June 1944, prepared 

by Royce L. Thompson, MS. Hist Div files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

additional information on the whole invasion front. The 709th Division opposing U.S. VII Corps was reporting strong 

armored reinforcements landed from the 

sea. At the same time the British were 

building up their beachhead. A concentration of shipping observed off St. Laurent was thought to indicate Allied intention to reinforce what had heretofore 

been considered minor penetrations in 

the St. Laurent area.91 General Kraiss concluded (apparently for the first time) that 

the Allies were planning a two-pronged 

attack on Bayeux from bridgeheads at St. 

Laurent and Meuvaines. The 2d Battalion of the 915th Regiment was therefore 

split off from the force on its way toward 

Crepon and together with one antitank 

company (with twelve self-propelled 75-

mm. antitank guns) was attached to the 

916th Regiment in the center of the division sector. The infantry reinforcements 

moved into the Colleville area in the 

early afternoon but reported that their 

counterattack had been stopped by firm 

American resistance and that they had 

suffered heavy losses. 

The body of Kampfgruppe Meyer 92 

in the meantime advanced toward the 

area Bazenville-Villiers-le-Sec whence it 

planned to attack to Crepon. By the time 

it reached its assembly area at about 1730 

it found the British already in possession. 

The units on the right were able to with91 It is possible that the Germans were interpreting 

as concentration of force what was actually only 

congestion of landing craft backlogged by the difficulties of beaching them. See above, n. 77. 

92 Consisting of the 1st Batta/ion, 915th Regiment, 

the 352d Fuesilier Battalion, and one company of the 

352d Antitank Battalion (the 1352d Assault Gun 

Company) equipped with ten assault guns. MS # 

B-432. Ziegelmann's reference to the 1352d Assault 

Gun Battalion is an error. Cf. Kriegsgliederung, 18 

May 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-30.VI.44. 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 331 

NINTH AIR FORCE B-26 OVER BRITISH BEACHHEAD at Lion-sur-Mer. 

Note markings on plane. All Allied aircraft, except 4-engine bombers, in support 

of the invasion were painted thus for purposes of identification. Two black and three 

white stripes were painted on wings and around the fuselages. 

draw to St. Gabriel where they were 

joined by the ten assault guns of the 

Kampfgruppe. But the infantry battallion under direct command of Colonel 

Meyer on the left brushed with British 

forces near Bazenville. Meyer was killed 

and the battalion lost contact with other 

German units for several hours. It seems 

clear that Meyer's forces made no concerted attack, but were chewed up in 

small defensive actions. The assault guns 

scored the only success of the day in 

knocking out four British tanks near 

Bn~cy. On the other hand four of the 

guns were themselves lost, possibly to 

British naval fire. Out of the entire 

Kampfgruppe only about ninety men escaped. In the evening these remnants 

were attached to the 726th Regiment, 

which was ordered to establish a defensive line: Coulombs-St. Gabriel-the 

Seulles River west to Esquay-sur-SeullesHill 64 (west of Bazenville)-the Gronde 

River to Asnelles-sur-Mer. The plan for 

7 June on this front was simply to muster 

all available troops including artillery 

units in Kampfgruppen to prevent a British break-through into Bayeux.93 

93 This story has been pieced together from the 

telephone diary of the 352d Division and from reports 

of British action supplied to the author by the 

British Cabinet Office Hist Sec. The account (MS 

# B-432) written after the war by Lt. Col. Ziegelmann, G-3 of the 352d Division, telling of a counter· 

attack smashed by Allied fighter bomber interception 

and overrun by British tanks seems considerably exaggerated. 
332 

In the meantime the commander of the 

British 50th Division had decided to halt 

on a line north and northeast of the city 

roughly between Vaux-sur-Orne and 

Vaux-sur-Seulles. He had been advancing against very slight opposition, but because of the delays in getting started he 

feared that he could not occupy Bayeux 

and organize a proper defense before 

dark. He ordered the attack to be resumed at daylight.94 

Most of the countermeasures initiated 

by DB WEST and Army Group B on 

D Day were directed against the British. 

Because the British had established the 

most extensive beachhead, their landings seemed to constitute the main Allied effort. Matching the success of the 

50th Division immediately on the flank 

of U.S. V Corps, the 3d Canadian Division, landing on beaches near CourseulJes, 

had advanced from three to six miles and 

had sent armored patrols as far as Bretteville l'Orgueilleuse some ten miles from 

the beach. On its left the 3d British 

Division advanced beyond Bieville to 

within about two miles of Caen. East of 

the Orne River the two parachute brigades of the 6th Airborne Division had 

successfully accomplished their missions 

of seizing bridges at Benouville and destroying the enemy coastal battery at 

Merville. Although the advances of all 

British units fell short of their objectives 

(particularly in the failure to take either 

Caen or Bayeux), they nevertheless represented the widest and deepest penetration on the Allied front. Besides, they 

broke through what the Germans considered an especially vital portion of the 

D4 From information furnished by British Cabinet 

Office H ist Sec. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

defense. Caen was the gateway to the 

open country constituting the best tank 

route to Paris. In German eyes it was 

therefore the key to their whole position 

in France. 

At 0500 A rmy Group B released the 

21st Panzer Division (Generalleutnant 

Edgar Feuchtinger) to Seventh Army 

control in order to counterattack British 

airborne landings east of the Orne River. 

For the attack the division lacked half 

of its infantry, one artillery battalion, 

and the antiaircraft and antitank battalions. These units, located on both 

sides of the Orne River, had been attached to the 716th Division after the 

seaborne landings began. General Feuchtinger organized the remainder of his 

troops and started them northward. But, 

while still on the approach march, at 

about noon he was ordered to cross the 

Orne and make his attack west of the 

river to counter directly the threat to 

Caen. Delayed in passing through Caen 

where only one bridge over the Orne was 

still usable, Feuchtinger could not jump 

off until 1600. Then, with his troops organized in two regimental combat teams, 

he attacked the British 3d Division from 

about the line St. Contest-Herouville. 

The attack was heavily resisted and made 

little progress along the Orne. But to 

the west one battalion struck through to 

Cresserons and sent elements to the coast. 

A few stragglers got into a Luftwaffe 

communications bunker near Douvres 

where they held out until 17 June, but 

the bulk of the battalion after being 

badly mauled pulled out. Before dark 

F euchtinger halted the attack all along 

the line and ordered his units to dig in 

only a few hundred yards north of the 

line of departure. He tied in with in-
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

fantry units of the division fighting east 

of the Orne.95 

Feuchtinger's attack, stopped before 

it had achieved anything, was the only 

large-scale counterattack on D Day. That 

no more decisive moves were taken was 

due at least in part to the muddled German command system. Rundstedt had 

reacted to the first news of the airborne 

landings with a quick decision to commit at once all operational reserves within striking distance. (Map XIII) He 

took this decision, despite uncertainty as 

to the extent of the Allied landings, on 

the grounds that whether the landings 

were major or subsidiary it was still imperative to repel them at once. It was 

between 0330 and 0400, two hours before 

the seaborne landings, that he ordered 

the 12th SS Panzer Division to move immediate! y toward Caen and the Panzer 

Lehr Division to prepare for similar 

movement. 96 He estimated that the reported airborne landings were on such a 

large scale that they could not be a mere 

deception maneuver and they therefore 

would have to be reinforced from the 

sea. The only feasible area for such reinforcement was the east coast of the 

Cotentin and the beaches between the 

Vire and Orne Rivers. From observation 

of Allied assault exercises, the Germans 

were sure the assault on the coast would 

take place at dawn. Rundstedt wanted 

to have armor at hand to counterattack 

in the first hours. There was therefore 

es MS # B-441 (Feuchtinger). 

96 This timing is given in MS # T -121 (Zimmermann et al.) . See also Rad, 0445 (0545 DBST) , OB 

WEST to OKW /WFSt, 6 Jun 44. OKH/Op.Abt., 

Lagemeldungen OB WEST 1.IV . ...s'vI.44; cf. Fifteenth Army, KTB 1.I.-30'vI.44, 6 Jun 44. Rundstedt's reasoning detailed in the remainder of the 

paragraph is as reported in MS # T -121. 

333 

no time to debate contingencies. He 

reasoned further that, even if the Normandy assault were planned by the Allies 

as a secondary effort, it was probable that 

they would exploit whatever success it 

achieved. The attack, whatever its character, should therefore be met with all available force. Rundstedt's reasoning was 

clear and his action decisive. But the two 

panzer divisions which he ordered' to 

move were not under his command. They 

were in OKW reserve. To save precious 

time Rundstedt issued his orders first and 

then notified 0 K W of the action, req uesting approval. OKW did not approve. At 

about 0730 JodI informed Rundstedt 

that the two divisions would not be committed until orders were received from 

Bitler. The 12th SS Panzer Division was 

to hold up at Lisieux; Panzer Lehr would 

not move at all. In contrast to his earlier 

decisiveness, Rundstedt apparently accepted this critical intervention by Hitler's staff without argument. He made 

no effort to leach Hitler himse!f.97 The 

two panzer divisions waited, far from the 

beachheads, all during the morning 

hours of heavy overcast that might have 

permitted them to move without serious 

interference from Allied aircraft. They 

waited until 1600 when Hitler at last 

gave the word to move both divisions 

into battle. But by then cloud cover had 

broken up. Allied fighters and bombers 

ranged the skies smashing at everything 

that moved. It was necessary to delay 

the move further until dark. 

Although scattered infantry elements 

of the 12th SS Panzer Division arrived 

91 Under the German command system it would 

have been perfectly proper for Rundstedt to have 

appealed directly to Hitler, since OKW itself did 

not have command authority except as it spoke in 

Hitler's name. 
334 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

during the afternoon at forward assembly 

areas in the zone of the 21st Panzer Division, it was actually not until 8 June that 

the bulk of the two reserve divisions 

could be committed. The plan for their 

use, developed on D Day, was to place 

both the 12th SS and Panzer Lehr Divisions under I SS Panzer Corps along 

with the 21st Panzer and 716th Infantry 

Divisions (the latter consisting at the 

end of the day of little more than one 

German battalion and about twelve artillery pieces). 98 The massed armor was 

to counterattack on the right wing of 

LXXXIV Corps. The new corps boundary was to be the former boundary between the 716th and 352d Divisions. 

The commitment of another corps in 

the Caen area would mean an indirect strengthening of General Marcks’ 

(LXXXZV Corps) position by relieving 

him of responsibility for the BayeuxOrne sector. More direct support was on 

the way, The 30th Mobile Brigade was 

moving by bicycle from Coutances toward the invasion area, but it would 

not arrive until the morning of 7 June. 

In addition Seventh Army had taken the 

first steps to shift its weight into Normandy. In the morning the army commander, General Dollmann, ordered the 

XXV Corps in Brittany to prepare the 

mobile Kampfgruppen of the 275th and 

265th Infantry .Divisions for immediate 

movement to the invasion area. General 

Dollmann also wanted to move the 

Kampfgruppe of the 266th Division and 

the entire 77th Division from Brittany 

into Normandy, but Rommel considered 

the move premature in view of certain 

reports that Brittany itself might be 

98 MS # B-621 (Richter). 

threatened with airborne landings. When 

Dollmann repeated his request that night 

as the 352d Division front seemed to be 

rapidly reaching a breaking point, Romme1 yielded so far as to alert the units 

involved.99

While waiting for these reinforcements, the 352d Division had to depend 

wholly on its dwindling resources. Its 

last reserve, the engineer battalion, was 

moved from the vicinity of St. Martinde-Blagny and attached in the evening 

to the 916th Regiment in the expectation of heavy Allied attacks on 7 June 

to exploit the Colleville-St. Laurent 

beachhead. 

At midnight General Kraiss reported 

his situation to General Marcks at corps. 

He was not sanguine. He thought his 

present forces might be sufficient to hold 

off enemy attacks on 7 June but his 

losses were so heavy that he would need 

reinforcements for the following day’s 

fighting. In the coastal positions, he 

said, he had suffered a total loss of men 

and equipment. His casualties for the 

day were about 1,200, or nearly one-fifth 

of his combat effectives. General Marcks 

replied that the reserves which could be 

spared to the 352d Division had already 

been sent forward. Kraiss would simply 

have to hold on as tenaciously as possible 

with O what he had.100 

Actually there ws a reason for the German outlook to be considerably darker 

than it was. All of the reinforcements 

ordered up on D Day would arrive late 

and many would take severe losses from 

Allied air attack on the approach march. 

Although all German commanders had 

long realized that their mobility would 

99 Seventh Army, KTB l.I.-30.VI.44, 6 Jun 44. 

100 MS # B-432 (Ziegelmann) . 
THE SIXTH OF JUNE 

be severely restricted by Allied air supremacy, the full tactical significance of 

that fact was not yet apparent. General 

Dollmann, at his most pessimistic, could 

not have foreseen that the so-called 

mobile Kampfgruppen ordered out of 

Brittany would take ten days to reach 

the battle area. 

The immediate effect of Allied air 

power on the battle for the beaches was 

discouraging enough for the Germans. 

The 352d Division observed that not a 

single German plane had appeared over 

its sector during the day. All of the 250 

sorties flown by II Air Corps on 6 June 

were against shipping. The rest of the 

German air effort, which did not exceed 

335 

500 sorties altogether, consisted largely 

of fighter interventions, a good part of 

which occurred far inland. Some of 

these were planned interventions; many 

were chance encounters by planes sent 

on support missions and jumped by Allied aircraft before they could reach the 

battle area.lOl The 500 sorties of the 

Luftwaffe were in striking contrast to the 

almost 3,000 sorties by the Ninth Air 

Force fighters and bombers alone, flying 

chiefly tactical missions in the U.S. 

zone. 102 

101 MS # B-f)20 (Buelowius). 

102 [Lt Col Robert H. George] Ninth Air Force. 

April to November 1944 (Army Air Forces Historical 

Studies: No. 36) , MS, p. 81. AAF files. 
CHAPTER IX 

The V Corps Lodgment 

(7-18 June) 

Securing the Beachheads 

Supreme in the air, the Allies began on 

D Day to build up a similarly crushing 

superiority on the ground. By the end of 

6 June 1944 First Army had succeeded in 

landing most of eight and a third infantry 

regiments-only a little less than planned. 

For operations on 7 June five divisions 

were ashore and operational (although 

one, the 29th, lacked one of its regiments 

until later in the day). All of these divisions were seriously deficient in transport, tank support, artillery, and above 

all supplies. The worst situation was in 

the V Corps zone where, of 2,400 tons of 

supplies planned to be unloaded during 

D Day, only about 100 tons actually came 

in. Ammunition shortage was grave. 

Both beaches on D plus 1 were still under 

enemy artillery fire. On OMAHA pockets 

of enemy riflemen still held out at various poin,ts along the coast; beach obstacles, even after work by the engineers 

during low tide of the afternoon of D 

Day, were still only about a third cleared; 

beach exits had not been opened as 

scheduled nor vehicle parks established 

inland on the scale contemplated. 

Nowhere in First Army zone had initial objectives been fully achieved. In 

the V Corps zone not only had the two 

assault regiments stopped far short of 

their objectives along the beachhead 

maintenance line, but they were so badly 

chewed up and disorganized by the hard 

fighting that they were scarcely capable of 

continuing the attack as planned. Units 

of VII Corps had been more successful in 

staking out a beachhead large enough to 

remove the beaches from direct enemy 

fire and to provide sufficient space for 

maneuver and build-up. The 4th Division had taken only light casualties and 

was in relatively good condition for subseq uent attacks. Nevertheless the area 

was considerably smaller than desired 

and the initial efforts to push it out westward across the Merderet and southward 

toward a junction with V Corps were 

barred by the hard-fighting 91 st Division. 

The operations in the two days following the landings were a continuation 

of the assault phase as all units sought to 

reach their D-Day objectives.1 The exhaustion of the 16th and l16th Infantry 

Regiments in the V Corps zone required 

some reshuffling of regimental and battalion missions, and, in the VII Corps 

zone, missions of the 4th Division had to 

be tempered to conform to the realities 

of enemy opposition. 

In effect, the V Corps attack continued 

on 7 June with two divisions abreast although the regiments of the 29th Divi1 See below, however. for shift in operational priorities to insure early junction of V and VII Corps 

beachheads. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 337 

sion did not formally come under command of Maj. Gen. Charles H. Gerhardt, 

the division commander, until 1700. Ger· 

hardt had landed on the evening of D Day 

and with General Cota planned and 

directed the operations of the l15th and 

116th Infantry Regiments during D plus 

I. (MaPXIV) The third regiment of the 

division, the 175th Infantry, began landing at 1230 on 7 June, two hours later 

than scheduled, and was ashore by 1630. 

The 29th Division operated generally 

west of a line through St. Laurent and 

Formigny; the 1st Division, with all three 

of its regiments in line, operated generally to the east. 

The principal 1st Division attack on 

7 June was the 18th Infantry's drive 

southward toward its D-Day objectives: 

the high ground north of Trevieres and 

the Mandeville-Mosles area south of the 

Aure River. For this attack the 3d Battalion, 26th Infantry, was attached. The 

other tasks confronting the 1st Division 

were to make contact with the British 

and to clean out the Colleville area. To 

accomplish the first, two battalions (the 

1st of the 26th Infantry and the 3d of the 

16th Infantry) under control of the 16th 

attacked southeastward with the mission 

of taking the high ground west and southwest of Port-en-Bessin, including Mt. 

Cauvin. The clean-up job was assigned to 

the 1st and 2d Battalions of the 16th 

Infantry. The 2d Battalion, 26th Infantry, was held in division reserve. 

Despite wide dispersion of the attacking battalions and scanty artillery and 

tank support, all units made good progress against slight and sporadic resistance. 

A marked degree of enemy disorganization had been observed beginning on the 

afternoon of D Day. Expected counter· 

attacks had not materialized and the 

enemy's morale seemed low. The 1st 

Division realized that it was through the 

coastal crust and at the moment had to 

deal only with remnants of the 352d 

Division. It was thought, however, that 

an armored counterattack might be in 

the making. 2 

On the right, Huppain and the forward slopes of the ridge line 1,000 yards 

north of Mt. Cauvin were occupied. But 

the enemy, strongly opposing simultaneQUS British attacks from the east, continued to hold a narrow wedge between American and British beachheads 

through Port-en-Bessin and south along 

the valley of the Drome River. In the 

center the 18th Infantry made two crossings of the Aure, the 2d Battalion occupying Mosles and the 3d, Mandeville. 

The I st Battalion, effectively supported 

by five tanks of the 741st Tank Battalion, 

captured the high ground at Engranville 

after a fight with something less than a 

company of German infantry which 

lasted most of the afternoon. 

The success of the 18th Infantry attack 

was somewhat qualified by the inability 

of the 3d Battalion, 26th Infantry, on the 

division's right to take Formigny. Although opposition by exhausted elements 

of the 916th Regiment was not heavy. 

the battalion was unable to get moving.s 

2 1st Div G-2 Per Rpt 1. 

8 The 26th Infantry casualties for the day were 

ollly 15 killed and missing and 110 wounded. The 

G-3 of the German 352d Division in reporting on 

this action cited the Formigny assault as an ex· 

ample of the sluggishness of American infantry at· 

tack over open terrain, which he found in strong 

contrast to the determined fighting by individual 

American riflemen in the towns. See MS # 8-433 

(Ziegelmann) . 
338 

It was not until the next morning that 

the enemy was driven out of Formigny 

by a company of 18th Infantry and some 

tanks attacking from the Engranville 

position. 

On the German side the 352d Division 

at the end of D Day had been chiefly concerned with its open flank where the 

British were driving into the hole opened 

by the collapse of the left wing of the 

716th Division. Throughout 7 June there 

was little General Kraiss could do to repair the damage, for his last organic reserves had had to be committed in the 

center where the 916th Regiment was 

strained to the breaking point. At noon 

he requested and secured the attachment 

of the 30th Mobile Brigade. The brigade, 

which came up from Coutances on bicycles, arrived only late in the afternoon, 

its young, inexperienced recruits tired 

in body and spirit from constant attacks 

by low-flying planes along the route. One 

battalion (the 513th) was committed in 

the vicinity of Formigny to strengthen 

the 916th Regiment. 

The brigade, less this battalion, assembled northwest of Bayeux and was 

attached to the 726th Regiment with orders to attack the flank of British forces 

advancing on Bayeux. (See Map XII.) 

Action of German units in the Bayeux 

area during 7 June was so confused that 

no coherent story can be told in detail. 

The whole flank of the 352d Division 

from the Drome River to the division 

boundary east of St. Leger was falling 

apart. The disintegration, furthermore, 

was so rapid that reports reaching division headquarters were late and scattered. 

As evidence of the confusion, it is worth 

contrasting the German command picCROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ture of the action with what actually 

happened. 4 

In the early afternoon following the 

commitment of the 30th Mobile Brigade, 

General Kraiss's headquarters believed 

that the 352d Division held a thin defensive arc north and northeast of Bayeux 

from about Vaux-sur-Aure to Sommervieu. From left to right the units engaged were the 30th Mobile Brigade 

(-), elements of the 2d Battalion, 916th 

Regiment, and elements of the 3d Battalion, 1352d Artillery Regiment. Having 

expended their last rounds, these units 

had destroyed their guns and fought as 

infantry. South of this line there were 

only scratch forces, the most important 

of which were remnants of KamPfgruppe 

Meyer (2d Battalion, 915th Regiment 

and the Fuesilier Battalion, 352d Division), thought to be defending weakly 

northeast and north of Tilly-sur-SeuUes. 

The Bayeux defense was believed to have 

held during the day, despite penetrations 

by British armor and a British thrust 

through Sommervieu which was reported 

to have split the 2d Battalion, 916th, 

from the artillery unit. At midnight, the 

352d Division and Seventh Army supposed that the main British advance had 

been checked short of Bayeux and that 

countermeasures were in process to avert 

the fall of the city. While the 352d Division commander, General Kraiss, seriously doubted that those measures would 

succeed in view of the depletion of his 

own forces and their exhaustion after 

constant pounding by AUied aircraft and 

4 See MS # B-433 and MS # B-434 (both by 

Ziegelmann); Seventh Army, KTB l.l.-30.VI.44, 6 

and 7 Jun 44; information from British Cabinet Of· 

fice Hist Sec. Hist Div files. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 339 

naval artillery, he still did not know 

the true extent of the collapse on his 

right. 5 

The collapse was, in fact, almost complete. In the morning of 7 June, before 

the arrival of the 30th Mobile Brigade 

on the Drome River, two battalions of 

the British 56th Infantry Brigade (50th 

Division) entered Bayeux and by noon 

had cleared the city. The British then 

pushed out along the southwest road to 

occupy the high ground at Monunirel. 

The third battalion of the brigade in the 

meantime advanced about two miles 

southwest from Vaux-sur-Aure. On the 

coast, the 47th Royal Marine Commando 

captured Port-en-Bessin in a stiff fight 

beginning about 1600, 7 June, and not 

ending until the early morning hours of 

8 June. East of Bayeux, if there were 

still German forces at nightfall on 7 June, 

they were no more than remnants with 

insufficient coherence even to form a resistance pocket within British lines. Two 

brigades of the 50th Division were south 

of the Bayeux-Caen highway. On their 

left and astride that highway was one 

brigade of the 3d Canadian Division. 

The converging moves of the British 

50th Division and the U.S. I st Division 

on 7 June had squeezed the German 30th 

Mobile Brigade and elements of the 

726th Regiment into a narrow corridor 

along the Drome River north to its junction with the Aure. (See Map XIV.) On 

8 June the Allied vise was tightened in 

an effort to destroy the enemy forces sep~ 

arating the British and American beachheads. On the American side, the mission of attacking to effect a junction with 

5 Losses of the 352d Division during the day were 

virtually made up by the attachment of the 30th 

Mobile Brigade but the combat value of the latter 

was inferior. See MS # B-433 (Ziegelmann). 

the British was assigned to the 26th Infantry. The attack, however, never 

gathered momentum, partly because of 

the difficulty of assembling the widely 

dispersed battalions, and partly because 

of heavy enemy resistance. 

The 2d Battalion, 26th Infantry, released from division reserve at 1745, 7 

June, had moved during the night from 

the vicinity of Etreham to the crossroads 

between Mosles and Tour-en-Bessin 

which they occupied about dawn. There 

they awaited the rest of the regiment 

throughout 8 June. The 1 st Battalion, 

meanwhile, bogged down on 8 June at 

the Aure River crossing at Etreham, 

where the enemy fought stubbornly to 

hold one side of the Drome corridor. The 

3d Battalion remained at Formigny during the morning until it could be relieved 

by a battalion of the 115th Infantry. In 

the early afternoon it began a march 

down the Bayeux highway. At 1800 it attacked through the 2d Battalion positions, 

and through Tour-en-Bessin to Ste. Anne 

which it reached shortly after midnight. 

During the night a violent and confused 

action took place at Ste. Anne as the 

Germans, now in process of withdrawing 

from the corridor, fought to keep the 

escape route open. 

The 1st Division thus failed to trap 

the enemy. The British were similarly 

checked east of the Drome. Elements of 

the 50th Division attacked and cleared 

Sully during 8 June but were unable to 

hold a bridgehead over the Drome. Other 

elements of the division pressed in the 

northern end of the enemy corridor by 

clearing the chateau at Fosse Soucy. But, 

in the face of threatened enemy counterattacks, the British withdrew to high 

ground near Escures. 
340 

Thanks lo these actions, the German 

72()tli negill/e/II during the night of 8-9 

June was able to extricate the bulk of its 

forces. This was perhaps the first German 

withdrawal from coastal positions accomplished on orders from division and 

corps. In direct disobedience of Hitler's 

command to hold every inch of ground 

to the last bullet, the decision reflected 

the seriousness of the German position. 

During the morning of 8 June the 352d 

Divisioll was out of touch with the 7261h 

Regimelll. At about 1500, however, contact was established with the regimental 

commander (possibly just west of Sully). 

He was ordered to resist stubbornly with 

all available forces until nightfall and 

then break out to the southwest and form 

a defensive line from Blay east to Haley 

and thence south to Agy. Shortly after 

General Kraiss had given this order, the 

corps commander, General Marcks, came 

into the 352d Division command post. 

Marcks was asked to approve the decision 

on the grounds that, if the troops in the 

Bayeux salient were sacrificed, the division would have nothing with which to 

repair the rip in its right flank and the 

way would be open for unopposed Allied marches to the south. "After a long 

pause, the Commanding General 

[Marcks] agreed .... " 6 

While the U.S. 1st Division and the 

British converged on Bayeux the 29th 

Division on D plus 1 still found itself entangled in the enemy's coastal defenses 

and spent most of the day cleaning up 

the fragments of enemy units that were 

shattered but not destroyed by the initial 

shock of the landings. In some areas 

small arms fire from groups of enemy 

6 MS # B-433 (Ziegelmann). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

riflemen or isolated strong points was almost continuous; American troops gradually became used to moving under the 

constant crack of bullets. 

D Day had left the units of the 115th 

and 1 1 6th Infantry Regiments and a 

large part of the two Ranger battalions 

in the sliver of coast between Vierville 

and St. Laurent, where they were still 

meeting scattered opposition. The 175th 

Infantry was still afloat. A precondition 

for the division's pursuit of D-Day objectives was to expand this toehold and clear 

room for maneuver. The 115th Infantry, 

after mopping up around St. Laurent, 

attacked generally southwest toward Louvieres and Montigny, while the 116th 

Infantry with Ranger units undertook to 

clear the bluffs and go to the relief of the 

three Ranger companies isolated on 

Pointe du Hoe. 

The 115th Infantry made slow progress. Moving on a broad front, the regiment found communication difficult. 

Furthermore, since the regiment still had 

no transport, ammunition and heavy 

weapons had to be hand-carried. Near 

the end of the day Col. Eugene N. Slappey requested the immediate establishment of army supply points as an urgent 

prerequisite for further advance. 7 

Colonel Canham's 116th Infantry, on 

the other hand, advanced rapidly. The 

regiment moved in column down the 

coastal road with ten tanks rolling between files of infantry. Tank fire was 

employed to neutralize small enemy positions and the main body of the regiment 

pushed on past them. Before noon Canham was only 1,000 yards from Pointe 

du Hoe. The Rangers awaiting relief 

729th Div G-3 JnL 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 341 

there then n umbered less than lOO effectives. Their position had seriously deteriorated during the night of 6-7 June 

as a result of a counterattack by the 

914th Regiment which overran their 

outpost line and pinned the force to a 

strip of the headland only about 200 

yards deep. While destroyer fire and the 

Rangers' two mortars kept the enemy at 

bay, the situation remained desperate 

until the afternoon when two LCVP's 

landed water, food, and ammunition and 

about thirty reinforcements. At the same 

time a series of attacks by the relieving 

force from the vicinity of St. Pierre-duMont, although frustrated by well-placed 

enemy artillery fire, at least eased the 

pressure. 

By 1630 on 7 June the 17 Sth Infantry 

(Col. Paul R. Goode) had come ashore 

and was placed in the line in the vicinity 

of Gruchy. Additional landings of artillery units swelled the 29th Division's 

artillery support to a total of twenty-nine 

guns belonging to five battalions. Although the achievements of the division 

on D plus 1 seemed slight measured in 

yards or vital objectives taken, in reality 

the crust of enemy defenses was broken 

and the division was set for a full-scale 

attack on the morrow. 

The fighting in the VII Corps zone on 

D plus 1, like that in V Corps, aimed first 

at dearing the beachhead already staked 

out and second at pushing on toward 

D-Day objectives. (Map XV ) 

The only substantial advances of 7 

June were made on the north flank where 

the two regiments of the 4th Division 

pushed the enemy back two miles to his 

strongly fortified positions at Azeville 

and Crisbecq. The 12th Infantry, attacking on the left from the vicinity of Beuzeville-au-Plain, reached the forward slope 

of hills between Azeville and Ie Bisson 

where, faced with stiffened resistance, it 

halted for the night to reorganize. The 

22d Infantry on the right advanced directly on Crisbecq. It moved rapidly to 

a point between Azeville and de Dodainville where it began getting fire from the 

forts. 

Both the Crisbecq and Azeville fortifications were permanent coastal artillery 

positions thoroughly organized for defense from land attack. Crisbecq was a 

naval battery with 210-mm. guns.s Azeville contained the four French lOS-mm. 

guns of the 2d Battery of the 1261 st A rtillery Regiment (army coastal artillery). At 

both positions massive concrete blockhouses with underground ammunition 

storage and interconnecting trenches constituted the core of the fortifications and 

were ringed with barbed wire and defended by automatic weapons. At Azeville the main positions were outposted 

with concrete sentry boxes. 

Attacks were launched on both forts 

in battalion strength and were driven 

back. The task at Crisbecq was especially difficult because approach to the 

fort was canalized aiong a narrow hedged 

trail. Open fields lay on the west, and on 

the east were either swamplands or steep 

slopes. The battalion advancing along 

this trail was counterattacked on the left 

flank and fell back in considerable confusion to re-establish a line 300 yards south 

of Bas Village de Dodainville. The Germans, trying to press their advantage with 

renewed attacks after dark, were routed 

by naval fire. 

In the meantime, along the beach, the 

8 In German documents it is called the Batterie 

Marcouf· 
342 

3d Battalion of the 22d Infantry had 

been advancing northward with the mission of reducing the beach fortifications. 

Progress was slow and costly as troops 

came under small arms fire from the 

beach resistance points as well as artillery 

fire from inland batteries. About 2,000 

yards were made during the day and two 

enemy resistance nests cleared. In the 

evening the battalion was brought inland 

as regimental reserve to guard against 

further counterattacks from the AzevilleCrisbecq positions. During the night the 

bulk of the battalion returned to the 

beach to receive the surrender of the 

enemy at Taret de Ravenoville who had 

been discouraged from continued resistance chiefly by naval shelling. 

In the center of the VII Corps beachhead the day was occupied chiefly with 

eliminating the enemy forces south of 

Ste. Mhe-Eglise who on D Day had prevented firm junction between the 8th 

Infantry on the south and the 82d Airborne Division. A patrol of the 82d Airborne Division got through to General 

Barton during the night and plans were 

then co-ordinated for the next day's operations. In the morning the 8th Infantry, 

on General Barton's order, attacked the 

Turqueville salient. Turqueville itself, 

held by the 795th Georgian Battalion, 

was hit by the 1st Battalion from the 

east. After a hard fight the Russian unit 

was talked into surrender by a Russianspeaking American captive. At the same 

time the 2d and 3d Battalions struck 

north from their positions near les Forges. The 1st and 2d Battalions were supported by two companies of the 70th 

Tank Battalion.o The 3d Battalion on the 

n 70th Tk Bn AAR. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

left, advancing astride the main highway, 

was stopped hard at the Fauville-Ecoqueneauville ridge by machine gun and 

artillery fire. These troops were shaken 

loose, however, by the 2d Battalion's 

capture of Ecoqueneauville, and both 

units continued the advance. When they 

reached Ste. Mhe-Eglise they found a 

German counterattack in progress, although they apparently did not recognize 

it as such. 

This counterattack, which lasted most 

of the day, actually represented General 

von Schlieben's supreme effort to drive 

in the Cotentin beachhead from the 

north. It will be recalled that the l058th 

Regiment (less one battalion) had been 

ordered to attack St. Mere-Eglise on D 

Day. Lacking artillery, it had spent all 

day working through the hedgerows 

against spasmodic paratroop opposition 

and only reached Neuville by nightfall. 

At dawn on D plus 1 the attack was resumed. For it the l058th now received 

attachments of the 456th and 457th Artillery Battalions, the 3d Battalion of the 

243d Artillery Regiment (less one battery), the Seventh Army Sturm Battalion, 

and one company of the 709th Antitank 

Battalion with ten self-propelled 75-mm. 

guns. 10 

After preparatory fire the Sturm Battalion began the attack astride the main 

highway, initially to make contact with 

elements of the l058th Regiment which 

had been cut off in action during D Day. 

When contact was made, the attack was 

reorganized and the Sturm Battalion 

struck down the west side of the highway, with the l058th on the east. It is 

apparent that the l058th Regiment, de10 MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 
TROOPS ON UTAH BEACH UNDER ARTILLERY FIRE 
344 

moralized in the fighting of the day before, made little progress. The Sturm Battalion, however, supported by the 709th 

Division assault guns, which the Americans mistook for tanks, carried the attack to the outskirts of Ste. Mere-Eglise. 

To the American command the situation looked gravely threatening. Ste. 

Mere-Eglise, besides being important as a 

communications hub, was the core of the 

82d Airborne Division's position, which 

elsewhere was still tenuous. General Ridgway, thinking that a German armored 

thrust was building up, called for assistance. A staff officer met Maj. Gen. J. Lawton Collins, VII Corps commander, at 

the 4th Division command post near Audouville-la-HubertY Collins ordered a 

task force of the 746th Tank Battalion, 

which had been in 4th Division reserve 

near Reuville, to proceed at once to Ste. 

Mere-Eglise. The task force, commanded 

by Lt. Col. C. G. Hupfer and consisting of 

Company B, the assault gun platoon, and 

three headquarters tanks, drove into Ste. 

Mere-Eglise in the early afternoon and 

turned north along the Montebourg highway. A few hundred yards out of town 

the leading tanks came under heavy enemy artillery fire and about the same time 

spotted the German assault guns in column along the road. A fire fight began 

which, because of the column formation 

on each side, was inconclusive. Colonel 

Hupfer in the meantime reconnoitered a 

trail east of the main highway leading 

north into Neuville. Some of the 746th 

Battalion tanks took this route, entered 

11 Collins had commanded the 25th Division in the 

Pacific theater in 1942 and 1943, achieving a notable 

combat record in the Guadalcanal and New Georgia 

campaigns. In December 1943 he was transferred to 

the European theater, assuming command of the 

VII Corps the following February. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Neuville, destroyed two enemy assault 

guns, occupied the town, and took about 

sixty prisoners as well as releasing nineteen captured U.S. paratroopersP 

More significantly this armored slice 

northward cut the German forces attacking Ste. Mere-Eglise and began a panic on 

the German side. For the first time in the 

early beachhead battles the Americans 

were confronting the Germans with something like massed armor in a relatively 

small sector. When the 8th Infantry (-) 

arrived north of Ste. Mere-Eglise with two 

companies of the 70th Tank Battalion in 

support, about sixty American tanks were 

deployed in the area. While some of the 

tanks of the 746th Tank Battalion were 

moving on Neuville, Colonel MacNeely's 

2d Battalion, 8th Infantry, joined Colonel 

Vandervoort's 2d Battalion, 505th Parachute Infantry, in an infantry-tank attack 

to clear the enemy in the vicinity of Sigeville. Vandervoort, with the commander 

of the 70th Tank Battalion, Lt. Col. John 

C. Welborn, directing tank operations 

from a jeep, advanced up the highway 

north of Ste. Mere-Eglise, while MacNeely swept in from the west.13 In the envelopment 300 of the enemy were captured or killed. 

The 1058th Regiment, thus splintered 

by two separate American attacks and de-

~oralized by the presence of so many 

American tanks, broke and pulled out in 

disorder. The Sturm Battalion west of the 

highway and out of contact with the main 

force also withdrew. The retreat was 

checked only late in the day by intervention of General Schlie ben. The division 

12 Hist Div Combat Interv with 8-3, 746th Tk Bn. 

18 First Army GO 35. Colonel Welborn was awarded 

the D8C, with citation covering both this action and 

action of 6 June. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 345 

commander rallied his panicky troops 

and began putting them into a defensive 

line about 1,300 yards north of Neuville. 

Convinced after the failure of the Ste. 

Mere attack that he no longer had the 

strength needed for a successful counterattack to reduce the American bridgehead, Schlie ben determined that his policy must be simply to contain it and prevent a breakthrough to Cherbourg. He 

concentrated therefore on building a 

strong defensive line. He brought into the 

line a battalion of the 919th Regiment as 

well as the 922d Regiment (243d Division), which had arrived during the morning of 7 June. All these elements were 

formed into a Kampfgruppe under command of Oberst Helmuth Rohrbach, commander of the 729th Regiment. Further 

to concentrate his strength, Schlieben ordered the withdrawal of the bulk of the 

troops from defenses along the east coast 

which were not under attack. In succeeding days this defense was to be still further 

reinforced until it constituted a strong 

barrier to the attempts of the 4th Division 

to push north.14 

After the 8th Infantry had pushed 

north from les Forges, the 325th Glider 

Infantry began landing in the area in two 

serials as scheduled. Although somewhat 

scattered and hit by ground fire, the majority of the gliders came in where 

planned and rapid assembly ';Vas effected. 

The regiment originally intended as 82d 

Airborne Division reserve was actually 

split: one battalion was committed in the 

la Fiere area to strengthen attacks to force 

a crossing there; and one battalion was attached to the 505th Parachute Infantry 

for operations to the north of Ste. MereEglise. 

14 MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 

While the 82d Airborne Division had 

thus consolidated its base, its principal 

D-Day assignment-the establishing of 

bridgeheads across the Merderet-came 

no nearer accomplishment. On the contrary, during the morning of 7 June it 

was touch and go whether a determined 

enemy counterattack might not break the 

division's hold on the east bank of the 

river. At about 0800 the attack of elements of the enemy 1057th Regiment began to form against the American la Fiere 

position. Mortar and machine gun fire 

ranged in, chiefly on Company A, 505th 

Parachute Infantry, which was dug in to 

the right of the bridge. An hour or so later 

four Renault tanks led a German infantry 

advance across the bridge. The lead tank 

was disabled by either bazooka fire or a 

shell from a 57-mm. antitank gun that was 

supporting Company A. Although this 

checked the advance, the German infantry took advantage of the cover furnished 

by the knocked-out tank and some 

burned-out vehicles, which the American 

defenders had pulled onto the causeway 

during the night, to open a critical fire 

fight at close range. At the same time German mortar shells fell in increasing numbers among Company A's foxholes. The 

American platoon immediately to the 

right of the bridge was especially hard 

hit and eventually reduced to but fifteen 

men. These men, however, encouraged 

by the heroic leadership of Sgt. William 

D. Owens and by the presence in the thick 

of the fighting of division officers, including General Ridgway, held their line. 

The fight was halted at last by a German 

request for a half-hour's truce to remove 

the wounded. 'When the half hour expired, the enemy did not return to the attack. A count of Company A revealed that 
-

PLANES AND GLIDERS CIRCLING LES FORGES on the morning of 7 June. 

Dust is raised by gliders landing in fields at upper left. Wrecked gliders in foreground are some of those that landed on the evening of 6 June. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 347 

almost half of its combat effectives had the remainder were killed in the fire fight 

fallen in the defense, either killed or seri- preceding surrender. Only twenty-five 

ously wounded.15 men escaped to Carentan.17 

South of the 82d Division the 101st Division with small forces of the 3d Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry, and the 

501st Parachute Infantry still held precarious positions on the north bank of the 

Douve. Isolated and short of ammunition, these troops were unable to go on 

the offensive on 7 June. They nevertheless 

scored a notable success during the day 

when together they killed or captured the 

whole 1st Battalion of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment. This battalion had advanced 

on regimental order to Ste. Marie-duMont on D Day and then had been cut 

off. Patrols sent out by von der Heydte on 

7 June from St. Come-du-Mont became 

involved in fighting a few hundred yards 

east of the town and could not get 

through. The isolated battalion in the 

meantime was already moving south. 

About the middle of the afternoon paratroopers at le Port and la Barquette observed the Germans (about 800 in all) 

advancing through the open fields and 

marshes north of the river and east of the 

Carentan highway. In independent actions the men under Captain Shettle and 

those under Colonel Johnson opened fire. 

Caught by surprise and bluffed by demonstrations designed to impress them with 

overwhelming American strength, the 

majority of the Germans surrendered. 

About 250 were taken by Captain Shettie’s men at le Port, about 350 by Colonel 

Johnson at la Barquette.16 More than half 

During D Day no news of the actions 

along the Douve had reached the 101st

Division headquarters. Since capture of 

the Douve bridges was one of the most important of the division’s missions, on 

which depended the immediate security 

of VII Corps on the south and ultimate 

junction with V Corps, General Taylor 

decided on the afternoon of D Day to send 

the 506th Parachute Infantry (less the 3d 

Battalion) south on a reconnaissance in 

force. The reconnaissance, which in fact 

became an attack, led off on the morning 

of 7 June in column down the road from 

Culoville. Though harassed by scattered 

rifle fire, the 506th reached Vierville without undue delay, cleared the town, and 

then split, with the 1st Battalion heading 

down the highway to Beaumont and the 

2d diverging cross country to the left 

toward Angoville-au-Plain. Halted just 

beyond Vierville by heavy small arms fire, 

the attacks broke loose only after a platoon of medium tanks had been brought 

up and attached to the 2d Battalion. The 

1st Battalion fought its way down astride 

the highway to Beaumont where it was 

stopped by two enemy counterattacks.18

The 2d Battalion medium tanks together 

with a platoon of light tanks were then 

sent to its support and they advanced another 1,000 yards to just east of St. Comedu-Mont. 

17 MS # B-839 (von der Heydte). 

15Details from S. L. A. Marshall, Regimental Study 

5, MS. Hist Div files. Marshall’s full account was 

based on group and individual interviews which he 

collected. 

16 Colonel Johnson was awarded the DSC. 

18These “counterattacks” may have been only the 

probing patrol actions by which von der Heydte 

was trying to regain contact with his 1st Battalion. 

Von der Heydte reports no counterattacks in this 

area. Lacking two of his four battalions, he was much 

more concerned at the moment with maintaining his 

position than with aggressive action. See MS # 

B-839. 

THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 347 

almost half of its combat effectives had 

fallen in the defense, either killed or seriously wounded.H> 

South of the 82d Division the lOlst Division with small forces of the 3d Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry, and the 

50 I st Parachute Infantry still held precarious positions on the north bank of the 

Douve. Isolated and short of ammunition, these troops were unable to go on 

the offensive on 7 June. They nevertheless 

scored a notable success during the day 

when together they killed or captured the 

whole 1st Battalion of the 6th Parachute 

Regiment. This battalion had advanced 

on regimental order to Ste. Marie-duMont on D Day and then had been cut 

off. Patrols sent out by von der Heydte on 

7 June from St. Come-du-Mont became 

involved in fighting a few hundred yards 

east of the town and could not get 

through. The isolated battalion in the 

meantime was already moving south. 

About the middle of the afternoon paratroopers at Ie Port and la Barquette observed the Germans (about 800 in all) 

advancing through the open fields and 

marshes north of the river and east of the 

Carentan highway. In independent actions the men under Captain Shettle and 

those under Colonel Johnson opened fire. 

Caught by surprise and bluffed by demonstrations designed to impress them with 

overwhelming American strength, the 

majority of the Germans surrendered. 

About 250 were taken by Captain ShettIe's men at Ie Port, about 350 by Colonel 

Johnson at la Barquette.16 More than half 

15 Details from S. L. A. Marshall, Regimental Study 

5, MS. Hist Div files. Marshall's full account was 

based on group and individual interviews which he 

collected. 

16 Colonel Johnson was awarded the DSC. 

the remainder were killed in the fire fight 

preceding surrender. Only twenty-five 

men escaped to CarentanP 

During D Day no news of the actions 

along the Douve had reached the lOlst 

Division headquarters. Since capture of 

the Douve bridges was one of the most important of the division's missions, on 

which depended the immediate security 

of VII Corps on the south and ultimate 

junction with V Corps, General Taylor 

decided on the afternoon of D Day to send 

the 506th Parachute Infantry (less the 3d 

Battalion) south on a reconnaissance in 

force. The reconnaissance, which in fact 

became an attack, led off on the morning 

of 7 June in column down the road from 

Culoville. Though harassed by scattered 

rifle fire, the 506th reached Vierville without undue delay, cleared the town, and 

then split, with the 1st Battalion heading 

down the highway to Beaumont and the 

2d diverging cross country to the left 

toward Angoville-au-Plain. Halted just 

beyond Vierville by heavy small arms fire, 

the attacks broke loose only after a platoon of medium tanks had been brought 

up and attached to the 2d Battalion. The 

1st Battalion fought its way down astride 

the highway to Beaumont where it was 

stopped by two enemy counterattacks. IS 

The 2d Battalion medium tanks together 

with a platoon of light tanks were then 

sent to its support and they advanced another 1,000 yards to just east of St. Comedu-Mont. 

17 MS # B-839 (von der Heydte) . 

18 These "counterattacks" may have been only the 

probing patrol actions by which von der Heydte 

was trying to regain contact with his 1st Battalion. 

Von der Heydte reports no counterattacks in this 

area. Lacking two of his four battalions, he was much 

more concerned at the moment with maintaining his 

position than with aggressive action. See MS # 

B-839. 
348 

At the same time that the 506th Infantry was attacking south, the 2d Battalion 

of the 50lsl Infantry, which on D Day had 

fought an isolated and inconclusive action around les Droueries, continued its 

attempt to push westward into St. Comedu-Mont, still held in some force by two 

battalions under von der Heydte's command. This attack, co-ordinated in early 

afternoon with Colonel Sink, commanding the 506th Infantry, and supported by 

six medium tanks of the 746th Tank Battalion and the guns of the 65th Armored 

Field Artillery Battalion, made substantial headway. But it was a typical Normandy battle-cleaning out dug-in enemy 

riflemen and machine gun positions from 

the hedgerows field by field. The battalion did not get far enough west to tie in 

with the 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry. 

The latter was therefore ordered to withdraw to Beaumont and all units held during the night, reorganizing for resumption of the attack the next day. 

The small American gains of 7 June 

encouraged the Germans to feel that they 

had at least frustrated the Allied time 

schedule. 19 On the other hand, their own 

countermeasures planned for the day had 

also been checked, and, in general, it was 

clear that the invasion had succeeded in 

gaining a foothold. The build-up race 

was on. 

On the Caen front the 21st Panzer Division had called off its counterattack on the 

evening of D Day short of its objectives. 

(See Map XII. ) Throughout 7 June the 

division remained on the defensive except 

for small unsuccessful attacks east of the 

Orne against the British airborne forces. 

The 12th SS Panzer Division began arriv19 Tagesmeldung, 7 Jun 44. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen 6.-30.vI.44; MS # B-433 (Ziegelmann). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ing in assembly areas between eaen and 

Bronay during the day and Panzer Lehr 

Division formed to its left rear, north and 

northeast of Tilly-sur-Seulles. In the afternoon the reconnaissance battalion of the 

12th SS Panzer Division was committed to 

reconnoiter the wide gap between the 

21st Panzer and the 352d Divisions. 20 But 

air attacks had so delayed the assembly of 

I SS Panzer Corps and caused such heavy 

casualties that the corps postponed until 

the morning of 8 June the scheduled twodivision counterattack to recapture Courseulles. Rundstedt on 7 June had decided 

to put his own armored staff, Panzer 

Group West under General Geyr, in 

charge of the attack. Geyr was attached to 

Seventh Army and ordered to take over 

the sector on both sides of the Orne River 

and west as far as Tilly-sur-Seulles, seal 

off the penetrations at Caen and in the 

352d Division sector, and counterattack 

the Allies who had broken through southeast of Bayeux. But Geyr did not arrive to 

take over until the ni!-',ht of 8-9 June. In 

the meantime I .'IS Panzer CortJs had decided to make only a limited-objective 

attack with the 12th SS and 21st Panzer 

J)ivisiolls and a Kam plgru ppe of Paliza 

Lehr Division, pending the arrival of the 

tanks of the latter division. The attack of 

8 June to gain a line of departure for the 

later planned three-division attack made 

little progress and before evening both 

20 Apparently this reconnaissance unit tangled 

with the 3d Canadian Division near Authie and an 

engagement resulted heavy enough to give the 

Canadians the impression of an enemy counterattack. See notes by British Cahinet Office Hist Sec. 

Hist Div files. The German Seventh Army war diary 

is, however, emphatic on the point that no attack 

by I SS Panzer Corps took place on 7 June. The 

narrative (MS # C-024) of General Kraemer, chief 

of staff of the corps, confirms this. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 349 

divisions had gone over to the defensive. 21 

The 12th 5S was holding positions astride 

the Caen-Bayeux road between Authie 

and Carpiquet. The 21st Panzer Division, 

also on the defensive, was split on either 

side of the Orne. Panzer Lehr remained 

in assembly areas near Thury-Harcourt, 

southwest of Caen. As the attack failed to 

materialize on 8 June and Allied pressure 

continued to build up, the plan for a bold 

strike to the coast with two armored divisions abreast was abandoned. Seventh 

Army, concerned over the loss of Bayeux, 

decided to maneuver to recapture it. I SS 

Panzer Corps intended, therefore, to hold 

north and west of Caen while directing 

Panzer Lehr and portions of the 12th SS 

Panzer Division on Bayeux. Thus, as General Geyr commented later, the fist was 

unclenched just as it was ready to strike. 22 

While Seventh Army indulged fatal 

second thoughts concerning its critical 

.right flank, Field Marshal Rommel began 

to focus attention on the threat to Cherbourg. Reports of large-scale Allied airborne and glider landings in the Coutances-Lessay area caused him on the 

morning of 7 June to order the immediate 

move of both the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division and the 77th Division to 

meet the threat. He believed that the Coutances landings were part of an Allied 

move to cut off Cherbourg and the whole 

Cotentin Peninsula and that it was therefore an "unconditional necessity" to counter with all available forces. The risk of 

weakening Brittany by the transfer of the 

77th Division could be accepted, he 

21 See special Hist Div questionnaires on this action 

answered by Kraemer (CofS, I SS Panzer Corps) and 

Bayerlein (CG, Panzer Lehr Division), MS # B-814. 

See also MS # C-024 (Kraemer). 

22 MS # B-466 (Geyr). 

thought, since it looked as though the 

Allies were fully committed in Normandy.23 

Later in the morning Seventh Army assigned the task of cleaning up the west 

coast of the Cotentin to the II Parachute 

Corps then in Brittany. In addition to the 

77th Division and the 17th SS Panzer 

Grenadier Division, already under orders 

to move, the corps was to command the 

3d Parachute Division. The latter received marching orders to move by motor 

to assembly areas near those planned for 

the 17th SS northeast of Avranches. 

The 77th Division, which received orders to move by foot at 1015, actually 

began moving out at 1500. By 2000, advance elements of the 17th SS Panzer 

Grenadier Division had crossed the Loire. 

But traffic thereafter was interrupted by 

Allied air attacks on the Loire bridges 

which lasted for an hour and a half and 

scored twenty-four hits on a railroad 

bridge that the division had been using. 

With requisitioned vehicles the 3d Parachute Division formed an advanced motorized group consisting of one battalion 

from each of the regiments, two engineer 

companies, two artillery batteries, and the 

antiaircraft and signal battalions. This 

group moved out, surprisingly, without 

opposition from the air. But Seventh 

Army reported that movement of the remainder of the division was dependent 

on motor transport space from the two 

corps remaining in Brittany and requested an additional 2,000 tons from 

OB WEST and other reserves. On the 

morning of 8 June after General der Fallschirmtruppen Eugen Meindl, commanding II Parachute Corps, had personally 

23 Seventh Army, KTB l.I.-30.VI.44, 7 Jun 44. 
350 

confirmed that the reports of airborne 

landings in the Coutances area were without foundation, the II Parachute Corps 

with two divisions was diverted to St. La. 24 

Concern over the defense of Cherbourg 

again faded before the greater urgency 

of holding at Caen. This reaction was not 

due to ignorance of the true situation. 

On the contrary, on the evening of 6 June 

a copy of the VII Corps field order had 

been picked up by the 914th Regiment 

from a boat that drifted ashore in the 

mouth of the Vire River. The next evening a copy of the V Corps order was 

taken from the body of an American officer killed at Vierville-sur-Mer. The Germans thus had in their hands the entire 

scheme of maneuver and order of battle 

for American units in the first phase of 

the invasion. 25 

The fact that possession of these plans 

had no effect on the German conduct of 

operations throws considerable light on 

the tactical and strategic problems facing 

the enemy command. From the plans, 

Seventh Army and DB WEST learned 

that the major immediate objectives of 

Bradley'S forces were Cherbourg and St. 

La. But this news, after the first day, was 

hardly a revelation. The plans were confined to outlines of the initial phase and 

did not reveal American intentions beyond the establishment of a lodgment including Cherbourg and St. La. Even if 

they had revealed the planned American 

push into Brittany, however, the Ger24 Ibid., 8 June; d. MS # B--401 (Meindl). The 

two divisions at first ordered to St. L6 were the 17th 

SS Panzer Grenadier and the 77th Division. The 77th, 

however, was later ordered to Montebourg (see below, p. 370) and the 3d Parachute Division actually 

came into the St. L6 area. 

25 See MS # B-656 (Pemsel); MS # B~37 (Blumentritt) ; MS # B-636 (Ziegelmann). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

mans could not have profited materially 

from the knowledge. Rommel was not 

free to shift the weight of his defense to 

the American flank to block either the assault on Cherbourg or Bradley's planned 

move southward toward Brittany. The 

major operational threat, from his point 

of view, remained the possibility of a 

British breakout at Caen and a sweep to 

Paris. Without British plans, the Germans could not be sure that such a move 

had not been calculated. Even if it had 

not, a German collapse on that sector 

would undoubtedly be exploited to turn 

the flank of Seventh Army. In short, complete knowledge of American intentions 

could not have altered the logic of the 

battle dictated by terrain, the disposition 

of forces, and the location of the strategic 

objectives.26 

One fact might have been deduced 

from the plans: that they envisaged such 

a large commitment of force as to rule out 

a second major landing attempt. General 

Dollmann drew this conclusion. Field 

Marshal Rundstedt was inclined to agree. 

But OKW and Hitler figured the evidence was inconclusive. Again the fact 

that British plans were missing left a large 

realm for speculation and, according to 

German intelligence estimates, a large 

uncommitted military force. 

As of I June, the Germans had estimated that the Allies had combat forces 

in the United Kingdom equivalent to 

eighty-five divisions including eight airborne divisions. 27 The Allied high com26 Ibid. 

27 MS # B--782 (Oberst Anton Staubwasser, G-2, 

Army Group B) . Cf. MS # B-901 in which Zimmermann (G-3 of DB WEST) says that the large number of Allied units estimated to be still in England 

after the Normandy assault made it impossible for 

the Germans to rule out the probability of a second 

landing. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 351 

mand, aware that the enemy was overestimating British and American strength, 

made every effort to sustain the illusion. 

In addition, the Allies made use of the 

high regard in which General Patton was 

held by the Germans to persuade them 

that an army group under his command 

still remained in England after 6 June. 

The existence of this large reserve force 

was easy for the Germans to believe since 

it fitted with their preconceptions that a 

second major landing would strike the 

Kanalkueste. The Allies fostered this belief by various ruses so successfully that 

not until July did OKW finally appreciate that no second landing would take 

place. In the meantime the Fifteenth 

Army remained tied to the Kanalkueste. 

Tactically, German knowledge ot 

American plans might have made some 

difference by enabling the Germans to 

mass reserves and stage counterattacks at 

points along the planned axes of the 

American advance. Such a concentration 

of reserves was actually carried out by 

Seventh A rmy in and around St. La, but 

even without knowledge of American intentions the Germans would probably 

still have chosen to defend St. La because 

of its importance as a road junction and 

the terrain configurations that made it 

defensively strong. For the rest, the Germans could never maneuver with enough 

freedom to exploit any tactical situation. 

Instead of being able to mass reserves in 

accordance with plan, General Dollmann 

picked up the reserve companies and battalions as they straggled in, delayed and 

decimated by air attacks, and put them in 

to plug gaps in his lines wherever the 

immediate danger seemed gravest. The 

policy of maintaining an intact defense, 

whether wise or not, meant that German 

tactical commanders in disposing their 

reserves were continually confronted with 

emergencies and never with tactical 

choices. Absorbed, therefore, in sealing 

off today's penetrations, they had no resources with which to face tomorrow's 

threat. 

Junction between Vand VII Corps 

The failure of both V and VII Corps 

to make any substantial progress toward 

the vital joining of the beachheads, to· 

gether with the general slowness of the advances on D-Day objectives, had become a 

matter of concern to General Eisenhower, 

General Montgomery, General Bradley, 

and both corps commanders. The American build-up was far behind schedule, 

particularly in the landing of supplies. 

At the end of D plus 1 not more than a 

quarter of the planned 14,500 tons were 

ashore. The troop build·up, planned at 

about 107,000 for the first two days, was 

20,000 short. Scarcely more than half the 

14,000 vehicles had been disembarked.28 

Delayed build.up was in part due to technical difficulties of unloading and in part 

to the slow advance inland. Rapid expansion of the beachhead was vital to permit 

the massing of supplies and reinforcements. Both expansion and reinforcement 

were necessary to defend the lodgment 

against the expected full-scale enemy 

counterattacks which, it was thought, 

28 Unloading figures for the first two days are 

estimates. Figures for UTAH have been taken from 

ANCXF, Report, Vol. Ill, Rpt by Comdr Assault 

Force U, pp. 33-34. OMAHA figures, not available 

from naval sources, are taken from the Provisional 

Engineer Special Brigade and OMAHA Beach Command situation reports as cited in [Clifford Jones] 

NEPTUNE, Training, Mounting, the Artificial Ports 

(The Administrative and Logistical History of the 

ETO: Part VI), MS, II, l75ff. Hist Div files. 
352 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

U.S. COMMANDERS. Left to right: Generals Bradley, Gerow, Eisenhower, and 

Collins. 

might come any time after D plus 3 and 

would almost certainly come during the 

first week. 

General Eisenhower toured the assault 

area by mine layer with Admiral Ramsay 

on 7 June and ordered that the immediate 

tactical plan be altered to give priority to 

a concerted drive by both corps to link up 

through Isigny and Carentan. General 

Bradley gave orders accordingly during 

the afternoon of 7 June. For VII Corps 

the changed priority resulted in assigning 

to the 101st Airborne Division the sole 

task of capturing Carentan with reinforcements to be provided if necessary. 

V Corps gave the 29th Division the primary mission of seizing Isigny while the 

1st Division continued the push east to 

join with the British and south to expand 

the beachhead.29

Plans for the employment of the 29th 

Division were discussed that evening at 

General Gerhardt’s command post in a 

rock quarry just off OMAHA Beach. (See 

Map XIV)The mission of taking Isigny 

was given to the 175th Infantry; it was to 

drive between the 116th and the 115th 

straight for its objective while the other 

two regiments cleared either flank of the 

advance. The 747th Tank Battalion (less 

Company B) was attached to the 175th Infantry and the attack jumped off that 

night. Advancing along the LonguevilleIsigny road with tanks leading the columns of infantry, the regiment captured 

la Cambe before daylight and met its first 

real resistance about three miles west of 

that town. Antitank guns knocked out 

29Cbl, Eisenhower to Marshall, 8 Jun 44. Eisenhower Personal Files. 

352 CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

u.s. COMMANDERS. Left to right: Generals Bradley, Gerow, Eisenhower, and 

Collins. 

might come any time after D plus 3 and 

would almost certainly come during the 

first week. 

General Eisenhower toured the assault 

area by mine layer with Admiral Ramsay 

on 7 June and ordered that the immediate 

tactical plan be altered to give priority to 

a concerted drive by both corps to link up 

through Isigny and Carentan. General 

Bradley gave orders accordingly during 

the afternoon of 7 June. For VII Corps 

the changed priority resulted in assigning 

to the IOlst Airborne Division the sole 

task of capturing Carentan with reinforcements to be provided if necessary. 

V Corps gave the 29th Division the primary mission of seizing Isigny while the 

1st Division continued the push east to 

join with the British and south to expand 

the beachhead.29 

Plans for the employment of the 29th 

Division were discussed that evening at 

General Gerhardt's command post in a 

rock quarry just off OMAHA Beach. (See 

Map XIV.)The mission of taking Isigny 

was given to the 175th Infantry; it was to 

drive between the 116th and the 115th 

straight for its objective while the other 

two regiments cleared either flank of the 

advance. The 747th Tank Battalion (less 

Company B) was attached to the 175th Infantry and the attack jumped off that 

night. Advancing along the LonguevilleIsigny road with tanks leading the columns of infantry, the regiment captured 

la Cambe before daylight and met its first 

real resistance about three miles west of 

that town. Antitank guns knocked out 

29 ChI, Eisenhower to Marshall, 8 JUD 44. Eisenhower Personal Files. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 353 

one tank in front of the town and artillery 

fire disabled six more to the west. However, isolated enemy resistance, here and 

in other villages north and south of the 

Isigny road, was overrun, in some cases 

with the aid of naval fire. There was no 

organized resistance in Isigny itself, and 

it was entered and cleaned out during the 

night of 8-9 June. The town was partially 

gutted and burning from heavy naval 

bombardment. 

The speed of the l75th Infantry's advance collapsed the left flank of the 352d 

Division and opened a hole in German 

lines comparable to the disintegration at 

Bayeux. The sector overrun was the responsibility of the 914th Regiment and 

had contained, in addition to the remnants of that regiment, a battalion of the 

352d Artillery Regiment and the 439th 

Ost Battalion. In the Grandcamp area, 

where the 1 1 6th Infantry was attacking, 

were additional units of the 914 th Regiment and the 3 d Battalion of the 1716th 

Artillery Regiment which manned fixed 

coastal artillery positions there. General 

Kraiss recognized that in view of the increasing pressure on his center and right 

he could not expect to hold with his left. 

At about the same time that he ordered 

the 30th Mobile Brigade and 726th Regiment to pull out of the Drome corridor, 

he gave similar orders to the 914th Regiment. They were to fight to hold all positions during the day but withdraw the 

bulk of their forces at night south of the 

Aure. A small bridgehead was to be held 

at all COSt northeast of Isigny. The isolation of the various units in the Grandcamp-Isigny area as well as the presence 

of valuable artillery pieces there complicated the problem of withdrawal. It required time to organize and carry out. :\'0 

time was granted. The 914tlz Regiment 

found itself unable to offer effective resistance on the road to Isigny. The battalion 

of the 352d Artillery Regiment had to 

pull out in such a hurry that its gum 

were abandoned, thus reducing division 

artillery for the figh ling on 9 June to fourteen guns. The Ost battalion which was 

supposed to blow the bridge at Isigny 

across the Aure retreated without doing 

so. 

The fall of Isigny meant that the 35 2d 

Division could no longer block the corridor between the American bridgeheads. 

The 914th Regiment was ordered to organize a defense south of the Aure in the 

vicinity of Hill 35 near la Madeleine to 

prevent the division's left flank from being rolled up. Kraiss counted on the Aure 

inundations to cover the gap in his lines 

between Isigny and Trevieres. 3o 

While the main 29th Division attack 

gathered momentum that carried it without pause to its objective. both the ll5th 

and I I 6th Infantry Regiments had 

cracked resistance in the coastal area, and 

virtually completed the seizure of the 

whole of the high ground north of the 

Aure River by the end of the day. The 

troops of the 115th met almost no resistance, although lack of transport brought 

them tired and without rations to their 

objectives overlooking the river. The 

I I 6th Infantry, reinforced with Rangers 

and two companies of tanks, and supported by destroyer fire, achieved the relief of the Rangers on Pointe du Hoe before noon and then proceeded to Grandcamp where, because of a canalized approach over a flooded area, it ran into a 

nasty fight lasting until dark. One battal30 MS # B-4~4 Iliegelmann). 
TO VALOGNES ST. COME-DU-MONT TO CARENTAN 

ST. COME-DU-MONT AREA 
BEAUMONT LES DROUERIES 
356 

ion of the I I 6th had been detached to 

sweep south of the main regimental advance toward Maisy. The Maisy position 

was taken on 9 June and the rest of the 

area mopped up to the Vire River. 

With dispatch V Corps had completed 

its part of the drive to join the American 

beachheads. The lOlst Airborne Division 

had a much harder time. (Map X VI ) 

After the failure of the 506th Parachute 

Infantry (Colonel Sink) on 7 June to 

wrest St. Come-du-Mont from the 6th 

Parachute Regiment, a much larger attack was mounted the following day. The 

I st and 2d Battalions of the 506th were 

reinforced with the 3d Battalion, 327th 

elider Infantry,3t the 3d Battalion, 50lst 

Parachute Infantry, eight light tanks. and 

the 65th Armored Field Artillery Battalion. The glider battalion, commanded by 

Lt. Col. Ray C. Allen, on the left wing of 

the attack was to pass to the east of St. 

Come-du-Mont, proceed down the main 

highway, and blow the bridges on the 

Carentan causeway. Colonel Ewell's battalion of the 50lst was to attack to the 

south of St. Come to cut the highway there 

while Colonel Sink's two battalions 

(506th) drove in column directly into the 

town. Behind effective artillery prepara31 The 327th Glider Infantry, like all glider regiments at the time. had only two organic rifle battalions. In the informal reorganization of the airhorne division between the Sicily experience and 

the Normandy D Day, a third rifle battalion was 

added to the glider regiments of both the 82d and 

IOlst Airborne Divisions by splitting another regiment. the 401st, hetween them. Thus the 1st Battalion, 40lst Glider Infantry, while retaining its 

formal status as an independent unit, normally 

functioned as the 3d Battalion of the 327th; the 2d 

Battalion, 401st, similarly constituted the 3d Battalion, 325th Glider Infantry, 82d Airborne Division. 

To avoid confusion the attached battalions will be 

referred 10 as the 3d Battalions of the respective 

fosler regiments. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tory fire followed by a rolling barrage, the 

attack jumped off at about 0500.32 The 

glider battalion bogged down in the 

hedgerows. But Colonel Ewell's men, despite considerable confusion and intermingling of units, reached their objectives south of St. Come within three 

hours, In the meantime the battalions of 

the 506th pressed against the town from 

the east and artillery continued to fall 

heavily on the German defenders. In the 

first hour and a half, the 65th Armored 

Field Artillery Battalion fired about 2,500 

rounds of 105-mm. high explosive. 

The brunt of the U ,So attack was borne 

by the 3d Battalion, I058th Regiment, 

which on 7 June had been reinforced by 

two companies of the 3d Battalion, 6th 

Parachute Regiment, from Carentan. 

Early in the morning, the I058th men 

under heavy artillery fire began to show 

signs of cracking, Von der Heydte, still in 

charge of the defense, had no more reserves to bring up. Observing that men of 

the I058th were beginning to straggle 

in retreat westward and having lost contact with the I058th battalion headquarters, von der Heydte decided to pull out 

his own units and such troops of the 

l058th as he could contact. The withdrawal involved some severe fighting with 

Ewell's battalion posted south of the 

town, but eventually the majority of the 

Germans got out to the west and retreated on Carentan following generally 

the axis of railroad embankment. 

This route was also taken during the 

day by the 2d Battalion, 6th Parachute 

32 For details of this action see S. L. A. Marshall's 

account based on his interviews with personnel of 

the IOlst Airborne Division. MS in Hist Div files. 

The story is also told in detail in Rapport and Norwood, Rendezvous with Destiuy, pp. 153-59. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 357 

Regiment, pulling back from north of St. 

Come. With surprising ease the 2d Battalion disengaged and streamed southward. Most of the men swam the Douve 

and arrived in Carentan with few losses. 

There von der Heydte with the bulk of 

two battalions plus elements of the 1058th 

Regiment organized his defense. Late on 

8 June he had learned that Isigny had 

fallen and, primarily concerned with possible attack against Carentan from the 

east, he at first placed the whole 2d Battalion on that side of the city.33 

The U.S. lOlst Airborne Division, 

meanwhile, with the occupation of St. 

Come-du-Mont, completed the clearing of 

the enemy north of the Douve and east of 

the Merderet. Preparations began at once 

for an all-out attack on Carentan from 

the north. In preparation for that attack, 

the lOlst Airborne Division, by the night 

of 8 June, had grouped three regiments 

along the Douve with a fourth regiment 

assembled in reserve near Vierville. The 

502d Parachute Infantry was placed in 

line on the right flank from the junction 

of the Douve and Merderet Rivers to 

Houesville. The 506th Parachute Infantry was assembled astride the Carentan 

highway, and the 327th Glider Infantry, 

which had come in by sea, relieved elements of the 506th and 50lst Parachute 

Infantry Regiments at la Barquette and Ie 

Port. The 50lst Parachute Infantry was 

In reserve. 

The scheme of this attack had been 

worked out by the division in England. 

It appeared then that the only feasible 

route of attack was across the river flats in 

the vicinity of Brevands. Accordingly VII 

Corps on 8 June ordered attack in this 

83 MS # B--839 (von der Heydte) . 

zone. On 9 June, however, Colonel Sink 

led a patrol across the causeway toward 

Carentan. He was fired on and returned 

before reaching the city. The reports he 

sent back were apparently misinterpreted 

to indicate that Carentan was only lightly 

held. It was therefore considered possible 

to make a two-pronged attack across the 

causeway and through Brevands to envelop the city.34 

The final plan was for the 327th Glider 

Infantry to make the main effort on the 

left, crossing the Douve near Brevands 

to clear the area between Carentan and 

Isigny and join with V Corps near the 

highway bridge over the Vireo Since the 

key to possession of this objective area 

was Carentan, the 327th planned to use 

the bulk of its force in an attack on the 

city from the east. At the same time the 

502d Parachute Infantry, relieved of its 

defensive mission on the right flank by 

the 501st, would cross the causeway over 

the Douve River northwest of Carentan, 

bypass the city on the west, and seize Hill 

30. To secure Carentan after its capture, 

the lOlst Airborne Division had the additional mission of occupying the high 

ground along the railway west of the city 

as far as the Prairies Marecageuses. 

The causeway over which the 502d Parachute Infantry was to attack was banked 

six to nine feet above the marshlands of 

the Douve and crossed four bridges over 

branches of the river and canals. One of 

the bridges was destroyed by the Germans. Difficulties in repairing this under 

fire forced postponement of the right 

wing of the division attack, first sched34 Account based on correspondence conducted by 

Lt. Leonard Rapport, lOlst Division Historian, with 

General Taylor and other lOlst commanders. Other 

patrols were sent out by the 327th Glider Infantry. 
FARMHOUSE DOUVE RIVER ST. COME-DU-MONT 

CARENTAN CAUSEWAY. In foreground is northwestern tip of Carentan. Circles 

indicate position of bridges. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 359 

uled for the night of 9-10 June. It was the 

middle of the afternoon of 10 June before 

the 3d Battalion, 502d Parachute Infantry 

(Lt. Col. Robert G. Cole) advanced over 

the causeway single file. The men moved 

in a low crouch or crawled, and it took 

three hours for the point to cross three of 

the bridges. Then the enemy opened fire 

from a farmhouse and hedgerows, methodically searching the ditches with machine guns. At the fourth bridge a Belgian Gate had been drawn so far across 

the road that only one man at a time could 

squeeze by it. Under cover of artillery fire, 

which all afternoon worked on enemy positions, this maneuver was tried. Six men 

made it; the seventh was hit, and the attempt was abandoned in favor of building 

up additional fire. Mortars were brought 

forward. The stalemate, however, lasted 

until midnight while enemy fire and a 

bombing and strafing attack after dark 

took heavy toll of the thin battalion line 

stretched across the causeway. After midnight, resistance slackened and three companies were able to filter men through the 

bottleneck and across the last bridge 

where they could deploy on either side 

of the highway. 

The nub of the opposition seemed to 

be a large farmhouse to the west of the 

road on ground that rose sharply from the 

marshes. In the morning of 11 June after 

attempts to knock this out with artillery 

had failed, Colonel Cole, battalion commander, ordered a charge which he and 

his executive officer, Lt. Col. John P. 

Stopka, led. Followed at first by only a 

quarter of their 250 men, Cole and Stopka 

ran through enemy fire. The charge gathered momentum as more men got up and 

ran forward. The farmhouse was not occupied but the Germans had rifle pits and 

machine gun emplacements hn hedgerows to the west. These were overrun and 

the Germans killed with grenades and 

bayonets.36 

The heavy casualties and disorganization of the battalion prevented Cole from 

following up his advantage. Instead he 

sent word back to have the 1st Battalion 

of the regiment pass through and continue the attack south. The 1st Battalion, 

which was near the fourth causeway 

bridge when request came to move forward, reached Colonel Cole’s position 

through heavy fire. But since it was as 

hard hit and disorganized as the 3d Battalion it was in no better condition to 

move on. Both battalions set up a defensive line and held on during 11 June 

against determined German counterattacks, which on one occasion threatened 

to break through. The 2d Battalion took 

over the line during the night, but the 

502d Parachute Infantry was too exhausted to renew the attack and the 506th 

Parachute Infantry was sent to its relief, 

While the bitter battle of the Carentan 

causeway was being fought, the left wing 

of the 101st Airborne Division attack had 

carried south and made tenuous contact 

with V Corps units east of Carentan. In 

the early morning hours of 10 June all 

three battalions of the 327th Glider Infantry were across the Douve near Brevands. One company, reconnoitering to 

Auville-sur-le Vey, met the 29th Reconnaissance Troop and Company K of the 

175th Infantry. The 175th Infantry (29th 

Division) had followed up the capture of 

Isigny by sending Company K to take the 

35 For exceptional bravery in this action Colonel 

Cole was awarded the Medal of Honor. The award 

was made after Cole’s death in the Holland airborne 

operation in September 1944. 
360 

Vire bridge at Auville-sur-Ie Vey while 

the main body of the regiment moved 

toward objectives in the Lison-Ia Fotelaie 

area to the south. The bridge was found 

to have been destroyed and the company, 

reinforced with the reconnaissance troop 

and a platoon of tanks, fought most of the 

day of 9 June to force a crossing. They 

forded the river late in the afternoon, 

seized Auville-sur-Ie Vey, and held it during the night while engineers built the 

bridge behind them. Contact with the airborne unit the next day was only the beginning of the link between the corps. 

A savage fight remained for the possession 

of Carentan as well as some confused and 

costly maneuvering to clear the ground to 

the east. 

The Germans meanwhile made plans 

to reinforce the city, whose defense Field 

Marshal Rommel considered vital not 

only to prevent the junction of the American beachheads but to forestall any attempt by General Bradley to cut the Cotentin by a drive southwest across the 

Vire toward Lessay and Periers. As immediate stopgap measures LXXXIV Corps 

sent von der Heydte two Ost battalions 

and remnants of the defenders of Isigny. 

He placed these troops, of limited combat 

value, on the east side of the city and 

concentrated the two battalions of his 

own regiment on the north. But this was 

still admittedly a weak defense for such a 

critical objective. Late on 9 June Rommel 

decided to commit the II Parachute Corps 

(Meindl), which was on its way up from 

Brittany, to counter this threat. 36 Under 

Meindl's corps, the 17 th SS Panzer Grena36 The corps actually controlled only the 17th SS 

Panzer Grenarlin Division. The 77th Division had 

been diverted to MOlltebourg. See below, pp. 371, 

39') 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

dier Division (Generalmajor der WaffenSS Werner Ostendorf£) was assigned the 

primary mission of blocking an Allied 

westward thrust. Ostendorff's orders were 

to move to positions southwest of Carentan prepared to counterattack south of 

the city. 

These plans were frustrated by the difficulty of getting the units into position. 

On 8 June the move of Meindl's troops 

was reported greatly delayed by air attack and sabotage. Ostendorff's division 

had been forced by continued severe air 

attacks on the railroads to make most of 

its march northward by road. Shortage of 

gasoline then further delayed the move. 

By the end of 11 June only Ostendorff's 

forward elements had reached their assembly areas southwest of Carentan.37 

While awaiting reinforcements and 

holding off the concentric attacks of the 

WIst Airborne Division, von der Heydte 

in Carentan was running desperately 

short of ammunition. It was impossible 

to bring up resupplies by truck in view 

of the shortage of motor transport and gas 

and Allied air interdiction of the roads. 

OB WEST at last considered the need so 

critical that an air supply mission was 

flown during the night of 11-12 June and 

eighteen tons of infantry ammunition 

and 88-mm. shells were dropped to von 

der Heydte on a field south of Raids, some 

seven miles southwest of Carentan.38 

This, the first air supply mission attempted by the Germans in Normandy, 

came too late to save Carentan. 

On 10 June the bulk of the 327th 

Glider Infantry pressed in on Carentan 

from the northeast. Its initial objective 

37 Seventh Army, KTB l.l.-30.vI.44, 11 Jun 44. 

380berquartiermeister West, KTB 1.1.-17.v1l1.44, 

II Jun 44. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 361 

was to seize the highway and railroad 

bridges over the Vire-Taute Canal and 

so seal off the city from the east. The regiment advanced rapidly until at 1800 it 

came within five hundred yards of its objective. Stopped by enemy fire from the 

east bank, it reorganized and resumed the 

drive with two battalions abreast on either side of the Carentan-Isigny highway. 

The men fought until midnight through 

those last five hundred yards and succeeded at last in clearing the enemy from 

the east bank and digging in along the 

hedgerows beside the canal. 

Col. Joseph H. Harper, who had taken 

command of the 327th Glider Infantry 

that afternoon, now decided against any 

attempt to rush the bridge in favor of 

moving a portion of his force north to 

cross on a partly demolished footbridge 

and approach Carentan through the 

wooded area along the Bassin a Flot. Most 

of the regiment would hold positions 

along the canal and support the attack by 

firing into the city. After a patrol had repaired the footbridge, three companies 

crossed under enemy mortar fire during 

the morning of 11 June, but were unable 

to advance more than a few hundred yards 

before they were stopped by enemy fire 

from the outskirts of Carentan. 

In the evening of 11 June, First Army 

decided to commit another regiment and 

co-ordinate the two wings of the attack 

by forming all units into a single task 

force under command of Brig. Gen. Anthony McAuliffe, artillery commander of 

the lOlst Airborne Division. The 506th 

Parachute Infantry was to take over from 

the 502d the attack on the west toward 

Hill 30. Colonel Harper would continue 

to hold east of Carentan while attacking 

with a battalion plus one company along 

the Bassin a Flot. The 501st Parachute 

Infantry was to be taken from defensive 

positions north of the Douve and committed through the Brevands bridgehead. 

It was to drive east of the 327th Glider 

Infantry in a wider envelopment of Carentan designed to link with the 506th Infantry south of the city at Hill 30. 

Gerow's corps was drawn only slightly 

into this new effort. The bulk of V Corps 

continued the drive south to expand the 

beachhead. But inasmuch as the lOlst 

Airborne Division task force was now 

wholly absorbed with the envelopment of 

Carentan it became necessary to use V 

Corps units to protect the east flank in the 

area between the Douve and Vire Rivers. 

The bridgehead at Auville-sur-le Vey was 

reinforced on 11 June by the 3d Battalion, 41 st Armored Infantry Regiment of 

the 2d Armored Division, which had begun landing on 9 June. In addition, on 

12 June, the 175th Infantry was ordered 

to reconnoiter in force in the region of 

Montmartin-en-Graignes and seize two 

bridges over the Vire-Taute Canal, to 

secure the still insubstantial link between 

the corps from German counterattack 

from the south. 

The city of Carentan blazed during the 

night under concentrations of naval fire, 

artillery, mortars, and tank destroyer 

guns. The attack of the 506th Parachute 

Infantry got started at 0200, 12 June, and 

advanced rapidly against slight resistance. 

On his objective, Hill 30, Colonel Sink at 

0500 ordered the 2d Battalion to attack 

into Carentan. Despite interdictory artillery fire and some spasmodic machine gun 

fire the battalion entered the city within 

a few hours. At the same time the 327th 

Glider Infantry on the northwest attacked 

out of the woods at Bassin a Flot and 
TO 5T£. 1t.,(EtZE-EG{J5E 10 L/\ H/\ V'E OU VUlTS 10 VERfERS HfLL 30 A.RE 

CARENT AN AND HILL 30 AREA 
BASSIN A FLOT \"IRE-ET-TAUTE CAN:\L TO ISIGNY 
364 

drove rapidly into the center of town. The 

two units met at about 0730. Only enemy 

stragglers remained to contest possession 

of the city. While the concentric attack 

squeezed into the city, the wider envelopment made equally rapid progress as the 

50lst Parachute Infantry swept down east 

of Carentan and made contact with the 

506th half an hour after the entry into the 

city.39 

The closing of the trap had captured 

the objective, but few enemy prisoners 

were caught. The fact is that von der 

Heydte had pulled out of the city before 

dark on 11 June without being observed 

and had set up a defense line to the southwest.40 This new resistance line was discovered in the afternoon (12 June) when 

General Taylor attempted to push the attack to the southwest. His objective was 

to establish a deep defense of Carentan 

hooked up on the right with the 82d Airborne Division, which was driving south 

across the Merderet in the direction of 

BaupteY The 506th Parachute Regiment 

thrust out on the axis of the Baupte road 

while the 50lst attacked along the Periers 

road. But both bogged down and by the 

end of the day had reached out only a few 

hundred yards from the line of departure 

near Hill 30. 

The simultaneous effort to secure the 

ground east of Carentan on 12 June 

proved just as inconclusive as the push 

89 See Ruppenthal, Utah Beach to Cherbourg, pp. 

78-93, for further details. 

40 The withdrawal was a blunder for which von 

der Heydte reportedly escaped court martial only 

on the basis of his past record. See Pemsel, CofS 

Seventh Army, commentary on von der Heydte's ac· 

count. Von der Heydte explained his action rather 

weakly on the grounds that he did not know that the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division was on its way 

up. MS # B-839 (von der Heydte) . 

U See below, Ch. X. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

westward. In the morning a task force 

consisting of two companies of the 175th 

Infantry, reinforced by mortars and heavy 

machine guns, crossed the VireJnemy 

outposts of the newly arrived mobile 

Kampfgruppe of the 275th Division 42 observed the crossings but made no serious 

attempts to interfere with them. Not far 

from Montmartin, however, the Germans 

ambushed and badly cut up one company 

on a hedgerow-lined road. Remnants of 

the company withdrew north of Montmartin to re-form and there joined with 

the remainder of the task force. Into this 

position in the afternoon came the 1 st 

Battalion, 327th Glider Infantry, which 

with the 2d Battalion had attacked south 

early in the afternoon after the capture of 

Carentan. The combined force then secured high ground south of Montmartin. 

The 2d Battalion in the meantime had 

been checked at Deville to the northeast. 

During the night Colonel Goode, 175th 

commander, took a company across the 

Vire to attempt to reinforce General Cota 

but stumbled into a German bivouac. 

Colonel Goode was captured. Remnants 

of his force straggled back across the 

Vire.43 

The fighting southeast of Carentan had 

been on a very small scale and was not in 

itself important, but, in the course of it, 

reports came in to General Bradley's 

headquarters of a strong concentration of 

German forces in the area, including the 

17 th 55 Panzer Grenadier Division. Signs 

pointed to a possible enemy build-up of 

three divisions with the probable mission 

of counterattacking in force between Car42 For the move of this unit from Brittany, see be· 

low, pp. 378-79. 

48 The account of the Montmartin action in Taylor, Omaha Beachhead, pp. 157-59, was checked with 

General Cota and as a result is here slightly modified. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 365 

entan and Isigny where, General Bradley 

pointed out, "we are very weak." 44 As 

communications were temporarily out between First Army and V Corps, Bradley 

sent a letter by courier to Gerow ordering 

him to move a battalion of tanks and a 

battalion of armored infantry from the 

2d Armored Division into the Montmartin-en-Graignes area "prepared for action 

to the south." The movement was to be 

completed by daylight and co-ordinated 

with the 327th Glider Infantry. In addition Bradley ordered that the 116th Infantry be held in reserve for possible commitment on the right of the 175th. By 

0630 of 13 June the 2d Battalion, 66th 

Armored Regiment, in accordance with 

these orders had joined the 3d Battalion, 

41 st Armored Infantry, already west of 

the Vire, and the task force was ready to 

move south. The move, however, did not 

take place, for by morning Carentan was 

being threatened from the southwest 

rather than the southeast and the armored 

task force was diverted to go to the support of the 506th Parachute Infantry. 

After the fall of Carentan, the Germans 

planned to counterattack with the 17th 

SS Panzer Grenadier Division to retake it. 

But the attack was delayed on 12 June 

because the battalion of assault guns, 

which moved north by train, was held up 

in the assembly areas by air attacks. With 

the guns in position on the morning of 

13 June, Ostendorff attacked. The attack 

hit both the 506th and 501st Parachute 

Infantry Regiments at about 0630 and 

during the morning drove them back to 

within 500 yards of Carentan. (Map 4) 

The 502d Parachute Infantry was 

44 Ltr, Bradley to Gerow, 13 Jun 44. V Corps G-3 

Jnl. 

brought down to Carentan to reinforce 

the defense of the 506th. At 1030 the armored task force arrived and in the early 

afternoon the 101 st Airborne Division 

resumed the initiative. The 502d drove 

through the 506th, and the 501 st continued on its mission of the day before. 

With close support from the 14th Armored Field Artillery Battalion the enemy was thrown back with estimated 

losses of 500 men. A defensive position 

was secured along the road from Baupte 

to the Carentan-Periers highway. 

On the east the company of the l75th 

Infantry beleaguered at Montmartin was 

pulled out and Colonel Harper established a line north of the main railroad 

linked with the 29th Division to the east. 

Now V and VII Corps were securely 

joined, although the strip between them 

still lacked depth for adequate communications and defense. First Army, however, 

now had resources to deepen it and on 13 

June the mission was assigned to XIX 

Corps, which became operational the 

next day. 

Operations to fuse the two First Army 

beachheads have been traced through to 

their conclusion because they form a 

single story with few direct contacts with 

what was going on elsewhere in Normandy. The actions described were considered by the high command as of first 

importance. They did not, however, constitute a main effort by the First Army. 

Larger forces were being used simultaneously to expand the beachead westward 

and southward. Virtually the whole of V 

Corps during the week of 8-14 June was 

pushing south through the bocage country making rapid progress against a disintegrated German defense. 
366 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

From its D-Day objectives reached on 

8 June, V Corps ordered a three-division 

attack designed simply to push out the 

lodgment area in conformity with the advance of the British on the left. The 2d 

Division (Maj. Gen. Walter hl. Robertson) ,45 which had begun landing the evening of 7 June, had enough units ashore 

by midday of the 9th to be operational 

and it took over 5,000 yards of the 1st Division front north of Trevieres. (Map 

XVII) Here the main effort of the corps 

was to be made with the final objective 

45General Robertson was graduated from West 

Point in 1912. Assigned to duty with the 2d Division 

in 1940, he became commanding officer of the 9th 

Infantry in 1941 and took command of the division 

in May 1942. 

of seizing the Foret de Cerisy, high 

ground which always figured prominently 

in V Corps plans as a possible assembly 

area for enemy counterattack forces and 

as ground dominating the whole corps 

beachhead. The 1st Division on the east 

was to put its main effort on its right and 

advance to seize three towns: Agy, la 

Commune, and Vaubadon, on high 

ground along the St. Lo-Bayeux highway. The 29th Division, on the other 

flank, would seize the north bank of the 

Elle River from la Communette west to 

the Vire. A portion of its forces, as already 

noted, would operate west of the Vire to 

establish contact with VII Corps. Each division was to attack with two regiments 

abreast and each was to leave all or part 

of the third regiment prepared to defend 

366 

GERMAN COUNTERATTACK 

ON CARENTAN 

13 June 1944 

~ 

\\\\\\\\\\' FRONT LINE, MORNING 13 JUNE 

FRONT LINE. EVENING 13 JUNE 

MAP 4 

The Callmont Cal) 

From its D-Day objectives reached on 

8 June, V Corps ordered a three-division 

attack designed simply to push out the 

lodgment area in conformity with the advance of the British on the left. The 2d 

Division (Maj. Gen. Walter M. Robertson),45 which had begun landing the evening of 7 June, had enough units ashore 

by midday of the 9th to be operational 

and it took over 5,000 yards of the I st Division front north of Trt':vieres. (Map 

X V I I ) Here the main effort of the corps 

was to be made with the final objective 

45 General Robertson was graduated from West 

Point in 1912. Assigned to duty with the 2d Division 

in 1940, he became commanding officer of the 9th 

Infantry in 1941 and took command of the division 

in May 1942. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of selZlng the Foret de Cerisy, high 

ground which always figured prominently 

in V Corps plans as a possible assembly 

area for enemy counterattack forces and 

as ground dominating the whole corps 

beachhead. The 1st Division on the east 

was to put its main effort on its right and 

advance to seize three towns: Agy, la 

Commune, and Vaubadon, on high 

ground along the St. Lo-Bayeux highway. The 29th Division, on the other 

flank, would seize the north bank of the 

Elle River from la Communette west to 

the Vireo A portion of its forces, as already 

noted, would operate west of the Vire to 

establish contact with VII Corps. Each division was to attack with two regiments 

abreast and each was to leave all or part 

of the third regiment prepared to defend 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 367 

the D-Day positions. Positions gained by 

the attack would be organized for defense 

in depth. Both latter measures were insurance against enemy counterattack in 

strength, a contingency that continued to 

figure prominently in Allied calculations. 

Enemy resistance broke first on either 

flank of the attack and then disintegrated all through the corps zone. Despite this collapse, however, certain units 

had hard fighting on 9 June. The 29th 

Division, after clearing Isigny in the 

morning, pushed south with the 175th 

Infantry on the right, the 115th on the 

left.46 The 175th Infantry, having 

smashed the 914th Regiment in its rapid 

seizure of Isigny, advanced southward 

against only scattered opposition. Near 

la Foret, 352d Division stragglers defending a supply dump held off the 

American advance long enough to permit the evecuation of the bulk of the 

supplies. This action cost the Germans 

an estimated 125 killed. The 175th Infantry then moved on down to its objectives in the Lison-Ia Fotelaie area before 

nightfall. 

The 115th Infantry, during the night 

preceding the attack, reconnoitered crossings of the Aure River. The crossing 

promised to be difficult since the river 

flats were flooded to a width of half a 

mile to two miles. Although nowhere 

deep under water they were marshy and 

crisscrossed by drainage ditches. During 

the night 2d Lt. Kermit C. Miller of 

Company E took a platoon across south 

of Canchy. Entering Colombieres on the 

south bank, which had been hard hit by 

American artillery, Miller's patrol caught 

a considerable force of Germans by sur46 The 116th Infantry with the 2d and 5th Ranger 

Battalions attached spent 9 and IO June mopping up. 

prise, cut down about forty of them, and 

took a dozen prisoners. Thanks to this 

action the regiment's crossing the next 

day was unopposed, for Colombieres 

turned out to have been the only defended locality on the south bank of the 

river within range of the Canchy crossing. The lack of opposition was extremely fortunate, for the physical difficulties of crossing the swampy flats made 

progress very slow and exposed the 

troops for several hours as they struggled 

through the mud and waited for improvised bridges to span the few impassable 

streams. Two battalions were across by 

1100. The third followed after enemy 

fire frustrated an attempt to cross a narrower portion of the river valley farther 

east. Once across, the I st Battalion 

moved to Bricqueville and the 3d Battalion farther south to la Folie. Neither 

had met serious opposition. But the 2d 

Battalion ran into trouble from the start. 

Turning west to clean out the Bois de 

Calette, from which enemy riflemen were 

harassing bridging operations at the la 

Cambe-Douet causeway, the battalion 

brushed with enemy bicycle troops near 

Vouilly. Although the wood was not occupied in force the battalion took three 

hours to flush snipers from the thick 

brush. Then heading south for Ie Carrefour it took a wrong turning that added 

three miles to the six-mile march to its 

objective. Thoroughly exhausted the 

troops reached their initial objective at 

0230, 10 June. Leading units moved off 

the road. Reconnaissance to establish a 

temporary defensive position was difficult in view of the condition of the men 

and the dark night. Most of the men 

simply dropped to the ground and were 

almost at once asleep. 
368 

While the rear of the column still 

waited on the road to move into the bivouac area, an enemy infantry and armored vehicle column blundered down 

the road in retreat from the Aure valley 

fighting. A machine pistol was fired. 

American rifle shots replied. The enemy 

swung into action, sprayed the road with 

machine gun fire, and sent armored 

vehicles (probably self-propelled 88-mm. 

guns) down the road, firing into hedgerows and fields. The 2d Battalion men, 

scattered, confused, and disorganized, 

could offer no effective resistance. One 

man had presence of mind to take a 

bazooka and attack the enemy guns, 

knocking out two of them. But the 

greater part of the battalion-its commander, Lt. Col. William E. Warfield, 

killed-dispersed in small groups and retreated north and west during the night. 

In the melee 150 men were lost, including II officers. The next day the battalion was reorganized with 110 replacements, moved back into the line, and the 

115th Infantry proceeded to its objectives 

on the Elle River without opposition. 

On the opposite flank of the corps attack the left wing of the 1st Division 

drove forward against rapidly collapsing 

resistance. The 26th Infantry reached 

its objectives, Agy and Dodigny, at night. 

The 18th Infantry, held up initially by 

a single enemy strong point, at length 

bypassed it leaving it to be cleared by the 

reserve battalion. Thereafter moving 

rapidly, with strong artillery support on 

known enemy positions, possible assembly areas, and roads, it continued to advance through the night. It met no 

enemy after midnight and arrived by 

morning abreast of the 26th Infantry. 

During 10 June it moved down to its 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

objectives on the St. Lo-Bayeux highway. Only the 3d Battalion at the edge 

of the Foret de Cerisy met resistance.47 

In the center of the corps zone the 

newly landed 2d Division had a harder 

time, in part because it hit the center 

of the 352d Division> which despite the 

collapse of both wings continued to hold 

out during 9 June in strong defenses 

about Trevieres, and in part because it 

lacked most of its artillery, transportation, 

communications (wire and radios), machine guns and mortars, as well as a large 

part of its supporting troopS.48 For the 

attack of 9 June, one company of tank 

destroyers and one company of tanks 

were attached. 

While the 38th Infantry attacked Trevieres from the north, the 9th Infantry 

struck to the east to cut the TrevieresRubercy road. The 9th Infantry had relieved the 18th Infantry at Mandeville 

and Engranville. The line of departure 

for its attack was due east of Trevieres, 

but the 2d Battalion was at Engranville 

north of the Aure at 1100 when it received 

orders to jump off. It spent the whole day 

fighting to the line of departure, unable 

without heavy weapons to overcome enemy flanking fire from the direction of 

Trevieres. By midnight, however, it 

reached the initial objective, Rubercy. 

The 3d Battalion, starting from the Mandeville area, fought down the road toward 

47 Here S/Sgt Arthur F. DeFranzo was killed in a 

heroic action in which he destroyed an enemy posi· 

tion with grenades despite five wounds that finally 

felled him a few yards in front of the enemy. He was 

awarded the Medal of Honor. 

48 Since it had not been anticipated that the division would be sent into action immediately on landing. the weapons and equipment had been preloaded 

in vehicles scheduled to land on 10 June. Ltr, Col 

Walter Elliott (CO, 38th Inf) to author, 4 Feb 48. 

Hist Div files. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 369 

Rubercy but made very slow progress and 

was still short of the objective by dark. A 

gap of at least 4,000 yards separated the 

battalion from the 1st Division on the 

left. This was covered only by patrols 

of the 18th Infantry. 

The attack on Trevieres by the 38th 

Infantry ran into difficulties aggravated 

by its total lack of mortars and machine 

guns, the hedgerow terrain, and a stubborn though not numerous enemy. The 

Aure River had been selected as the line 

of departure, but both the 2d and 3d 

Battalions ran into opposition before 

reaching it. Progress was slow. The men 

were continually pinned down by enemy 

fire difficult to locate among the hedgerows and still more difficult to neutralize with only light infantry weapons. 

The attacking troops were given direct 

support by accurate fire from two batteries of the 38th Field Artillery Battalion. But the attack was kept moving 

chiefly by bold leadership. The success 

of the 3d Battalion in crossing the Aure 

under heavy German machine gun fire 

was due at least in part to the intrepidity 

of Capt. Ornery C. Weathers of Company K who led his men through the fire 

at the cost of his own life.49 Col. Walter 

A. Elliott, the regimental commander, 

unable to depend on communications in 

the typically fragmental maneuver of 

groups of men through the fields and 

orchards, spent most of the day moving 

between his battalions pushing the attack forward. Late in the afternoon the 

regiment, still short of its objective, was 

ordered by General Robertson to continue the attack to take Trevieres that 

night. By midnight the 2d Battalion had 

49 Captain Weathers was awarded the DSC posthumously. 

occupied the town except for a small 

strong point on the southern edge which 

was cleaned out the following morning. 50 

The Germans' abandonment of Trevieres, however, was not due primarily to 

the efforts of the 38th Infantry. The 

352d Division with both flanks torn open 

had at last decided to pull out of an untenable position. At about 1900, 9 June, 

General Kraiss reported his hopeless situation to General Marcks at LXXXIV 

Corps and received orders to withdraw 

far to the south to establish a defense 

along the Elle River from Berigny to 

Airel. The withdrawal was to take place 

during darkness and to be completed 

by 0600, 10 June. For the defense of 

this new line of about ten miles, General 

Kraiss had 2,500 men, 14 artillery pieces, 

16 antiaircraft guns, and 5 tanks. 51 

The withdrawal of the 352d Division 

allowed the 2d Division on 10 June to 

march to its objectives west and south of 

the Foret de Cerisy. About ninety enemy 

stragglers were rounded up during the 

advance. Both the 1st and 2d Divisions 

spent the day of 11 June virtually out of 

contact with the enemy, reorganizing 

the ground won and preparing for a new 

attack. The 1st Division units had made 

no advances since noon on 10 June. The 

only fighting on 11 June took place at 

the southern tip of the Foret de Cerisy 

where the 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry, 

fought to dislodge a stubborn group of 

enemy well dug in at the Haute-Littee 

crossroads. Even patrols probing far in 

50 Ltr cited n. 48. 

51 MS # B-435 and MS # B-436 (both by Ziegelmann). Kraiss estimated that he was lucky to escape with any of his division since he felt that, had 

the 29th Division driven east after crossing the Aure, 

it would have rolled up his flank and trapped the 

bulk of the 916th Regiment in the Trevieres area. 
370 

Pointe du Hoe 

MAP 5 

the south met no large forces and on the 

entire 2d Division front during the day 

only twice was enemy artillery fire reported. 

The 1st and 2d Divisions on 10 and II 

June were in fact facing a gaping hole in 

the German lines more than ten miles 

broad from Berigny due east to Longraye where the Panzer Lehr Division was 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

CAUMONT GAP 

Morning 10 June 1944 

ALLIED POSITIONS. NIGHT 9/10 JUNE 

GERMAN POSITIONS. MORNING 10 JUNE 

GERMAN UNITS 

I 0 

-- 2 4 

MILES 

Arromonches 

Tilly- l sur-SeUlles) 

~ ~f'""I""~.~,..... 

~ ) • r,ll, Longroye L~J Lehr (-l 

, ,\II""-;.,\,,."",~·,l\~~:~ ~~,:", "", 

::::.:~:::'~::~:~ .\' Coumonf 

~/"\''''''''\\'.,':;'''' 

attacking. (Map 5) This hole grew directly out of the D-Day collapse of the 

left wing of the 716th Division followed 

by the capture of Bayeux and the smashing of the 352d left flank. The ten-milewide corridor opened the way through 

Caumont to the high wooded terrain in 

the vicinity of the Bois du Homme and 

Ie Beny-Bocage. Occupation of that high 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 371 

ground would have placed V Corps in a 

deep southern wedge in Seventh Army 

lines which the Germans feared could 

be gradually reinforced and then exploited either to outflank Caen or more 

decisively to drive westward toward Avranches. 52 General Dollmann foresaw this 

development on the morning of 9 June, 

but the LXXXIV Corps no longer had 

any troops to plug the gap. Dollmann 

therefore proposed that the 11 Parachute 

Corps be assembled south of Balleroy for 

attack northward in conjunction with the 

I SS Panzer Corps. Although the order for 

this maneuver was given to General 

Meindl, Dollmann was doubtful whether 

it could be accomplished since it was not 

known when the 11 Parachute Corps units 

would arrive. It was probable that they 

would straggle into the battle area and 

would not be available for a concerted 

counterattack. 53 

Of the units originally attached to 

Meindl's corps, the 77th Division had already been diverted to the Cotentin. The 

increasing urgency of blocking a threatened penetration at Montebourg made it 

imperative that the 77th continue on that 

mission. 54 Meindl was thus left with only 

two fresh divisions, the 17th SS Panzer 

Grenadier and the 3d Parachute. By the 

evening of 9 June the bulk of 3 d Parachute Division had only reached Brecey, 

east of Avranches. The 37th SS Panzer 

Grenadier Regiment of the 17th SS Division was in the same general area; the 

38th SS Panzer Grenadier Regiment was 

east of Laval. The tracked vehicles of Ostendorff's division were being transported 

52 See MS # B-204 (General der Panzertruppen 

Heinrich FreiheIT von Luettwitz. CG, 2d Panzer 

Division) . 

63 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.vl.44, 9 Jun 44. 

64 See below, Ch. X. 

by train and on 9 June were strung out 

between la Fleche and Saumur. Because 

of rail breaks due to air attack the last two 

trains had to be unloaded south of the 

Loire. Only advance elements of the division had reached Balleroy, including the 

reconnaissance battalion equipped with 

amphibious Volkswagen. Reconnaissance 

north and northeast of Balleroy was begun on 10 June preparatory to commitment of the division in that sector. 

In the meantime, however, plans were 

changed. Rommel considered that German weakness in the Carentan area was 

more dangerous than the hole on the 

right of LXXXIV Corps. 11 Parachute 

Corps was diverted to block the sector between Carentan and S1. La, and this task 

was given priority over support of the 

352d Division despite the desperate condition of the latter. The 3d Parachute Division was still to come into the St. La 

area with the tentative mission of occupying the north edge of the Foret de Cerisy. 

The 353d Division) the last mobile unit 

in Brittany, was also ordered to St. La to 

come under Meindl's corps. But the chief 

concern was along the Vireo Most of the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division was 

sent southwest of Carentan. Kampfgruppe Heintz (mobile combat group of 

the 275th Division) was to move on arrival 

into the St. Jean-de-Daye area. 55 

The only immediate step to plug the 

Caumont gap on 10 June was the decision 

to leave Ostendorff's reconnaissance battalion in the vicinity of Balleroy. Although the move does not seem to have 

been intended as deception, it had that 

effect. The 1st Division immediately took 

prisoners and located forward positions 

55 Seventh Army, KTB 1.I.-30.vI.44, 9 and 10 

Jun 44. 
372 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of elements of the 17th SS Panzer Grenaclier Division south of Balleroy east to St. 

Paul-de-Verney.56 Unidentified medium 

tanks were also reported on the afternoon 

of 10 June in the vicinity of la Londe.57 

The light mixed units actually in contact 

were recognized to be incapable of major 

counterattack, but from prisoner interrogations V Corps deduced that the 17th 

SS Panzer Grenadier Diuision might be in 

position to attack, probably from the direction of the Foret de Cerisy by daylight 

of 11 June. 58 The G-2 further warned of 

a long-range contingency. The 11 th Panzer and 1st SS Panzer Diuisions were reported on the move from the south and 

northeast respectively. It was thought that 

one of them might be used against V 

Corps, although when either would arrive 

could not even be guessed at. 

The possibility of enemy armored 

counterattacks was in the forefront of 

most American commanders’ minds. This 

was D plus 3, when according to all planning calculations the enemy could begin 

to exert heavy pressure against the beachheads.59 Signs that the Germans had actually succeeded in concentrating reserves 

for counterattack were, to be sure, scanty. 

They consisted chiefly in the identification of elements of Panzer Lehr Diuision 

in the British sector, of the 17th SS Panzer 

Grenadier Division in front of the 1st Division, and a curious multiplication of 

56 1st Div AAR. 

57 V Corps G-2 Jnl. Corps located the 17th SS 

Panzer Grenadier Division chiefly by prisoner reports. The bulk of the division was thought to be 

moving up opposite the 2d Division. The latter, 

however, had made no identifications through 11 

June. See 2d Div G-2 Jnl. 

58 G-2 believed that the division had both a tank 

and an assault gun battalion. Actually Ostendorff 

had no tanks and his guns were far to the south. 

59 See above, p. 176. 

rumors from prisoners and civilians that 

there were large enemy concentrations in 

the Foret de Cerisy. First Army G-2 wrote 

at the end of 9 June: “No surprise should 

be occasioned should this cover produce 

an armored or motorized division.” co 

The whole tone of the intelligence estimates of this date was dominated by conviction that the enemy \vas preparing to 

strike a major blow. In summing up the 

fighting of 9 June, First Army reported: 

“Enemy forces pursued their delaying 

tactics pending the arrival of armored 

counterattack forces.” 61 There was no appreciation of the havoc that had been 

wrought in the German defenses by Allied success in smashing the coastal crust. 

On 10 June First Army observed that the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division had 

come into the area south of Carentan and 

that no new identifications had been 

made on V Corps front. The enemy units 

in contact were still only the 352d Division and elements of the 716th. First 

Army G-2 believed that in the fighting of 

10 June German forces had withdrawn 

south along the Vire and their eastern 

flank had been forced back to the northern edge of the Foret de Cerisy.62’ In reality, not only had the German forces been 

south of the forest for at least twelve 

hours, but at the time the intelligence 

report was issued troops of the U.S. 2d Division were also south of the forest.63 

The Caumont gap was literally held by 

the reconnaissance battalion of the 17th 

WI First Army G-2 Per Rpt. 

61 Ibid. 

6aFirst Army Int Sum as of 2400, 10 Jun. 

63 See above, p. 370. Despite concern over theForet

de Cerisy as a possible enemy assembly area, apparently no special report came to the First Army 

G-2 when the 2d Division found the forest clear. It 

seems that the intelligence summary as of 2400, 10 

June, was prepared on information probably twelve 

372 

of elements of the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division south of Balleroy east to St. 

Paul-de-Verney.56 Unidentified medium 

tanks were also reported on the afternoon 

of 10 June in the vicinity of la Londe. 57 

The light mixed units actually in contact 

were recognized to be incapable of major 

counterattack, but from prisoner interrogations V Corps deduced that the 17th 

SS Panzer Grenadier Division might be in 

position to attack, probably from the direction of the Foret de Cerisy by daylight 

of 11 June. 58 The G-2 further warned of 

a long-range contingency. The 11 th Panzer and 1 st SS Panzer Divisions were reported on the move from the south and 

northeast respectively. It was thought that 

one of them might be used against V 

Corps, although when either would arrive 

could not even be guessed at. 

The possibility of enemy armored 

counterattacks was in the forefront of 

most American commanders' minds. This 

was D plus 3, when according to all planning calculations the enemy could begin 

to exert heavy pressure against the beachheads. 59 Signs that the Germans had actually succeeded in concentrating reserves 

for counterattack were, to be sure, scanty. 

They consisted chiefly in the identification of elements of Panzer Lehr Division 

in the British sector, of the 17 th SS Panzer 

Grenadier Division in front of the 1st Division, and a curious multiplication of 

56 1st Div AAR. 

57 V Corps G-2 Jni. Corps located the 17th SS 

Panzer Grenadier Division chiefly by prisoner reports. The bulk of the division was thought to be 

moving up opposite the 2d Division. The latter, 

however, had made no identifications through II 

June. See 2d Div G-2 Jni. 

58 G-2 believed that the division had both a tank 

and an assault gun battalion. Actually Ostendorff 

had no tanks and his guns were far to the south. 

59 See above, p. 176. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

rumors from prisoners and civilians that 

there were large enemy concentrations in 

the Foret de Cerisy. First Army G-2 wrote 

at the end of 9 June: "No surprise should 

be occasioned should this cover produce 

an armored or motorized division." GO 

The whole tone of the intelligence estimates of this date was dominated by conviction that the enemy was preparing to 

strike a major blow. In summing up the 

fighting of 9 June, First Army reported: 

"Enemy forces pursued their delaying 

tactics pending the arrival of armored 

counterattack forces." 61 There was no appreciation of the havoc that had been 

wrought in the German defenses by Allied success in smashing the coastal crust. 

On 10 June First Army observed that the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division had 

come into the area south of Carentan and 

that no new identifications had been 

made on V Corps front. The enemy units 

in contact were still only the 352d Division and elements of the 716th. First 

Army G-2 believed that in the fighting of 

10 June German forces had withdrawn 

south along the Vire and their eastern 

flank had been forced back to the northern edge of the Foret de Cerisy.62 In reality, not only had the German forces been 

south of the forest for at least twelve 

hours, but at the time the intelligence 

report was issued troops of the U.S. 2d Division were also south of the forest. 63 

The Caumont gap was literally held by 

the reconnaissance battalion of the 17th 

60 First Army G-2 Per Rpt. 

61Ibid. 

62 First Army 1nt Sum as of 2400, 10 Jun. 

63 See above, p. 370. Despite concern over the Foret 

de Cerisy as a possible enemy assembly area, apparently no special report came to the First Army 

G-2 when the 2d Division found the forest clear. It 

seems that the intelligence summary as of 2400, 10 

June, was prepared on information probably twelve 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 373 

SS Panzer Grenadier Division during 10 

June. Plans were made that day to bring 

the XLVII Panzer Corps (General Funck) 

into the gap with the 2d Panzer Division 

(Generalleutnant Heinrich Freiherr von 

Luettwitz). The 2d Panzer Division had 

in fact begun its move from Amiens to 

the battle area during the night of 9-10 

June. Advance units had reached Paris, 

but the movements under air attack during the day were slow and costly. On the 

evening of 10 June while wheeled elements were near Alen~on the tanks had 

just begun to move from Amiens by 

train. With the example of the ineffective 

piecemeal commitment of the 12th SSJ 

21st) and Panzer Lehr Divisions) Funck 

wanted to delay commitment of the 2d 

Panzer until it had completed assembly 

with its tanks. This was expected by 13 

June. In the meantime, on the strong urging of General Luettwitz, the reconnaissance battalion was committed at Caumont with the mission of holding the high 

ground there. 

During the day one reinforced regiment of the 3d Parachute Division arrived in the vicinity of St. Georges-d'Elle. 

The division commander, Generalleutnant Richard Schimpf, wanted to take positions according to plan in the Foret de 

Cerisy area along with Ostendorff's reconnaissance units.64 But Meindl (II Parachute Corps), to whom the regiment was 

attac:hed, believed that the more urgent 

need was to strengthen the 352d Division 

defenses along the Elle. The regiment 

therefore went into line from Berigny to 

St. Germain-d'Elle. II Parachute Corps 

hours old. The G-2 report of 11 June covers the 

error by saying that the 352d Division "was forced 

back from the line Moon-sur-Elle-la Gouesmerie and 

from the Foret de Cerisy ... " Italics are the author's. 

64 MS # B-541 (Schimpf). 

thus refused its right flank at the gap to 

establish an arc defense north and northeast of St. La. The gap was slightly narrowed but it remained open. 

While attempting to fill the gap, the 

Germans on 10 June had also made a final 

effort to mount a counterattack in the 

Caen sector against the British. Inasmuch 

as Panzer Lehr was fully engaged in defensive fighting south of Bayeux, Generai 

Geyr (Panzer Group West), who took 

over command in the Caen sector on 9 

June, planned to use half of the 12th SS 

and half of the 21st Panzer Divisions in a 

limited-objective attack due north of 

Caen. The objective was the Anisy-Anguerny area. Both Geyr and Rommel 

would have preferred to attack more to 

the northwest of Caen, but Geyr did not 

want to spend another twenty-four hours 

maneuvering into position. He felt that 

what was needed was aggressive action 

even if its immediate purposes were relatively inconsequential. Rommel agreed, 

and the attack was ordered for the evening.65 

Even this attack could not be carried 

out. In the afternoon British pressure 

mounted against the right of Panzer Lehr 

and the left of 12th SS Panzer Division 

where the British 30 Corps had committed the 7th Armoured Division to drive 

through Tilly-sur-Seulles, toward VillersBocage. Knowing that Panzer Lehr was already dangerously weakened Geyr called 

off the attack. 

Less than an hour later his headquarters was hit by fighter-bombers that wiped 

out his entire staff. All personnel in the 

operations section were killed, as well as 

65 MS # B-466 (Geyr). Geyr believed that, against 

enemy air superiority and heavy naval artillery fire. 

no daylight attack would have a chance. 
374 

most of the officers of the forward echelon. The bulk of the signal equipment 

was destroyed. With Geyr physically unable to exercise command, the sector reverted to the control of I SS Panzer Corps 

and Seventh Army. Seventh Army henceforth abandoned the idea of a decisive 

armored counterattack and bent all its 

efforts to solidifying its defense. 66 

After the rest and reorganization of 11 

June, V Corps mounted a new attack, this 

time with the deepest southward penetration planned on the left flank in the 1 st 

Division zone. (See Map XVII. ) This was 

designed primarily to assist the British 

Second Army attempt to outflank Caen. 

The Panzer Lehr Division, despite heavy 

losses, had checked the British 7th Armoured Division on 10-11 June at Tillysur-Seulles. On the other hand the U.S. 

First Army advance had evidently struck 

a weak spot in the enemy lines. Although 

the true extent and significance of the 

gap were unknown, it was planned to take 

advantage of obvious German weakness 

in the area to thrust the British 7th Armoured Division south close to the interarmy boundary and hook past the Panzer 

Lehr to capture Villers-Bocage on the 

Caen-Avranches highway. The 1st Division advance to the high ground at Caumont would protect the right flank of 

this maneuver. In conformity with the 

drive to Caumont the 2d and 29th Divisions would continue to push south, but 

with objectives echeloned to the right 

rear so that the advance called for on the 

Vire River flank was relatively small. Besides achieving specific tactical objectives, 

the renewed V Corps attack, it was hoped, 

66 MS # B-466 (Geyr) and Panzcr-Armeeoberkommando 5 (referred to hereafter as Fifth Panzer 

Army), KTB IO.VI.~.VI11.44, 10 Jun 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

would help take pressure off VII Corps, 

which was making the main army effort 

aimed at the capture of Cherbourg. 

The 1st Division estimated that, although the enemy was capable of offering 

only scattered opposition to the advance, 

there was a chance that weak elements of 

Panzer Lehr might penetrate the division 

left boundary and that the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division might attack the 

right flank of the advance. General Huebner's plan provided strict control of the 

attack. Regiments were to move by 

bounds and prepare to defend successive 

phase lines. They would report arrival 

at the phase lines and, except for pushing 

out aggressive reconnaissance, would continue the advance only on division order. 67 

The attacks of 12 June on either side 

of the army boundary at first seemed to 

promise rapid and spectacular success. 

The 1st Division, jumping off at 0800 

with the 18th and 26th Infantry Regiments on a 3,000-yard front behind a 

screen of two troops of the 102d Cavalry 

Squadron, moved rapidly against light enemy forces which readily gave way. The 

18th Infantry had reached the CaumontSt. La highway by evening and sent patrols into Caumont. The 26th Infantry at 

the same time got one battalion to the 

edge of Caumont but there ran into determined resistance from an estimated 

two companies of Germans who belonged 

to the reconnaissance ba ttalion of the 

2d Panzer Division. The town was not 

cleared until the following morning.68 On 

67 1st Div FO 37, II Jun 44. 

68 The enemy patrolled strongly during 13 June, 

giving the Americans the impression at some points 

that counterattacks were in progress. Actions, however, though sometimes sharp were all local and involved few troops. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 375 

the 1st Division right the 9th Infantry of 

the 2d Division occupied the Litteau 

ridge south of the Foret de Cerisy. Not 

until it reached the objective did it make 

firm contact with the enemy. 

The 7th Armoured Division in the 

British 30 Corps zone, starting its attack 

in the afternoon, at first made similarly 

rapid progress. By 1745 leading elements 

had passed through Livry three miles 

northeast of Caumont. At dark the point 

of the attack was south of the divisional 

objective and the armor began to wheel 

east. Villers-Bocage was entered the following morning. This initial success, 

however, was qualified by the failure of 

the British 50th Division on the northeast to make any progress in direct attacks 

against the Panzer Lehr Division west of 

Tilly-sur-Seulles. On 13 June the 2d Panzer Division (with two infantry regiments 

supported by two battalions of artillery 

but no tanks) strongly counterattacked 

between Cahagnes and Villers-Bocage. 

The Germans drove up almost to the Caumont-Villers-Bocage road. The 7th Armoured Division, with its forward movement stopped, found itself in a dangerously exposed thin salien't. In the afternoon it withdrew to high ground some 

two miles west of the town where it tied 

in with the 1st Division at Caumont. During the afternoon of 14 June, renewed enemy attacks induced a further withdrawal 

of about five miles north to the ParfouruL'Eclin area on the Aure River and Caumont-Caen road. The 2d Panzer Division 

attacks were broken up in large measure 

by artillery concentrations in which batteries of the V Corps, which had observation of the enemy from the Caumont 

heights, took an important part. 

Positions on high ground covering 

Villers-Bocage remained for about six 

weeks in enemy hands. The Caumont gap 

remained open between the 2d Panzer 

and 3d Parachute Divisions) but in view 

of the strong enemy opposition to British 

advance the 1st Division was ordered to 

hold at Caumont while Gerow continued 

to push with his right against the 352d 

and 3d Parachute Divisions in front of 

St. La. 

The push was to net few gains during 

the next week. Two regiments of the 2d 

Division and the whole of the 29th Division had run into a new kind of enemy 

resistance, based in part on stubborn defense of positions prepared in depth and 

in part on small counterthrusts against 

the flanks of advancing American forces. 

The 3d Parachute Division) moreover, 

turned out to have some of the best and 

toughest infantrymen in Rundstedt's 

armIes. 

On 12 June the attacks of the 2d Division in the center of the corps zone were 

split by the Foret de Cerisy. While the 

9th Infantry on the left advanced in conformity with the 1st Division and against 

only slight opposition, the 23d Infantry 

directed its attack southwest toward St. 

La in an operation linked with the advance of the 29th Division on its right. 

Principal objective of the 23d Infantry 

was Hill 192-a dominating hill mass 

north of the main Bayeux-St. La roadthe key to St. La because it provided observation of all approaches to the city for 

miles to the north and east. The regiment, 

attacking with two battalions, was stopped 

at the Elle River. This stream, only ten 

feet wide and no military obstacle in itself, marked the enemy's main line of resistance. It was clear, too, that the enemy 

was making effective use of the observa-
376 

tion afforded by Hill 192. But neither 

American fighter-bomber missions shortly 

before dark nor repeated artillery concentrations on enemy positions there 

achieved any effective results. 

On 13 June the 2d Division renewed 

the attack and the 38th Infantry, with 

heavy artillery support (more than 6,500 

rounds were fired), advanced about two 

miles south of the Elle. As enemy resistance thickened, the American troops were 

stopped by division order and directed 

together with the 23d Infantry to organize their present positions for defense. 

The difference in enemy opposition east 

and west of the Foret de Cerisy can be 

seen from comparative casualties. While 

the 1 st Division lost 92 men in the twoday attack, the 2d Division lost 540, most 

of them from the two regiments that had 

struggled toward Hill 192. 

The 29th Division attacked on 12 June 

with one regiment, the 115th, while the 

175th Infantry held north of the Elle protecting the corps west flank and the 1 1 6th 

remained in corps reserve as precaution 

against an enemy counterattack west of 

the Vire. 69 The 747th Tank Battalion was 

held in division reserve also against the 

contingency of counterattack. The 115th 

Infantry, despite direct support by three 

battalions of artillery, had hard going. 

The 1st Battalion was stopped at the river 

bank mostly by small arms fire. The 3d 

Battalion succeeded in crossing and advanced south about 3,000 yards. Enemy 

forces built up in the hedgerows, and by 

the end of the morning the battalion was 

not only stopped but was fighting to avoid 

being cut off. After taking severe losses it 

withdrew to its original line of depart69 See above, section on Junction Between V and 

VII Corps. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ure. 70 In the afternoon two platoons of 

tanks were put in with the 1st Battalion 

to try to outflank the enemy holding the 

river crossing southeast of Ste. Marguerite-d'Elle. After three tanks were lost, 

the attempt was abandoned. In the evening the 116th Infantry was passed 

through the 115th and not only succeeded 

in crossing but by daylight had approached its objectives, against resistance 

reported to be light. Continuing under 

generous supporting artillery fires the 

regiment entered St. Clair-sur-Elle and 

Couvains. Casualties to the 29th Division 

for the two days were 547. 

At the end of 13 June the V Corps 

attack toward St. La was halted by order 

of General Bradley. The Carentan-Isigny 

link between his two corps was still thin 

and weak, and despite success in beating 

off the attack of the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division it still seemed possible that 

the enemy might try again. Furthermore 

XIX Corps was just becoming operational 

in this area and it was necessary to adjust 

troop assignments between the corps. The 

29th Division passed to the control of the 

new corps and the 30th Division was 

brought into the zone between the Vire 

and Taute Rivers. Supporting troops 

were reshuffled. 

In calling off the southward push, General Bradley was also influenced by the 

desire to avoid a general engagement of 

V Corps which might absorb resources 

needed for First Army's main effort-the 

VII Corps attack to cut the peninsula and 

take Cherbourg.n Finally, since the British seemed to be stopped north of Tillysur-Seulles, any advance by V Corps 

70 115th Regt 8-3 JnI. 

71 Ltr, Lt Gen C. R. Huebner to author, 17 Oct 

47. Hist Div files. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 377 

would expose both flanks to possible enemy armored attack. There seemed a real 

danger of that in the afternoon, when the 

2d Panzer Division was identified on the 

left of the 1st Division, and the warning 

was issued to both 1st and 2d Divisions to 

dig in when they reached suitable defensive positions. 

For the time being the mission of V 

Corps became to hold its present positions while First Army devoted its main 

effort to the capture of Cherbourg and, as 

a precondition for that, strengthened the 

Vire-Taute corridor. The corps' divisions, however, were given a certain latitude to improve their defensive positions 

and were ordered to conduct aggressive 

patrolling "so as to deny the enemy any 

opportunity to abandon this front with 

impunity" and to give the impression of 

continued major offensive action.72 

Toward St. La 

When V Corps halted on 13 June, the 

whole First Army line on the south was 

echeloned to the right from Caumont 

held by the 1st Division to the Carentan 

area in the zone of the lOlst Airborne Division. The 1st Division held a salient in 

the Caumont area substantially in advance of the 2d Division on its right. The 

2d and 29th Divisions were deployed on a 

northwest-southeast line generally from 

Cormolain to Airel on the Vire River. 

They confronted the right wing of II Parachute Corps} temporarily subordinated 

to LXXXIV Corps} which defended St. 

La on an arc along the high ground north 

and northeast of the city. The 1st and 2d 

Divisions remained under V Corps, which 

had also the 2d Armored Division (less 

72 V Corps FO 5, 13 Jun 44. 

Combat Command A) 73 in reserve. The 

XIX Corps (Maj. Gen. Charles H. Corlett) 74 became operational on 13 June, 

with the 30th Division (Maj. Gen. Leland Hobbs) attached, and on the next 

day took over from V Corps control of the 

29th Division. 

In anticipation of renewing the drive 

south, both V and XIX Corps on 14 June 

issued warning orders marking out objectives and schemes of maneuver. Following the outlines of these orders all 

forward divisions except the I st made limited-objective attacks during the next 

week primarily to secure better defensive 

positions, although commanders hoped 

that larger rewards might be reaped. 

The series of limited-objective attaGks 

began on 15 June with a thrust by XIX 

Corps aimed at securing the high ground 

on the line St. Georges de Bohon (three 

miles southwest of Carentan)-le Hommet 

d'Arthenay (three miles northwest of 

Pont Hebert)-St. L6-la Barre de Semilly. 

The 30th Division, which had not yet 

landed all its troops, attacked initially 

with only one regiment. The attack made 

very slow progress even though the estimated enemy opposition consisted of only 

one platoon of riflemen and a section of 

the machine guns. At the end of the day 

the 120th Infantry occupied Montmartinen-Graignes and the high ground north 

of the Vire-Taute Cana1.75 The day's op73 CCA was still attached to the lOIst Airborne 

Division. 

74 General Corlett had come to the European 

theater after serving in the Pacific. He had taken 

command of the 7th Division in September 1943, 

and led it in combat on Kwajalein. He was transferred to Europe to take over XIX Corps in April 

1944. 

75 Although Montmartin had been entered on 12 

June, troops had pulled back to a defensive line 

along the high ground north of the town. 
378 

erations cost it less than twenty casualties. 

Again the fighting between the Vire 

and Taute Rivers had proceeded on a 

very small scale, as the attitude on both 

sides remained defensive and the opposing forces almost equally weak. Curiously 

enough, each opponent viewing his own 

weakness expected the other to attack. 

Though the narrow zone between the rivers cut by the open muddy depression at 

the Vire-Taute Canal would have made 

any attack difficult, the rewards of success 

might have tempted either of the respective commanders to accept the risks. The 

Americans expected the Germans to 

strike for the sea and split the First Army; 

the Germans expected the Americans to 

drive for Periers and split the Seventh 

Army. The fact was that neither opponent had the strength to do anything but 

hold on. 

Weakness on the German side resulted 

mainly from the nearly incredible difficulties of moving troops into the linedifficulties that had constantly disrupted 

Seventh Army offensive plans and jeopardized its defensive positions everywhere 

in Normandy. The story of how Kampfgruppe Heintz struggled up to Montmartin-en-Graignes where it fought against 

the 120th Infantry is worth the telling for 

it shows how completely the battlefield 

was sealed off by Allied air forces. (Map 

XVIII) 

Kampfgruppe Heintz consisted of the 

984th Regiment of the 275th Division) reinforced by the division Fuesilier battalion, a three-battery artillery battalion, 

the engineer battalIon, and a Flak battery.76 It had been ordered on the morn76 It also took over command of the Angers Engineer Battalion, an alarm unit. which consisted of 

the school troops and students of the Seventh Army 

Engineer School at Angers. On 6 June the battalion 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ing of 6 June to begin immediate priority 

movement to the battle area. The division headquarters then at Redon in Brittany was less than 120 miles by rail from 

St. La. A day or two should have been 

ample for the movement. But Allied aircraft, sovereign in the skies, ruled otherWIse. 

The Kampfgruppe took only about ten 

hours to assemble but was delayed in entraining by air attacks which blocked 

tracks, damaged locomotives, and generally interfered with the assembling of 

cars. These delays continued through the 

night, and by 0800 the following morning 

only three sections of the Kampfgruppe 

had been loaded. In the afternoon five 

trains were under way; three were still 

being loaded. The lead train made good 

progress to Avranches, where at 1400 it 

was held up by undetermined trouble 

ahead. While this was being cleared up, 

the rails behind it were cut. Late in the 

afternoon the train passed through Avranches and reached Foligny a few miies 

to the north. At Foligny, however, air attack destroyed it with total loss of vehicles 

and equipment and very heavy casualties. 

The second train in the meantime 

reached Pontorson but was there halted 

by rail cuts to the east. Under heavy air 

attack which took severe toll of the men 

and equipment of the engineer unit 

aboard, the train was unloaded and the 

troops ordered to continue on foot. 77 

consisted of a headquarters and headquarters COlli· 

pany. a heavy weapons company. and two infantry 

companies. which were committed west of the Vire 

on 10 June when the 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division was delayed in moving into its sector south of 

Carenlan. Seventh Army, KTB 1.I.-30.VI.44, 27 Jan 

and 6-9 Jun 44. 

77 The account of the move of Kampfgruppe 

Heintz is from the Seventh Army, Trans. 0., KTB 

1.I.-30.VI.44. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 379 

All other trains en route on 7 June had 

been attacked and so delayed that at 1800 

they were still all south of Rennes. At that 

time it was reported that bombs had cut 

the rails in three places between Rennes 

and Dol and the whole movement was 

ordered rerouted via la Brohiniere-Dinan-Dol. Scarcely had this decision been 

made when it was discovered that between Dinan and Dol the tracks were 

broken in no fewer than nineteen places. 

All during 8 June seven trains languished 

on the rails south of Rennes. Two other 

trains meanwhile were struggling to load 

artillery units of the Kampfgruppe and 

were being continually interrupted by 

air attacks. It was 1915 on 8 June before 

the last train got under way. Since no 

progress had been made to clear the route 

beyond Rennes on 7 June, it had been 

decided to reroute the trains through 

Fougeres. On 9 June the Fougeres line 

was cut. The transportation officers then 

gave up. The troops of Kampfgruppe 

Heintz were all unloaded and ordered to 

proceed by truck or foot. The bulk of the 

unit had thus in two days and three nights 

traveled less than thirty miles. Three to 

five more days were consumed in the road 

march to the final assembly areas where 

the Kampfgruppe was attached to the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division and 

put at once into the line southeast of Carentan. 78

The experience of Kampfgruppe 

Heintz in trying to move under unre78It was attached to the 352d Division for supply. 

The 2d Battalion, 984th Regiment, and the Fuesilier 

Battalion came up on bicycles in the evening of 11 

June. The 1st Battalion arrived on the 13th. Order, 

13 Jun 44, Kampfgruppe Heintz. Miscellaneous orders in 275th Division files, 1944; cf. XXV Corps, 

KTB and Anlagen 6.-30.VI.44; Seventh Army, Trans. 

O., KTB 1.I-30.VI.44. 

stricted Allied air attacks was by no means 

exceptional. On the contrary the difficulties of a unit of the 265th Division ordered out of Brittany at the same time 

were even worse. Original orders to move 

the whole 265th unit by train were canceled on 7 June in order to save trains for 

the use of Kampfgruppe Heintz. The 

bulk of the troops thus turned out on the 

road arrived in about five days in the 

battle area. But the so-called immobile 

portions deemed essential to move by rail 

entrained at Quimperle and took seven 

days to reach Rennes about one hundred 

miles away. From that point they had to 

walk. 

Discouraged by these and similar experiences, on 13 June Seventh Army decided that rail movements between Brittany and Normandy were impossible and 

that there was little hope that the situation would improve. Dollmann therefore 

closed the branch rail office under 

LXXIV Corps which had been established on D Day.79 

By the attack of 15 June XIX Corps secured a defensive position fronting the 

depression of the Vire-Taute Canal. In 

this position the 30th Division continued 

to build up. It did not seem feasible to 

continue the push south through the 

bottleneck of the St. Lo highway across 

the lowlands. The decision was made to 

wait for additional troops with which to 

force a crossing of the river in attack westward. General Corlett therefore ordered 

the 30th Division to defend the line of 

the canal while the 29th Division and the 

79Seventh Army, Trans.O., KTB l.I.-30.VI.44. German supply by road and rail was similarly disorganized. See below, pp. 410-11. 

THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 379 

All other trains en route on 7 June had 

been attacked and so delayed that at 1800 

they were still all south of Rennes. At that 

time it was reported that bombs had cut 

the rails in three places between Rennes 

and Dol and the whole movement was 

ordered rerouted via la Brohiniere-Dinan-Dol. Scarcely had this decision been 

made when it was discovered that between Dinan and Dol the tracks were 

broken in no fewer than nineteen places. 

All during 8 June seven trains languished 

on the rails south of Rennes. Two other 

trains meanwhile were struggling to load 

artillery units of the Kampfgruppe and 

were being continually interrupted by 

air attacks. It was 1915 on 8 June before 

the last train got under way. Since no 

progress had been made to clear the route 

beyond Rennes on 7 June, it had been 

decided to reroute the trains through 

Fougeres. On 9 June the Fougeres line 

was cut. The transportation officers then 

gave up. The troops of Kampfgruppe 

Heintz were all unloaded and ordered to 

proceed by truck or foot. The bulk of the 

unit had thus in two days and three nights 

traveled less than thirty miles. Three to 

five more days were consumed in the road 

march to the final as.sembly areas where 

the Kampfgruppe was attached to the 

17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division and 

put at once into the line southeast of Carentan.78 

The experience of Kampfgruppe 

Heintz in trying to move under unre78 It was attached to the J52d Division for supply. 

The 2d Battalion, 984th Regiment, and the Fuesilier 

Battalion came up on bicycles in the evening of 11 

June. The 1st Battalion arrived on the 13th. Order, 

13 Jun 44. KamPfgruppe Heintz. Miscellaneous orders in 275th Division files, 1944; d. XXV Corps, 

KTB and Anlagen 6.-JO.VI.44; Seventh Army, Trans. 

a., KTB JJ.-JO.V1.44. 

stricted Allied air attacks was by no means 

exceptional. On the contrary the difficulties of a unit of the 265th Division ordered out of Brittany at the same time 

were even worse. Original orders to move 

the whole 265 th unit by train were canceled on 7 June in order to save trains for 

the use of Kampfgruppe Heintz. The 

bulk of the troops thus turned out on the 

road arrived in about five days in the 

battle area. But the so-called immobile 

portions deemed essential to move by rail 

entrained at Quimperle and took seven 

days to reach Rennes about one hundred 

miles away. From that point they had to 

walk. 

Discouraged by these and similar experiences, on 13 June Seventh Army decided that rail movements between Brittany and Normandy were impossible and 

that there was little hope that the situation would improve. Dollmann therefore 

closed the branch rail office under 

LXXIV Corps which had been established on D Day.79 

By the attack of 15 June XIX Corps secured a defensive position fronting the 

depression of the Vire-Taute Canal. In 

this position the 30th Division continued 

to build up. It did not seem feasible to 

continue the push south through the 

bottleneck of the St. La highway across 

the lowlands. The decision was made to 

wait for additional troops with which to 

force a crossing of the river in attack westward. General Corlett therefore ordered 

the 30th Division to defend the line of 

the canal while the 29th Division and the 

79 Seventh Army, Trans.a., KTB 1.I.-JO.VI.44. German supply by road and rail was similarly disorganized. See below. pp. 410-11. 
380 

2d Division of V Corps renewed the attack toward St. La.SO (MaPXIX) 

The critical objective of the new attack 

was again Hill 192. The hill itself was the 

assigned objective of the 38th Infantry 

on the right flank of the 2d Division. To 

assist in taking it the 29th Division, attacking with two regiments abreast, was to 

put its main effort on the left. There the 

116th Infantry, with the 3d Battalion of 

the 115th Infantry attached, was to drive 

for St. Andre-de-l'Epine and Hill 150 at 

the northeastern end of the Martinville 

ridge (later one of the bloodiest of the St. 

La battlefields). The 175th Infantry, attacking with its right on the Vire River, 

would advance to Hills 90 and 97 northwest of St. La. The 2d Division, besides 

taking Hill 192 with the 38th Infantry, 

would seize the high ground astride the 

St. La highway near la Croix Rouge with 

the 23d Infantry and the heights west of 

St. Germain-d'Elle and northwest of 

Montrabot with the 9th Infantry. The 1st 

Division was alerted by V Corps to advance later to a line roughly from la 

Lande-sur-Drame to Cahagnes, but the 

attack would wait for the completion of 

the 2d Division advance. 

Enemy positions had been discovered 

on 15 June, in and around St. Germaind'Elle, by patrols of the 102d Cavalry 

Squadron which probed as far south as 

Vidouville. The cavalry also identified 

German paratroopers at Montrabot. 

Since the arrival on 10 June of advance 

elements of the 3d Parachute Division to 

take up defensive positions on the right 

flank of the 352d Division, other march 

groups of the division had straggled in to 

extend the line southeast and gradually 

80 Ltr. Gen Corlett to author. 14 Oct 48. Hist Div 

files. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

fill the Caumont gap. Although the final 

assembly of all three regiments of the 

division was not complete until the night 

of 17 June, the line was already strong 

by the 16th. Unlike most German units 

moved to the front during June, the regiments of the 3d Parachute Division arrived almost intact. By marching only at 

night, avoiding the main roads, and maintaining strict march and camouflage discipline, they had almost wholly escaped air 

attack.s1 

The U.S. 2d Division in the attack of 

16 June, which began for all three regiments at 0800, pushed both wings forward 

slightly but was unable to advance in the 

center. All along the line, heavy fighting 

netted advances measured only in yards, 

as the enemy put up a skillful and stubborn defense in position that made maximum use of the tangled hedgerow country. The experience of one platoon of the 

9th Infantry on the left was typical. The 

platoon advancing through open fields 

was hit by fire from eight machine guns 

emplaced in the network of hedgerows: 

its leader was lost as well as a third of its 

men. With observation from high ground 

west of St. Germain-d'Elle, the enemy repeatedly permitted the attackers to reach 

exposed positions and then opened withering fire. At the end of the day the 9th 

Infantry had lost 140 men-twenty of 

them killed-and had advanced only a 

few hundred yards. St. Germain-d'Elle remained in enemy hands.s2 

The most important advance of the day 

occurred on the 2d Division right, where 

the 3d Battalion of the 38th Infantry 

pushed up Hill 192 to within 700 yards of 

the crest. The value of the success, how81 MS # B-S41 (Schimpf). 

82 Regimental S--3 Jnls. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 381 

ever, was limited by the failure of units 

on the right and left to keep up. The 23d 

Infantry in the center of the division zone 

fought hard all day, losing 11 officers and 

162 men. But the end of the day found it 

still virtually at the line of departure. 

Despite the exposed position of the battalion on Hill 192, it was decided to leave 

it in place and the 2d Engineer Battalion 

was ordered up to double for infantry 

and reinforce its lines. The hill salient 

was held throughout the rest of June, as 

the 2d Division by corps order passed to 

the defensive. 

The attack of the 29th Division on 16 

June at first seemed to go well. Colonel 

Canham planned to advance his 116th 

Infantry by bounds. The 1st Battalion 

leading off at 0800 would pass through the 

3d Battalion to take the plateau between 

the Bois du Bretel and la Blotrie. There 

it would reorganize and be prepared to 

advance to capture Hills 147 and 150 on 

the Martinville ridge. The 3d Battalion, 

1 1 5th Infantry, attached for this operation, would advance southwest to cut the 

St. L6-Isigny highway near la Fossardiere 

and organize the high ground there for 

all-around defense. The 2d Battalion, 

116th Infantry, then in contact with the 

enemy at St. Clair-sur-rElle, would break 

contact and assemble in the vicinity of 

Couvains prepared to strike through the 

other two battalions to take Hill 115 and 

the stretch of highway near la Luzerne. 

The two battalions that led the attack 

(Canham'S 1st and the 3d of the 115th) 

each had eight tanks attached. The order 

emphasized the organization of all objectives for defense against enemy counterattack. The 115th Infantry, less the 3d 

Battalion, was held in corps reserve near 

Ste. Marguerite-d'Elle. 

All units got off on time and at 0930 

the lead battalions were both making 

good progress against slight opposition. 

About noon, however, the 3d Battalion, 

115th, reported meeting two companies 

of enemy infantry with two tanks. By midafternoon two of its own tanks were 

knocked out and forward progress was virtually halted east of les Foulons. At the 

same time the 1st Battalion, 116th Infantry, was far to the south, only about 

1,000 yards short of St. Andre-de-rEpine. 

Here it was stopped by artillery fire and 

an enemy counterattack. The 2d Battalion, committed about noon to attack 

toward la Luzerne, was held up just west 

of the highway near Villiers-Fossard 

where the enemy was dug in on a nose of 

high ground. Supporting artillery fire 

failed to shake the battalion loose. The 

3d Battalion, 115th Infantry, in the meantime was withdrawn 1,000 yards to the 

rear. By 1800 General Corlett at corps 

had given up the idea of reaching final 

objectives before dark and all forward 

battalions dug in to hold for the night 

and resume the attack the next day.s3 

Enemy resistance from commanding 

ground and hedgerows had been stubborn, but Colonel Canham was nevertheless not satisfied with the effort his regiment had made. He admonished his subordinate commanders that night to take 

uplhe attack the next day with new vigor. 

They should advance their units on a 

broad front, he said, and "get around the 

sniper and machine gunner and wipe him 

out .... If you allow your unit to bunch 

up behind a hedgerow and wait for hours 

you are only playing into Jerry's hand. He 

will move around where he can enfilade 

83 29th Div G-3 JnI; 115th and 116th Inf Regts 5-3 

JnIs. 
382 

you or drop artillery or mortar fire on 

you .... It is time to get over the jitters 

and fight like hell." 84 

The 17 5th Infantry (Lt. Col. Alexander George) 85 during the day met much 

lighter resistance as it attacked with its 

right on the Vire River. The 1st and 3d 

Battalions, north of the Elle River, were 

relieved during the night of 15-16 June 

by elements of the 119th Infantry and 

crossed the river to gain a line of departure along the ridge line on the south 

bank. The move was made without opposition, but the next morning both battalions ran into some enemy machine 

gun, mortar, and artillery fire as they 

pushed south to reach Amy and les Buteaux. One company of the I I 9th Infantry followed the 3d Battalion, stationing 

patrols along the river to guard possible 

crossing sites against an eruption of the 

enemy into the regiment's open flank. 

The comparatively rapid advance of 

the l75th Infantry led the 29th Division 

command to believe that enemy opposition in this zone had cracked. 86 As late as 

1400 on 17 June General Gerhardt told 

General Corlett, "I feel we'll be getting to 

St. La before long." But he added, "It's 

hard to tell." 87 

Actually, in the fighting of 17 June 

there appeared indications of stalemate. 

The 116th Infantry, renewing the attack 

at 0400, ran into strong enemy machine 

gun and mortar fire. The worst spot was 

in the gap of about 1,000 yards developed 

in the previous day's attack between the 

116th and 175th. There in the vicinity of 

84 116th Inf 8-3 Jn1. 

8~ George replaced Colonel Goode, who had been 

captured 13 June. See above, section on Junction 

Between V and VII Corps. 

86 So estimated in 29th Div FO 9. 

8729th Div G-3 Jn1. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Villiers-Fossard the enemy was strongly 

entrenched. General Gerhardt observed 

that it was "a devil of a place. Every time 

they go forward they are driven back." 88 

Attempts to smash through with artillery 

or 4.2-inch mortar support foundered on 

the difficulties of observation. Sources of 

enemy fire could be located generally but 

seldom pinpointed.89 

This was true everywhere on the front. 

It was also noted that preparatory artillery fire did little good since the Germans 

made a practice of thinly outposting their 

front lines and moving the bulk of their 

forces forward to meet the infantry attack after the artillery lifted. The attack 

of the 115th Infantry (less the 2d Battalion) got off at 1840, 17 June. Leading the 

attack, the 1 st Battalion lost direction and 

was caught by machine gun fire in an orchard not far from the line of departure. 

The 3d Battalion remained in the assembly area and dug in for the night. 

Under the attacks of the 29th Division 

on 16 and 17 June the German 352 d Division} already only a Kampfgruppe of 

about regimental strength, lost about 500 

men. On the other hand withdrawal 

southward coupled with the build-up of 

the 3d Parachute Division had resulted 

in a substantial shortening of Kraiss's 

lines. His right rested on high ground 

west of St. Andre-de-l'Epine, his left on 

the Vireo The division, furthermore, was 

strengthened on the evening of 16 June 

when Kampfgruppe Boehm of the 353d 

Division arrived from Brittany. Boehm, 

who was commander of the 943d Regiment} brought up two infantry battalions 

and a few supporting troops on bicycles. 

Pending the arrival of the rest of the divi88 Ibid. 

89 See, for instance, 115th 8-3 Jnl, 18 Jun. 
THE V CORPS LODGMENT (7-18 JUNE) 383 

sion (still south of Avranches) he was attached to the 352d and ordered into the 

area of la Luzerne. It was chiefly Boehm's 

fresh infantry that fought in the VilliersFossard salient during 17 June.90 

In the 175th Infantry zone only the 1st 

Battalion attacked on 17 June. On Hill 

108 it ran into heavy enemy artillery and 

machine gun fire and at 1440 reported 

that it was unable to advance. About the 

same time the 2d Battalion, which had 

held in position just northwest of the 1st, 

reported a counterattack that seemed designed by the Germans to cut off the 1st 

Battalion. Although the enemy made no 

significant penetrations of the 175th Infantry's lines, the advance southward was 

effectively halted. 

For the third day's attack (on 18 June) 

General Gerhardt got eight battalions of 

artillery, six of which were to mass fires 

in front of the 1 1 5th and 1 1 6th Infantry 

Regiments. A seven-minute artillery concentration before the jump-off had little 

effect in softening enemy defenses. At 

noon the 115th reported that the general 

advance had been stopped. The troops 

were getting mortar, 88-mm., 105-mm., 

and 20-mm. explosive fire and found it 

impossible to determine the exact location of the enemy in the immediate area. 

As for the 1 1 6th, it was exhausted by the 

attacks of the first two days. The 1st Battalion commander reported that he could 

not attack as he had "hardly anyone left." 

His executive officer added that "everyone is done out physically. No leaders left. 

No reorganization possible." 91 

A similar situation developed in the 

175th zone. The 3d Battalion, after being 

90 MS # A-983 (Generalleutnant Paul Mahlmann, 

CG, 353d Division) . 

91 116th 5-3 Jnl, 18 Jun. 

relieved at Meauffe about midnight by 

the 11 9th Infantry, attacked south the 

morning of 18 June and reached Ie Carillon without meeting much opposition. 

But the 1st Battalion was getting badly 

battered on Hill 108. To relieve it, the 

3d Battalion was first diverted at 1400 to 

attack southeast toward Hill 102; later it 

was ordered to disengage and go directly 

to the assistance of the 1st Battalion. 

Positions occupied by V Corps units on 

18 June were held for the next two weeks. 

Less than five miles from the key city of 

St. Ln, the 29th Division would not enter 

it for almost a month and then at the cost 

of some of the most difficult and expensive fighting of the war. A foretaste of the 

struggle had already come in the last three 

days of the June attacks as V Corps mired 

in the hedgerow country. One of the 

prime difficulties faced by the Americans 

in this terrain was in co-ordinating tanks 

and infantry. The enemy skillfully established defenses combining antitank guns 

and automatic weapons well concealed in 

hedges. Tanks could not go forward to 

knock out the machine guns, nor could 

infantry spearhead the advance to take 

out the antitank guns. The effect was 

graphically described in the account by 

the 747th Tank Battalion of a limitedobjective attack on 20 June to reduce the 

Villiers-Fossard salient: 92 

At 0600 Company B moved forward, with 

the engineers blowing gaps in hedgerows 

and the infantry following. The infantry was 

pinned down and tanks could not move further forward. But they were on part of their 

objective. Tanks were forced to withdraw 

due to heavy antitank fire and bazooka fire. 

One tank was knocked out and the crew of 

five men were wounded. The tanks kept try92747th Tk Bn AAR, with supporting documents. 
384 

ing to move forward, but got stuck. And the 

infantry stayed pinned down. Another tank 

was hit. On order of the regimental commander four tanks forced their way through 

fire to the objective. No infantry followed. 

Two tanks returned; one was knocked out 

by antitank guns. The other was stuck so 

that [the 1 crew had to abandon [the 1 tanks 

as no help could reach them. The infantry 

withdrew 900 yards and took up defensive 

positions. The tanks covered the withdrawal. ... 

One answer was the development of 

small infantry-tank teams which could 

advance together. To make this possible 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

hedgerow cutters were devised and 

welded to the fronts of the tanks to allow 

them to bull through the earth banks. 

Technicians wrestled with difficult problems of direct communication between 

infantry and tanks. All during the rest of 

June training took place in the V Corps 

zone to perfect tank-infantry tactics 

which could set the attack rolling once 

more toward St. La when the time came.93 

98 During the remainder of the month the whole 

V Corps front was static, except for a limited objective attack in the Villiers-Fossard area on 29 June. 

See below, p. 444. 
TANK EQUIPPED WITH HEDGEROW CUTTER 
CHAPTER X 

The Capture of Cherbourg 

(8 J une-l July) 

Securing the North Flank 

On 18 June, when V Corps went on the 

defensive in front of St. La, VII Corps 

on First Army's right had just completed 

a brilliant victory-the cutting of the Cotentin-which split the German Seventh 

Army and sealed the fate of Cherbourg. 

The victory, swift and dramatic in the 

final stage, was preceded by ten days of 

hard slugging in order to break out the 

ring which the Germans pressed around 

the D-Day beachhead. 

Some of the hardest fighting during the 

first week of the invasion took place on 

the north flank of VII Corps where the 

4th Division, together with the 505th Parachute Infantry (82d Airborne Division) 

on its left, fought to take the corps D-Day 

objective: the ridge line, QuinevilleMontebourg-Ie Ham, from the coast to 

the Merderet River. (Map XX ) The enemy in this area had the advantage of defending higher ground which rises gradually northward to the Quineville-Montebourg ridge. Field fortifications were prepared throughout the area making maximum use of the network of hedgerows. 

In addition, the fully developed fortified 

areas at Azeville, Crisbecq, Ozeville, and 

along the beach as far as Quineville provided strong nodes of defense. It will be 

remembered that the 4th Division had 

butted up against the southernmost defenses on 7 June but had been unable to 

subdue them. 

After the D-Day lodgment area had 

been cleaned out on D plus 1, VII Corps 

organized a full-scale attack to the north. 

It was essential to reach the QuinevilleMontebourg line in order to knock out 

enemy batteries which kept the UTAH 

landing beaches under artillery fire as 

well as to widen the base of attack for a 

drive westward across the peninsula. 

Four regiments attacked abreast on 8 

June: the 505th Parachute Infantry and 

8th Infantry west of the Montebourg 

highway with objectives between the 

Merderet River and Montebourg, and the 

12th and 22d Infantry Regiments in the 

zone east to the coast with final objectives along the Quineville-Montebourg 

ridge. 

The 8th Infantry and 505th Parachute 

Infantry made slow but steady progress 

under harassing opposition during 8 June 

to reach a line generally from the Montebourg highway through Magneville to 

the Merderet. Probing attacks farther 

north before dark revealed what seemed 

to be a prepared defense along the tributary of the Merderet just north of Magneville. Centers of resistance were apparent 

at the Magneville hangar and at Ecausseville. Along the creek bank machine guns 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 387 

were dug in and artillery was registered 

on all routes of approach.! 

These positions were actually part of 

the defense set up by General von Schlieben after the unsuccessful counterattack 

on Ste. Mere-Eglise on 8 June. The main 

German defensive line, however, was to 

the north along the railroad from Ie Ham 

to Montebourg and thence northeast following the main highway to Quineville. 

Between 9 and 12 June troops were gathered to man this line from miscellaneous 

units of the 709th) 243d) and 91st Divisions and the Seventh Army Sturm Battalion and formed into three Kampfgruppen of nominally regimental size. The 

east wing of the line rested securely on 

the high ground at Quineville extending 

to the sea, but the west flank was open. It 

was planned that the 77 th Division would 

tie in on the west as soon as that unit, still 

moving up slowly from the south, should 

arrive. 2 The chief strength of the German 

defense in the meantime was its unusually 

strong artillery support. In addition to 

the artillery that von Schlieben had on 8 

June (a battalion of the 243d Artillery 

Regiment and two heavy motorized battalions, the 456th and 457th), on about 

9 June two Russian 1 22-mm. guns were 

moved from Carteret on the west coast of 

the Cotentin to northwest of Quineville. 

At the same time the six French 155-mm. 

guns of the 3d Battalion) 1261st Artillery 

1 Combat intervs, 82d Abn and 4th Inf Divs. For 

treatment in greater detail of this action and others 

on the road to Cherbourg see Ruppenthal, Utah 

Beach, pp. 95fI. 

2 MS # B-845 (Schlie ben) ; d. Holfmann Report. 

Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-JO.Vl.44. The 

Kampfgruppen formed were: Kampfgruppe Hoffmann from the Ie Ham railroad station to Montebourg; Kampfgruppe Kei/ from Montebourg to the 

vicinity of les Landes; and Kampfgruppe Mueller 

from les Landes to Quineville. 

Regiment) were shifted from Fontenay to 

positions about half a mile west of Lestre. 

In addition the guns of two fixed coastal 

battalions at Videcosville and Morsalines 

(about four miles north of Quineville 

ridge) were removed from their bases and 

mounted on carriages so that they could 

be used in the land fighting-the job being done by ordnance personnel working 

day and night under almost constant 

American fire. The effectiveness of this 

comparatively large aggregation of guns 

in support of the German defense was 

qualified, however, by a shortage of ammunition and by the fact that the crews 

were submitted to almost constant Allied 

naval bombardment and air attacks.3 

Co-ordinated American attacks on 9 

June had varying success. The 8th Infantry at the cost of hard fighting and heavy 

losses made significant gains in overcoming some of the points of heaviest German resistance. Company L took the hangar positions at Magneville by charging 

across open fields in the face of heavy 

grazing fire and at the cost of many lives. 

In the meantime the 2d Battalion, assaulting Ecausseville, which was reported to 

be lightly held, had its leading company 

chewed by enemy artillery, mortar, and 

machine gun fire that caught it in a hedgerowed trail. The I st Battalion, however, 

took up the fight late in the day and fared 

better. With two platoons of tanks in the 

lead the 1st Battalion moved up the road 

east of Ecausseville. At the crossroads east 

of the town, tanks shot up a group of 

houses from the rear and enabled the infantry to move in and take 100 prisoners. 

Ecausseville itself held out as enemy 88-

mm. guns prevented the tanks from enterS MS # B-260 (Triepel). 
388 

ing. But the outflanking maneuver was 

successful, and during the night the Germans withdrew to their main defensive 

positions. 

The 8th Infantry then advanced rapidly and by the night of 10 June all three 

battalions had reached objectives along 

the Ie Ham-Montebourg highway. But 

attacks toward the Ie Ham-Montebourg 

railroad line were met with very heavy 

enemy fire. The entire regiment therefore dug in east of the highway and established a defensive line which it was 

to hold until the beginning of the major 

drive north to Cherbourg on 19 June. 

The simultaneous attack on 10 June of 

the 505th Parachute Infantry on the left 

proved more difficult, largely because of 

the nature of the tactical problem. The 

regiment was to take the Montebourg 

Station and Ie Ham. The latter town was 

the western anchor of the German defense line and was situated on the Merderet between two small tributaries. The 

plan of attack was for one battalion to 

seize the Station and defend to the north 

while the 2d came up behind and then 

swung west between the creeks to Ie 

Ham. 

The first part went well. Under heavy 

artillery rolling ahead of the attack, the 

1st Battalion reached its objective within six hours of the jump-off. The 2d Battalion, following the I st slightly farther 

north than intended in order to avoid 

flanking fire from the left, turned to attack Ie Ham along the axis of the Montebourg road. The enemy troops at Ie Ham, 

some of whom had retreated there from 

the Station, fought stubbornly as they 

were pressed into their last stronghold. 

The attack was halted at dark still about 

a thousand yards from its objective. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

On the morning of II June Colonel 

Ekman, regimental commander, ordered 

the 2d Battalion to employ a holding attack on the north of Ie Ham while the 2d 

Battalion, 325th Glider Infantry, thrust 

at the enemy from the east. The attack 

of the latter battalion, though prepared 

by a fifteen-minute artillery concentration and covered by smoke, nevertheless 

cost heavy casualties as troops struggled 

through open fields and swamps. The battalion was halted short of its objective, 

weakened by casualties and low in ammunition. Then the enemy began to 

withdraw. A new attack was mounted 

and the battalion, widely deployed, 

moved in against a badly shaken covering 

force. Passing abandoned German field 

pieces the Americans entered Ie Ham to 

find it deserted. The bridge over the 

Merderet west of Ie Ham was secured, 

and during the rest of the day the whole 

position was organized for defense. On 

the morning of 13 June the 505th Parachute Infantry was relieved by a battalion 

of the 359th Infantry of the 90th DiVISIon. 

The attacks of the 8th and 505th Infantry Regiments, which have been 

traced through to their conclusion, were 

only part of the general advance of the 

4th Division northward which in four 

days pushed back the enemy into his last 

prepared defensive positions south of 

the Cherbourg Land/ront (landward fortifications of the port). In the center of 

the division zone Colonel Reeder's 12th 

Infantry, after losing 300 men in a violent fight around Emondeville during 8 

June, broke loose and moved up to 

Joganville where it destroyed a German 

resistance point. Reeder then advanced 

another 2,000 yards. The next day his 3d 
FONTENAY FOR TIFIED AREA DANGUEVILLE CRISBECQ 

CRISBECQ FORTIFICATION. In foreground is village of St. Marcouf. lnset: 

One of the forts. 
390 

Battalion sped north to just short of the 

regimental objective, 1,500 yards northeast of Montebourg, and far in advance 

of all other 4th Division units. 

On the division's right the attack of 8 

June against the Crisbecq and Azeville 

fortifications repeated the experience of 

the day before. Two companies of the 

1st Battalion, 22d Infantry, led the assault on Crisbecq after a twenty-minute 

preparation of naval fire, together with 

field artillery and mortar concentrations. 

Advancing then under a rolling barrage 

which the infantry followed at about 200 

yards, and under indirect fire from heavy 

machine guns, the two companies reached 

the edge of the fortified area with few 

losses. The third company was then 

passed through to blow the concrete emplacements with pole charges. The assault sections, however, used all their 

explosives without materially damaging 

the concrete and then became involved 

in small arms fights with Germans in 

the communicating trenches. A counterattack on the left at last forced the battalion to withdraw to its starting point 

north of Bas Village de Dodainville. 

Action of the 2d Battalion before Azeville was similar, and similarly unsuccessful. 

Twice turned back, Colonel Tribolet, 

commander of the 22d Infantry, on 9 

June revised his tactics. He temporarily 

abandoned the assault on Crisbecq and 

concentrated on Azeville. The 3d Battalion (less one company engaged in attacking beach defenses) was brought up 

to take over the mission of assaulting that 

position. While naval and artillery fire 

neutralized the Crisbecq guns, two companies circled to the west of the four 

Azeville blockhouses whose southern apCROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

proaches had been rendered almost impenetrable by mine fields, barbed wire, 

and concrete one-man shelters. Although 

there were mines and wire on the west, 

too, the Germans here had not cleared 

fields of fire and apparently had made no 

preparations to cover this approach. The 

assaulting troops were thus able to cut 

their way through the wire and pick 

paths through the mines without removing them. Bazookas and one tank that 

managed to get through the mine fields 

opened fire on the nearest of the blockhouses but without effect. A demolition 

team then made three separate attempts 

to blow up the blockhouse. All three 

failed. It looked as though once more 

the attackers might run out of explosives 

and have to pull back. Then happened 

one of those minor miracles that may 

turn the course of battle. On orders of 

his company commander, Pvt. Ralph 

G. Riley took the last available flame 

thrower to "give it a few more squirts." 

Reaching the blockhouse after running 

through enemy fire, Private Riley lighted 

his flame thrower with a match, as the 

firing mechanism failed, and trained the 

stream of blazing oil on the threshold of 

the door. The fire should have had no 

more effect than previous squirts. But it 

did. It hit some ammunition inside. Explosions followed. Within minutes a 

white flag emerged. When the firing 

ceased the German commander stepped 

out and surrendered the whole of the 

Azeville fortifications with their garrison 

of 169 men. Riley received the Silver Star. 

The capture of Azeville opened the 

way for continuing the attack north toward Quineville. Even though Crisbecq 

and other known German prepared positions remained in action, General Bar-
AZEVILLE FORTS are located at upper left of photo on both sides of road. 

Inset: One of the forts. 
392 

ton, in view of success all along his front, 

decided to bypass them and send a task 

force straight through to Quineville. 

But although each of the regiments of 

the 4th Division at the end of 9 June 

had succeeded in cracking determined 

enemy resistance no holes had been 

punched in the enemy's main defenses. 

A task force of the 22d Infantry 4 under command of Brig. Gen. Harry A. 

Barber found that it was not at liberty 

to move through the Azeville gap for 

direct attack on the Quineville positions. 

Germans held out in strength all along 

the right side of the proposed advanceat Crisbecq, Dangueville, Chateau de 

Fontenay, and Fontenay-sur-Mer. On 

the left, the enemy had scattered positions in the mile-and-a-half gap between 

the 22d and 12th Infantry Regiments. 

Too weak to contain the enemy on its 

flanks and at the same time push ahead, 

and plagued by bad weather which prevented air support, Task Force Barber 

made little headway for the next three 

days. 

On 12 June General Collins, VII 

Corps commander, decided to commit 

another regiment on the right to clear 

the fortified beach and coastal area and 

so free General Barber for his main mission of advancing to capture the Quineville ridge. Collins was also anxious to 

take out the coastal batteries whose 

harassing fire on UTAH Beach threatened 

to slow down the unloading of supplies. 

Accordingly the 39th Infantry of the 9th 

Division, which had landed on 11 June, 

was committed in the zone roughly from 

the Fontenay-sur-Mer-St. Marcouf road 

4 With the 899th Tank Battalion and the bulk of 

the 746th Tank Battalion attached. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

where it relieved the 1st Battalion, 22d 

Infantry. 

The 39th Infantry (Col. Harry A. 

Flint) in part profited from the hard 

fighting of the three previous days which 

had seemed to batter unsuccessfully 

against the enemy's fortifications. The 2d 

Battalion found Crisbecq unoccupied, 

and pushed on to take Dangueville in 

the afternoon. Advances elsewhere were 

more heavily contested. The 1st Battalion cleared the beach between Taret 

de Ravenoville and Fort St. Marcouf, 

while the 3d Battalion captured Fontenay-sur-Mer in a hard fight against an 

enemy whose resistance grew more stubborn as he was forced back against his 

main line on the Quineville ridge. 

Freed now for the attack north, Task 

Force Barber devoted its entire strength 

to the reduction of the Ozeville fortifications. Two battalions took up flanking 

positions from which they could deliver 

mortar, tank, and cannon fire on the 

enemy defenses while the 3d Battalion, 

with a company of chemical mortars and 

a platoon of tanks, advanced behind artillery concentrations from two battalions. 

At the same time naval fire neutralized 

German guns at Quineville. Bad weather 

again prevented the use of air, but the 

concentrated volume of fire was decisive. 

Ozeville in short order hung out the 

white flag. The close of the fight, however, was not to be capitulation. An 

American officer trying to stop the firing 

in order to receive the signaled surrender 

was shot down. Infuriated, the assault 

company rushed the enemy emplacements with bayonets and grenades and 

all but exterminated the garrison. 

Capture of Ozeville was the signal for 

the 12th Infantry on the left to advance 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 393 

to its objective on the Montebourg end 

of the Quineville-Montebourg ridge. 

The 12th Infantry had actually reached 

this objective on the morning of 11 June 

but it was then far ahead of units on both 

flanks. It was therefore ordered back behind the Montebourg-St. Floxel road 

where it remained on the defensive until 

the attack on Ozeville seemed assured of 

success. Late in the afternoon of 12 ] une 

it reoccupied the heights of les Fieffes 

Dancel,5 

The enemy from the Merderet to 

Montebourg had thus been forced back 

to the line of the railroad by the night of 

12 June. Montebourg itself remained in 

enemy hands. Until 12 June General 

Barton felt that the limited forces at his 

disposal would not warrant involving any 

considerable numbers of them in street 

fighting. On that day, after reports that 

Montebourg was lightly held, he at last 

ordered Colonel Van Fleet to take the 

city, if it could be done cheaply. 

Actually the Germans were prepared 

to defend Montebourg strongly as a key 

to the defense of Cherbourg. Located in 

the angle between the German line defending south under von Schlie ben and 

the line of the 91 st Division defending 

west, the city was ordered to be held 

with every available means. On 8 and 9 

June twenty-five light French tanks and 

the 3d Battalion of the 919th Regiment 

had moved in to the defense.6 

When the 8th Infantry task force discovered the strength of the Montebourg 

garrison, the attack was called off and a 

mixed force of infantry and armor of 

somewhat less than battalion size was 

~ Colonel Reeder was wounded on 11 June and Lt. 

Col. James S. Luckett took command of the regiment. 

6 MS # C-018 (Keil); MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 

formed to contain the city. The rightwing units of the 4th Division then set 

about completing their D-Day tasks. What 

remained was the capture of the Quineville ridge. The 12th Infantry, which 

already occupied the western end of the 

ridge, was to hold there and protect the 

22d Infantry's left flank while the 22d 

advanced north and then east along the 

ridge toward Quineville. At the same 

time Colonel Flint with the 39th Infantry 

would attack north along the beach and 

west edge of the inundations. 

Progress of the attack during 13 June 

was disappointingly slow. The 39th Infantry made only small gains while Colonel Tribolet's 22d Infantry was able only 

to maneuver into position for attack in 

column of battalions down the ridge to 

Quineville. On 14 June the attack was 

resumed. Tribolet's three battalions 

fought their way to the nose of the ridge 

and captured two hills just west of 

Quineville. The 3d Battalion of the 39th 

Infantry in the meantime came up from 

the south and, when abreast of the 22d 

Infantry, turned east. The plan then was 

for it to continue the advance on the 

town of Quineville with the 3d Battalion, 

22d Infantry. Instead, Colonel Flint 

with permission of the division attacked 

alone, after a bombardment of Quineville by thirty-six A-20's. 

Company K of the 39th led off the attack and at first moved rapidly. Supported by mortar fire the company entered Quineville but at once ran into 

stiff opposition from Germans defending 

the beach positions east of the town. 

There was little room for maneuver and 

it was impossible to employ the other two 

companies without exposing them in 

open fields barred by wire entanglements. 
~ -----=-- ~ - -~ -~ 

QUINEVILLE. Village is in foreground. At top of photograph along beach's 

Quineville Bains. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 395 

Tanks could not advance because of an 

antitank gun on the beach and heavy 

enemy mortar fire. The answer was 

smoke. A concentration fell squarely on 

enemy positions and permitted Company 

K to push the attack to the beach fortifications. The enemy's situation was 

then hopeless and he promptly surrendered. While the capture of Quineville 

was accomplished, the 1st Battalion of the 

39th Infantry, despite severe casualties 

from mines, had completed the clearing 

of the beach with the capture of Fort St. 

Marcouf. 

The northern flank of VII Corps anchored on the Quineville ridge was 

now secure. In the ensuing lull in the 

fighting the enemy would be allowed to 

build up slightly opposite the 4th Division but his attitude remained purely 

defensive. Actually, after the initial attempt to counterattack on 6 June, the 

Germans never could muster enough 

strength on this front to take the offensive. On the contrary, from 9 June they 

became increasingly concerned over their 

ability to hold and prevent a clean breakthrough to Cherbourg. On the 9th the 

77th Division received orders to proceed to Valognes and at the same time 

General Marcks, the corps commander, 

secured the immediate release of two battalions from the Cherbourg Landfront.'t 

He also asked for air support, saying that 

the fate of his troops, pressed hard between Montebourg and Marcouf, depended on it. Third Air Force replied 

that bad weather made it momentarily 

1 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44, 9 Jun 44; 

Kriegsgliederung, 18 May 44. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen 1.1.-30.V1.44; MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 

The battalions released were the 2d Battalion, 921st 

Regiment, and 1st Battalion, 922d Regiment (both of 

the 243d Division) . 

impossible. 8 Actually with all airfields 

in the vicinity of the coast unusable, 

Luftwaffe fighters were never able to intervene in the Cotentin battles. 

While awaltmg ground reinforcements, Marcks tried to straighten out the 

command situation in the Cotentin. 

Troops had been rushed hurriedly into 

battle and committed promptly on arrival to plug the defense wherever the 

weakness seemed most critical at the 

time. Reorganization became necessary. 

Marcks named Generalleutnant Heinz 

Hellmich of the 243d Division to command a Kampfgruppe of these miscellaneous units along the MontebourgQuineville line. The formation of 

Kampfgruppe Hellmich simplified the 

chain of command, but at the lower 

levels it is probabie that the mixed 

Kampfgruppe had considerably less cohesion in defense than regular units 

would have had. 

On 10 June the advance elements of 

the 77th Division, consisting of about a 

battalion, arrived in the vicinity of 

Valognes. Two days later the bulk of 

the division was in position on both sides 

of the Merderet. General Dollmann expressed himself as satisfied that the situation was restored to balance on this portion of the front. 9 Units of the new 

division relieved Kampfgruppe, Hoffmann, which had been holding the western wing of the Montebourg line. 10 But 

the restored balance was short-lived. 

Again success in the defense of one sector 

was almost immediately nullified by 

breaks in the line elsewhere. The Ger8 Seventh Army, KTB 1 J.-30.v1.44, 9 Jun 44. 

91bid., 11 Jun 44. 

10 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.I.-30.VI.44. 
396 

mans' Montebourg line could hold only 

so long as their position on the west 

remained firm. U.S. VII Corps troops in 

the week following D Day hammered this 

position into crumbled ruins. 

A ttack to Cut the Peninsula 

The drive north had reached only a 

little beyond D-Day objectives in a week 

of hard fighting. The delay had been 

caused chiefly by German success in 

bringing up considerable reinforcements 

to hold a line which the enemy command 

deemed vital to the defense of Cherbourg. On the VII Corps west flank on the 

Merderet River a similar delay of about a 

week in reaching D-Day objectives was 

caused principally by the original accidents that befell the airborne drops and 

by terrain difficulties in subsequent attempts to force the river crossing. Although the 91 st Division was ordered to 

counterattack the American bridgehead 

from the west, the Germans were never 

able to concentrate in the Merderet area. 

The parachute drops in their midst 

caused heavy losses and disorganization, 

including the death of the division commander, General Falley, and effectively 

stifled the planned attacks.l1 

Even against relatively small enemy 

forces, the problem of seizing a bridgehead over the Merderet remained difficult. At the end of 7 June, there were at 

la Fiere some 600 men of the 507th and 

11 Memo, Dollmann for Army Group B, 10 Jun 44. 

Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-30.VI.44. Seventh 

Army considered the Allied mass use of airborne 

troops in an occupied area a brand new tactic comparable to the British introduction of the tank in 

World War 1. Cf. von der Heydte's discussion of the 

difficulties of assembling his widely scattered troops 

to concentrate for attack. MS # B-839. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

508th Parachute Infantry Regiments, together with some tanks and artillery and 

the 1st Battalion of the 325th Glider Infantry which had moved up with the 8th 

Infantry after landing by sea. West of 

the river were three organized but isolated groups, ranging from company to 

battalion size. After the failure of the 

attempt to establish a bridgehead at la 

Fiere on D Day, the 82d Airborne Division had been under violent counterattack. While elements of the division held 

the bridge, other units cleared the east 

bank of the river and established firm 

contact with American forces to the 

north and south. 12 

Late on 8 June two men from Colonel 

Timmes' force west of the Merderet discovered a submerged but passable road 

across the swamps north of la Fiere, 

crossed without incident, and reported 

to division headquarters. The discovery 

opened up a promising route to reach 

Colonel Timmes' and Col. George V. Millett's groups, isolated on the west bank, 

and then attack south in force to clear 

the enemy defending the la Fiere causeway. The plan was for the 1st Battalion, 

325th Glider Infantry (Maj. Teddy H. 

Sanford), to cross the swamp road after 

dark while Colonel Millett's force near 

Amfreville thrust southeast to join with 

Colonel Timmes. Sanford's battalion 

negotiated the crossing successfully and 

made contact with Timmes. (Map 6) But 

in the meantime Millett's attack failed 

as his column, fired on in the dark, fell 

apart. Millett and some of his men were 

captured; the remainder withdrew northeast toward the river and took no further 

part in the fighting until 10 June. Lack· 

12 See above, p. 346. 
-~~~--------------~~:=::~~~~~ -- -- THE LA FIERE BRIDGEHEAD --_- 9 JUNE 1944 

~ X NING 

A IS OF MOVEMENT 9 JUNE 

POSIT IONS. EVE 

7TTTTTT1TTTTTTI rTI'TTTT'I GERMAN RESISTANCE 

Conlo"r inlervol 10 melllrs 

o 1000 YAROS 

MAP 6 

---

1000 
398 

ing Millett's support, Sanford organized 

his men and headed for the western end 

of the causeway. They had not gone far 

when the enemy opened heavy fire. The 

Americans were thrown back with severe 

losses to Colonel Timmes' position along 

the river east of Amfreville. 

When Colonel Lewis, commander of 

the 325th Glider Infantry, reported the 

failure of the attack, General Ridgway, 

the division commander, decided to renew the attempt to force the causeway at 

la Fiere. The mission was given to the 

3d Battalion, 325th Glider Infantry, 

which was to move up under cover of 

smoke from positions at Chef-du-Pont. 

A fifteen-minute artillery and tank fire 

preparation was arranged and a reinforced company of the 507th Parachute 

Infantry was to follow up the causeway 

attack if it faltered. General Gavin, the 

assistant division commander, was directed to co-ordinate the attack. 

Although the smoke screen proved too 

thin and the troops of the 325th Glider Infantry came under enemy machine gun 

fire before they reached the line of departure, the men were able to creep up along a 

stone wall to the jump-off point. At 

1045 the attack was signaled and the men 

left their shelter under orders to sprint 

the 500 yards across the exposed causeway. Everything depended on the first 

dash. But it proved too much for most 

of the men. Under mortar and artillery 

fire, all but a handful yielded to the overpowering instinct to seek shelter, and 

though there was no shelter they threw 

themselves down along the roadside. 

Some were casualties, and later arrivals, 

seeing them, lost the spirit needed to 

carry them across. The causeway became 

congested with the dead, the wounded, 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

and the disheartened. Congestion which 

threatened to abort the attack was made 

worse by a tank that got out on the causeway and hit an uncleared American mine 

field. An enemy tank destroyed in earlier 

action already blocked the road in part. 

The double constriction increased the 

difficulty of crossing and added to the 

casualties. Despite all this, men encouraged by Generals Ridgway and Gavin 

and Colonel Lewis did succeed in reaching the opposite bank and parts of two 

companies were able to proceed with 

their missions. Company E cleared Cauquigny with comparative ease as the Germans under heavy fire from the east bank 

were disposed to surrender,13 Company 

G, deploying southward, made slower 

progress. The delayed crossings meant 

that when the support company, Company F, crossed under orders to mop up 

the bridgehead it found no bridgehead. 

On the initiative of the commander, 

therefore, it attacked west along the main 

road. 

In the meantime, General Gavin, lacking reports of progress in pushing out 

the bridgehead from the west bank and 

worried about the increasing congestion 

of the causeway, committed the company 

of the 507th under Capt. R. D. Rae with 

orders to sweep the causeway stragglers 

across with him. A part of Captain Rae's 

company pushed westward with Company F and entered Ie Motey. Another 

part broke off to the south to seek contact with Company G. At the same time 

a platoon of Company E in Cauquigny 

was sent north to join the I st Battalion, 

325th Glider Infantry, held up near Amfreville. This platoon was pulled back 

13 See above, Ch. IX, 11. 31, for glider regiment organization. 
LE MOTEY CAUOUIGNY AMFREVILLE 

LA FIERE CAUSEWAY. Merderet River is in foreground. 
400 

later when a patrol reached Major Sanford's position and discovered that enemy 

pressure had so far eased that Sanford 

was actually freed to move as he wished. 

While the north flank of the new bridgehead was thus secured, fighting continued in the center and on the south, 

complicated by confused small unit 

maneuvers extremely difficult to control 

among the hedgerows. 

The gravest threat to the new bridgehead developed during the day at Ie 

Motey. Le Motey, sited on a slight rise, 

afforded ideal ground for defense of the 

la Fiere causeway. By the same token, its 

commanding position and the cover of 

its buildings provided a good assembly 

point for German forces to form for a 

counterattack. It was the intention of 

Company F and the company of the 

507th to clean out and secure the village. 

While they were proceeding to this 

task, however, General Gavin on the 

east bank of the river, unaware that the 

American push had already carried into 

Ie Matey and fearing a German assembly there,' ordered the supporting 

artillery to pull back its fire and hold it 

on the village. One or two shells fell on 

American troops. Few casualties were 

suffered but commanders on the spot 

tried in vain to get word back to have 

the fire lifted. Company F was therefore 

forced to withdraw to poorer defense 

positions on the lower ground. In its 

new position the company found both its 

flanks open, and the commander therefore requested that Company E move up 

on his left. 

That move was accomplished, but only 

after a considerable delay during which 

Company F, apprehensive of being surrounded, again withdrew a few fields to 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the east. When Company E moved up, 

it in effect exchanged positions with F, 

neither group having observed the 

other's move. Company E, coming into 

line where it expected to find American 

troops, was greeted only by enemy fire 

from the flanks. With a sense of isolation 

and under the impression of being counterattacked, it pulled out in disorder. 

The retreat was checked by officers on 

the west bank of the river before it acquired the momentum of a general 

panic, and fortunately the enemy made 

no move. The bridgehead was saved and 

the line was redressed. The four companies that had crossed from la Fiere 

were securely tied in on the north with 

the 1st Battalion, 325th Glider Infantry, 

plus Colonel Timmes' force. On the 

south, contact was made with the 2d 

Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry, under command of Colonel Shanley. 

For Shanley the la Fiere bridgehead 

served as a long-overdue relief. He had 

fought for three days in a virtual state 

of siege on Hill 30. Although he had a 

relatively large force occupying strategic ground that might have provided 

a basis for developing a bridgehead at 

Chef-du-Pont, he attracted such heavy 

enemy pressure that he had to fight hard 

and ingeniously just to maintain his position. As far as the command on the east 

bank of the river was concerned, Shanley's men were isolated and apparently 

the only thought was to rescue them. 

One such attempt made on 9 June failed. 

Not until the bridgehead was established 

at la Fiere and tied in with Hill 30 did 

Shanley's real contribution to the division's battle become clear. In denying to 

the enemy control of the west bank of the 

Merderet and in absorbing a large meas-
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 401 

ure of the enemy's striking force which 

might otherwise have been pointed more 

sharply at la Fiere, he had done much to 

assist the ultimate establishment of a 

bridgehead.14 

Late in the afternoon of 8 June the 

Merderet bridgehead was consolidated as 

the 1st Battalion, 508th, was moved in 

between Colonel Shanley and the 325th. 

With all units west of the Merderet at 

last brought within a single bridgehead, 

the crossing was ready for exploitation 

in the first step of the major corps effort 

to cut westward across the peninsula. 

This mission was given to the 90th 

Division (Brig. Gen. Jay W. MacKelvie), 

which had begun landing on D Day, and 

verbal orders were issued by General 

Collins on 9 June.15 The 359th Infantry 

had been attached to the 4th Division to 

assist the latter in the attack north in 

accordance with the original operational 

plan that contemplated committing the 

entire 90th Division on the 4th Division 

right for a co-ordinated advance on Cherbourg. Despite the change in plan, the 

359th Infantry was to remain at first with 

the 4th Division while MacKelvie operated west of the Merderet with his remaining two regiments, the 357th and 

358th. The initial divisional objective 

was the line of the Douve where the 

river flows south between Terre-deBeauval and St. Sauveur-le Vicomte. 

(Map XXI) The northern part of this 

objective was assigned to the 357th Infantry attacking through the lines of the 

14 For details of Shanley's action see Col. S. L. A. 

Marshall, "Affair at Hill 30," The Marine Corps 

Gazette, February 1948, pp. 8-15, and March 1948, 

pp.20-25. 

IG VII Corps Opns Memo No. 10, 11 Jun 44, contains the commanding general's verbal order of 9 

June. 

82d Division just west of la Fiere. The 

358th Infantry would cross at Chef-duPont attacking toward Picauville, Pont 

l' Abbe, and St. Sauveur-le Vicomte. 

When the 82d Airborne Division had 

been relieved by the 90th's attack, it 

would first hold the line of the Merderet 

River and then, following the 90th Division, would take over the security of the 

VII Corps south flank along the Douve. 

The attack of the 90th Division jumping off early in the morning of 10 June 

went badly from the start. The 357th 

Infantry (Col. Philip H. Ginder) scarcely 

advanced beyond the perimeter of the 

9 June bridgehead. Just beyond Ie Motey 

the regiment ran into strongly entrenched troops of the 1057th Regiment 

(91 st Division). The 2d Battalion in the 

lead recoiled under its first experience 

with heavy enemy fire and was relieved 

in the afternoon by the 1st Battalion. 

But the latter, attacking toward Amfreville, made virtually no progress. Since 

the 325th Glider Infantry had stayed in 

position after being passed through, the 

bridgehead, though scarcely enlarged, 

remained secure. Ginder lost ninetynine men in the action. 

On the left, the 358th Infantry (Col. 

James V. Thompson) advanced a few 

hundred yards west of Picauville before 

meeting serious resistance. It then halted 

on Thompson's order and the forward 

companies dug in. Thompson felt that 

his position was insecure. Germans still 

held out in a chateau to the rear which 

had been bypassed in the advance, and 

an engineer-infantry detachment ordered 

to blow the Beuzeville-la Bastille bridge 

over the Douve had been deterred from 

its mission by heavy enemy fire from 

across the river. When the regiment 
402 

tried later in the afternoon to resume the 

attack westward, it was unable to move. 

Both the 1 st and 3d Battalions dug in on 

the forward line. The bulk of the 129 

casualties of the 1st Battalion, 358th Infantry, during the first day of action appear to have been from mortar and artillery fire. 

On 11 June both regiments continued 

the attack, but nightfall found them still 

short of the D-Day objective line set for 

the 82d Airborne Division by the original plan. The 357th Infantry was still 

fighting in the vicinity of les Landes, and 

the 358th had encircled but not captured 

Pont l'Abbe. Next day the 359th Infantry, released from attachment to the 

4th Division, was committed between 

Ginder and Thompson on a 1,000-yard 

front and assigned objectives along the 

Douve in the center of the division zone. 

South of the 90th Division zone the 

508th Parachute Infantry, reinforced and 

under command of Brig. Gen. G. P. 

Howell,16 Was ordered to attack across 

the Douve on 12 June to seize the area 

between the river and the Prairies Marecageuses and join with the lOlst Airborne Division at Baupte. By the same 

order the 325th Glider Infantry was 

given the mission of defending the north 

bank of the Douve westward as the 90th 

Division advanced. 17 After a night crossing of the river at Beuzeville-la Bastille, 

Howell marched to his objective without 

a fight worth mentioning and reached 

Baupte by 0800. What happened was that 

16 Howell was commander of the 2d Airborne 

Brigade, a headquarters that originally controlled 

the 507th and 508[h Parachute Regiments, which 

were not organic to the 82d Airborne Division. In 

combat Howell was attached to the division head· 

quarters and assigned special missions. 

11 82d Abn Div Opns Memo. FO 6. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the lOOth Panzer Replacement Battalion, 

which was holding this sector with a 

large number of foreign personnel and 

makeshift equipment, broke at first contact with the Americans and pulled out. 

The debacle not only opened a new 

hole in the German lines bu t resul ted 

in exaggerated reports of the strength of 

the American penetration. German 

countermeasures were taken in the belief that American armor had broken 

through in strength.IS The Kampfgruppe 

of the 265th Division, which was just arriving, was diverted to hold the Baupteles Moitiers sector and was ordered reinforced by one battalion of the l049th Regiment of the 77th Division to be brought 

down from the Cherbourg Landtront.19 

While the 508th Parachute Infantry 

drove unexpectedly into a hole in the 

enemy lines, the 90th Division continued 

its sticky movement through defended 

hedgerow country. By 13 June it had 

struggled to its initial objectives roughly 

on a line from Gourbesville to Pont 

l'Abbe. The latter town was captured 

by the 358th Infantry after bombing and 

artillery concentration had leveled it, 

leaving, as the regimental commander 

remarked, only two rabbits alive. Criticizing its own failures in the four-day 

attack, the 90th Division afterward 

pointed out that training lessons h~d not 

been properly applied, particularly the 

doctrine of fire and maneuver and the 

precept of closely following artillery.20 

In the hedgerow country the normal 

difficulties of any division green to combat were greatly intensified. In a country 

18 Actually TF Howell had no tank support. 

19 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44, 13 Jun 44. 

2090th Div Opns Memo No.2. 19"Jun 44; 358th 

Inf Jnl, 15 Jun 44. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 403 

where each field constituted a separate 

battlefield and where there was no chance 

of seeing what was happening on either 

side control was at times impossible. 

To the shock of experiencing hostile fire 

for the first time was added the demoralizing invisibility of an enemy entrenched in natural earthworks and concealed in the thick vegetation that luxuriated on their tops. These conditions 

were, of course, pretty general throughout the Normandy fighting and each 

division had to work out a solution. 

General Eisenhower believed that the 

90th Division's special difficulties were 

due to the fact that the division had not 

been "properly brought up." 21 On 13 

June General MacKelvie, who had commanded the division since 19 January 

1944, was relieved without prejudice and 

replaced by Maj. Gen. Eugene M. Landrum. 22 Two regimental commanders 

were relieved at the same time. 

The division was left in the line, but 

General Collins decided to reorganize 

completely his attack scheme. The main 

attack west was to be taken over on 14 

June by the 9th Division (Maj. Gen. 

Manton Eddy) and the 82d Airborne 

Division.23 Detailed verbal orders for 

21 Ltr to Marshall, 5 Jul 44. OPD file 319.1, sec. I, 

cases 1-80. 

22 General Landrum enlisted in 1910 and was commissioned in 1916. He served with the American Expeditionary Forces in Siberia in 1918-19. Assigned to 

the Alaskan Defense Command in 1942-43, he commanded U.S. troops in the occupation of Attu. In 

October 1943 he took command of the 87th Division. 

23 Each division put only two regiments into the 

attack. The 39th Infantry of the 9th Division was 

still engaged on the 4th Division right flank. The 

505th Parachute Infantry was released from attachment to the 4th Division on the morning of 13 June. 

The 508th Parachute Infantry had a defensive role 

in the Baupte bridgehead. The 9th Division, a battletested unit like the 82d, had been commanded by 

the attack were issued by General Collins 

on 13 June. The 82d Airborne Division 

was assigned the southern part of the 90th 

Division's original attack zone with an 

axis of advance along the Pont l'AbbeSt. Sauveur-Ie Vicomte road; the 9th Division in the northern half of the zone 

would attack toward Ste. Colombe. The 

90th Division, when passed through, 

would wheel north to take objectives 

along a line from Ie Ham to Terre-deBeauval covering the north flank of the 

westward drive. On General Collins' request, General Bradley assigned the 79th 

Division to VII Corps as a replacement 

for the 90th, but as it turned out the 

79th was not used in the attack. 

Attack on 14 June began in the south 

where the 358th Infantry advanced 

1,000 yards west of Pont l'Abbe. General 

Ridgway committed his regiments about 

noon, the 325th Glider Infantry and the 

507th Parachute Infantry abreast, left 

and right of the highway respectively. 

Despite an evening counterattack which 

forced back the right flank of the 507th, 

the division by night had pushed forward 

about a mile. While the 358th Infantry 

was relieved, the 359th began a pivot 

northward toward its new objectives, 

opening a gap in the lines near Gottot. 

Here the 9th Division's 60th Infantry 

(Col. Frederick J. de Rohan) was committed, attacking through the narrow 

zone in column of battalions. Under 

enemy mortar and artillery fire, the lead 

companies advanced slowly to reach the 

Valognes-Pont l'Abbe highway by dark. 

General Eddy since 1942. Eddy. who had served with 

a machine gun detachment and been wounded in 

World War I,led his troops in 1942 and 1943 through 

the campaigns of North Africa and Sicily before entering the Normandy operations. 
404 

Virtual paralysis of the 90th Division, 

however, continued and the 359th and 

357th Infantry Regiments made little 

progress. Two full days of fighting were 

required for the 357th to take Gourbesville, while the 359th inched forward and 

a battalion of the 358th committed on 

15 June on the division right flank 

achieved little. 

Whatever may be the full explanation 

of the 90th Division's continued slow 

progress, there is no question that the 

German defense on the north and northwest was substantially stronger than on 

the west. While Landrum faced elements 

of the recently arrived 77th Division> 

opposition to the drive due west was still 

only the 9Ist Division, now beaten down 

to a battle-weary Kampfgruppe. The 

bringing up of the Kampfgruppe of the 

265th Division did not reinforce the 

9Ist, since the bulk of the new unit was 

committed in the Pretot area south of 

the Douve where the Germans thought a 

large-scale break-through threatened. 

General der Artillerie Wilhelm Fahrmbacher, who replaced Marcks as commander of LXXXIV Corps after the 

latter's death in an air attack on 12 June, 

reported to Seventh Army on 14 June 

that a, large-scale American attack westward could not be held because of the 

splitting and mixing of units, the fatigue 

of the troops, and the lack of sufficient 

ammunition. 24 

He was right. On 15 June the 82d 

Airborne Division accelerated its advance against decreasing opposition. The 

24 Seventh Army, KTB l.l.-30.vI.44, 12 and 14 Jun 

44, and MS # B-784 (Criegern). Fahrmbacher, 

former commanding general of the XXV Corps in 

Brittany, took command of LXXXIV Corps on the 

evening of 12 June. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

325th Glider Infantry got within 1,000 

yards of St. Sauveur-Ie Vicomte while the 

505th Parachute Infantry, after relieving 

the 507th, established its night line just 

south of Reigneville. The 60th Infantry 

on the other hand was hit shortly after 

the jump-off by a strong counterattack 

supported by tanks which drove it back 

to its line of departure. Fighting through 

the remainder of the day succeeded in 

recovering only about half the lost 

ground. Resistance here turned out to 

be the enemy's last stand east of the 

Douve. 

Colonel de Rohan's direction of attack had been shifted slightly to point 

more nearly due west, increasing the 

divergence between his advance and that 

of the 359th on the right. This permitted 

another regiment to be committed between them. The 47th Infantry (Col. 

George W. Smythe) was brought in to 

attack shortly after noon for the high 

ground west of Orglandes. Colonel 

Smythe's advance was rapid, though he 

was bothered by the exposure of his 

north flank which was harassed by enemy 

fire from the vicinity of Orglandes. Despite this the regiment reached its objective by dark. 

In planning the continuation of the 

attack on 16 June, General Collins decided to drive to the Douve with his 

southernmost regiment (the 325th) regardless of whether commensurate advances could be made on the rest of the 

front. The whole attack would thus be 

echeloned to the right rear, as each regiment refused its right to tie in with the 

regiment to the north of it. Speed in 

reaching the Douve seemed essential in 

order to forestall enemy reinforcement. 

Although the only enemy opposition con-
TANK ENTERING ST. SAUVEUR-LE VICOMTE. Company A of the 746th 

Tank Battalion supported the 325th Glider Infantry in the advance on St. Sauveur. 
406 

sisted of small groups fighting delaying 

action, it seemed possible that, given 

time, the Germans might be able to organize a co-ordinated defense along the 

Douve. The main effort of the corps, 

General Collins announced on 15 June, 

would now be to cut the peninsula. To 

give more weight and cohesion to the 

attack the 39th Infantry was returned to 

the 9th Division, and in addition the 

359th Infantry was attached, with the 

result that the division resumed the attack with four regiments in line. The 

90th Division committed only the 358th 

Infantry in its zone. The 82d Airborne 

Division employed the 325th Glider Infantry and the 505th Parachute Infantry 

in the attack while the 507th relieved the 

508th in the Baupte sector and the latter 

regiment passed to reserve in the vicinity 

of Pont l'Abbe. 

The attack of the 82d Airborne Division again made rapid progress on 16 

June, and before noon both the 325th 

Glider Infantry and 505th Parachute Infantry had reached the line of the Douve 

opposite St. Sauveur-le Vicomte. They 

were joined here by the 508th, released 

from reserve. General Ridgway, observing the enemy withdrawing from St. 

Sauveur, asked and received corps permission to continue his advance. The 

city was occupied easily as artillery interdicted the escape routes north, south, 

and west. The 505th and 508th together 

established a bridgehead 2,000 to 3,000 

yards in depth. 

Actually the Germans had been pulling out through St. Sauveur all during 

the night and it looked as though they 

were in general retreat. General Collins 

therefore decided to accelerate his attack. 

Before noon he called General Eddy of 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the 9th Division and directed that, instead of stopping at the limited objectives (Reigneville, Hautteville-Bocage, 

Orglandes) assigned in the original order, 

Eddy should push his leading regiments, 

the 47th and 60th, all the way to the 

Douve line, while the 39th swung around 

to protect the north flank. Eddy ordered 

Colonel de Rohan to advance the whole 

60th Infantry to the river. Colonel 

Smythe was assigned objectives for the 

47th Infantry on the high ground just east 

of Ste. Colombe. Smythe had a hard fight 

in the area of Hautteville-Bocage and Biniville on the last high ground east of the 

Douve, but pushed on to the main highway west of Biniville. 

While this advance was going on, the 

2d Battalion of the 60th Infantry under 

Lt. Col. Michael B. Kauffman, with the 

support of a company of tanks of the 

746th Tank Battalion, made a crosscountry sweep, avoiding enemy contact 

except for a brush with some machine 

gunners, and entered Ste. Colombe. 

Scarcely pausing there, Kauffman's lead 

company began crossing the river without 

any preparatory fire. The Douve at this 

point splits into three small streams and 

the road traversing the river flai runs for 

almost 1,000 yards between Ste. Colombe 

and N ehou on the west bank. Both towns 

are built on the hills rising from the river 

valley, but the slopes are gradual and observation restricted by the ubiquitous 

hedgerows. With tanks in the vanguard, 

the crossing of the first two bridges proceeaed uneventfully. But the third bridge 

was out and the tanks turned back. Enemy artillery fire began to range in on all 

three rifle companies. Company E reached 

the west bank and dug in before N ehou, 

under increasing enemy artillery and di-
DOllVE RIVER NEHOU STE. COLOMBE 

STE. COLOMBE-NEHOU AREA. Circles indicate position of bridges. 
408 

rect large-caliber fire. The other two companies, disorganized by enemy fire, either 

dug in between the bridges or withdrew 

to Ste. Colombe. Company G was at last 

moved up to support Company E on the 

west bank and during the night the 3d 

Battalion was brought up to bolster the 

shaky line. 

Hitler Intervenes 

By the end of 16 June, the 9th and 82d 

Divisions together had broken the last 

enemy defenses east of the Douve in their 

zones and had given impetus to what 

looked like a precipitate German withdrawal that might be followed rapidly to 

the sea. As a matter of fact the way ww 

open, and the withdrawal was actually the 

retreat of disorganized remnants; the 91st 

Division had been smashed beyond repair. 

For the Germans, the threatened splitting of their Cotentin forces was serious 

enough in itself. But the crumbling of the 

91st Division was not a unique or merely 

local failure; it took place against a background of developing crisis in the whole 

German defense of the west-a crisis that 

in the view of OKW demanded not tactical doctoring but far-reaching revision 

of policy. 

During the first week of operations 

there remained a chance that German 

armor in the beachhead might be able to 

seize the initiative at least locally and 

that, by so doing, might so far check the 

Allies as to allow the Germans to restore 

a balance of forces. Whether or not that 

was ever a real chance, by the end of the 

week it was becoming increasingly illusory. On 12 June General Marcks, the 

LXXXIV Corps commander, who was reCROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

spected throughout the German west 

army as an inspired leader, was killed. His 

death coincided roughly with the loss of 

Carentan, the capture of the Quineville 

ridge, which strained von Schlieben's 

Montebourg line to the breaking point, 

another postponement of offensive action 

against Caen by the I SS Panzer Corps) 

and a discouraging survey by Seventh 

Army of the resources remaining in Brittany to reinforce the Normandy front. 

This survey turned up only a handful of 

mobile battalions suitable for transport 

to the battle area.211 In Normandy Seventh 

Army had no closed front, no prepared 

positions behind the front, and no possibility of even making up the losses in 

front-line units, much less of building up 

a striking reserve. 

Still worse was the situation in the rear 

areas, where Allied air power assisted by 

saboteurs of the French Resistance had 

so effectively sealed off the battlefields 

that su pplies and replacements could not 

hope to keep up with the need. Before 6 

June Leigh-Mallory's tactical air forces 

had knocked out all the bridges across 

the Seine River between Mantes-Gassicourt and the sea. (See Map/V.) Between 

6 and 15 June at least eight bridges over 

the Loire were destroyed and all were severely damaged.26 The Seventh Army 

quartermaster noted on 13 June that rail 

traffic since the invasion had been 90 percent paralyzed. No transport at all had 

come into the army area from the east.27 

One bridge over the Loire at Tours had 

been repaired on 17 June to the extent 

211 Seventh A.rmy, KTB l.1~30.J'1.44, 12 JUD 44. 

26 AAF Evaluation Board, Effectiveness of Air Attack Against Rail Transportation in the Battle of 

France. Jun 45. AAF file 1118.4-117. 

21 Report of Railroad Situation. 111 Jun 44. Seventh Army, O.Qu., KTB Anlagen 1~30.VI.-I4. 
SEINE RIVER BRIDGE AT MANTES-GASSICOURT UNDER BOMBARDMENT by aircraft of Ninth Air Force. 
410 

that it was possible to push cars across it, 

although it could not support the weight 

of a . locomotive. An officer from army 

headquarters was assigned to make sure 

that five trains a day were moved across.28 

Interdiction at the river lines was reinforced by air attacks on the rail centers 

of the Region Ouest and by continual 

strafing attacks which made the Germans 

refrain from risking rail movements that 

would otherwise have been possible. For 

example, although some rail lines remained passable between Paris and Orleans traffic along them was negligible. In 

the week ending mid-June only four 

trains came through; in the three succeeding weeks, none at all. 29 Within the Seventh A rmy area, the routes between Normandy and Brittany had been mostly destroyed by bombing and sabotage. Engineers worked night and day repairing the 

lines, but they could not keep up with the 

rate of destruction. Finally, even on the 

undestroyed routes, few undamaged locomotives could be found to move the 

trains.30 

The total effect of constant air attacks, 

dispersed over main and secondary lines 

and small wayside stations, was much 

greater than the reduction in rail capacity 

statistically computed. In the first place, 

because losses of equipment and personnel through line attacks became insupportable in view of already grave shortages, th~ Germans were forced to ban 

nearly all daylight movements, thus cutting two-thirds of their capacity. In addition, cumulative disorganization caused 

28Seventh Army, Trans.O., KTB 1.1.-30'vI.44, 17 

Jun 44. 

29 AAF Evaluation Board study, cited n. 26. 

30 Report of Railroad Situation, cited n.' 27. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

by the unpredictability of rail movements 

resulted in an increasing paralysis that 

made impossible even traffic which was 

not physically blocked. Finally, once the 

rate of attack outstripped the rate of repair, attacks causing only minor damage 

had the same effect as destruction of large 

portions of the rail system. 

Examples of the effect of interdiction 

on troop movement have already been 

noted. The effect on supply was at least as 

serious. During the first ten days of the 

battle Seventh Army received from DB 

WEST supply depots a little over one million gallons of gasoline against estimated 

requirements of almost four million. To 

make up part of the deficit, about a third 

of the 900,000 gallons in army stock piles 

was consumed. In the same period ammunIuon requirements were 6,700 metric 

tons.31 Against actual consumption of 

about 5,000 tons, deliveries amounted 

only to 3,000, leaving again a deficit to 

be made up out of local t:eserves. Against 

ten days' ration requirements of 5,250 

tons, only 200 tons were delivered.s2 

By the middle of June, rail supply had 

become impracticable. For supply by road 

Seventh A rmy was allocated 1,300 tons of 

transport space, of which only about onequarter was serviceable because of unreliable French drivers and the disrepair of 

the vehicles.s3 With this truckage Seventh 

Army needed to bring up daily 3,200 tons 

81 A metric ton equals 2,204 pounds and thus compares roughly to a U.S. long ton (2,240 pounds) . 

82 Supply Requisition and Consumption Figures 

for Seventh Army, 6.-15.VI.44, 15 Jun 44. OB WEST, 

O.Qu., KTB Anlagen 1.1.-17.Vlll.44. 

33 Report of the Supply Situation, 14 Jun 44. OB 

WEST, O.Qu., KTB Anlagen 11.-17.Vlll.44. German 

Transportraum (transport space) means total capacity of vehicles fully loaded. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 411 

of ammunition, gasoline, and rations for 

a defensive action or 4,500 tons for attack. 

Although the army had substantial stores 

of ammunition on hand, most of it was 

captured material and most of it was in 

Brittany. Dallmann estimated a minimum need for 3,000 more tons of transport space and a daily arrival of eight to 

nine trains carrying gas, ammunition, rations, and vehicles and equipment.34 He 

looked with envy at the vehicles with a 

capacity of 15,000 tons which were being 

held for the support of Fifteenth Army. 

But requests for transfer of trucks from 

Fifteenth Army were rejected by Rundstedt and OKW who, in view of the estimates that large Allied forces still remained in England, held to their belief 

that the Kanalkueste was threatened by 

a second landing. Allocation of more 

trucking might have eased the shortages, 

but it was perfectly clear to General Dollmann that there was only one real solution. He wrote on II June that it was absolutely essential that the German Luftwaffe be committed in strength to eliminate the unbearable enemy air superiority.35 Supplies must be able to move by 

day if the army was to be nourished for 

offensive action. Armor must be rendered 

mobile, not only by sufficient deliveries 

of gasoline, but by protection from direct 

attack both in the battle zone and on the 

approach marches. Rail movement of 

troops and supplies could be resumed 

only if one line was protected with all 

available forces, engineers, Flak, and 

34 Report of Seventh Army Supply Situation, 21 

Jun 44. Seventh Army, a.Qu., KTB Anlagen 1.-30.· 

VI.44. Ammunition stocks on 21 June amounted to 

16,000 tons. 

35 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.v1.44, 11 Jun 44. 

fighter planes.36 Without such air support, the transport situation would certainly get progressively worse. The German Army would continue to have its 

strength drained away far behind the battle lines. 

Hitler's solution to this dilemma was 

to exhort the dying man to fight harder. 

On 12 June Seventh Army received word 

that every strong point and resistance nest 

surrounded by the enemy must fight to 

the last man and the last bullet in order 

to prepare for the counterattack which 

would strike through to the coast. Hitler 

bluntly ordered Seventh Army to wipe 

out the Allied beachhead between the 

Vire and Orne Rivers.37 What Dollmann 

would use to counterattack with was not 

immediately clear. Hitler had taken one 

constructive step in canceling a planned 

attack at Kowel on the Eastern Front so 

that the II SS Panzer Corps with the 9th 

SS and the 10th SS Panzer Divisions could 

be released for employment in the west.3S 

But the move of these reinforcements 

would consume many days. Furthermore, 

it was the opinion of Keitel and JodI in 

OKW that the time had passed when the 

situation could be patched up. Only a 

bold revision of strategy could hope to 

meet the crisis. 

Keitel and JodI believed that the situation was very serious. If the Allies once 

fought their way out of the beachhead and 

gained freedom of action for mobile warfare, then all of France would be lost. The 

36 Seventh Army, Trans.a., KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44. 

37 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.v1.44, 12 Jun 44; d. 

Fifteenth Army, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-30.v1.44, 12 Jun 

44. 

38 aKW jWFSt, KTB Ausarbeitung, Der Westen, 

1.IV.-16.XIl.44, cited hereafter as Der Westen. For 

·nature of the document, see above, Ch. VI, n. 115. 
412 

best hope of avoiding that defeat, they 

felt, lay in an unsuccessful Allied landing 

attempt at some other point. But they 

questioned whether the Allies would 

make such an attempt unless they could 

be compelled to by the long-range rocket 

bombardment of London soon to begin. 

If there were no second landing, a chance 

still remained of isolating the Normandy 

beachhead. To that end, they thought, 

German efforts should be directed with 

all possible means. 39 On 13 June JodI recommended to Hitler that the risks of 

landings on other fronts now be accepted 

and the maximum forces moved into the 

critical fight for France.4o 

Three days later Hitler sent an order 

to Rundstedt which conformed in tone to 

the recommendations of OKW but in 

substance amounted to no more than another attempt to patch up the front without altering the basic strategy.41 The order told Rundstedt to concentrate his 

forces, taking the risk of weakening all 

fronts except that of Fifteenth Army. 

Specifically, one infantry corps (the 

LXX X V I) was to be moved up from First 

A rmy. The 12th SS Panzer, Panzer Lehr, 

and 2d Panzer Divisions were to be relieved by infantry divisions to be transferred from Holland and the Fifteenth 

and Nineteenth Armies. But the Fifteenth Army in return was to get two new 

divisions from Norway and Denmark, 

and the Nineteenth Army's loss would be 

made up by transfer of one division from 

39 Conf, 12 Jun 44, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1944. 

The first ten V-I rockets were launched on the night 

of 12-13 June. See Rad, OB WEST to OKW, 13 Jun 

44. OB WEST, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-30.v1.44. 

40 Der Westen; d. MS # B...{i72 (Buttlar·Brandenfels) . 

41 Der Westen; Seekriegsleitungj 1.Abt., KTB 1.-

JO.VI.44, 16 Jun 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Germany and by naval alarm units. Preparations were to be made for a mass armored counterattack using the three panzer divisions relieved from the line and 

the four panzer divisions that were on 

their way to the battle area (the 2d SS 

from southern France, the 1 st SS from the 

Netherlands-Belgium border, and the 

9th SS and 10th SS from the east). 

The plan looked good on paper. Without really weakening any front-the Fifteenth Army would actually be strengthened-seven armored divisions would be 

freed for offensive action. What the plan 

failed to take into account was simply the 

sum of the military realities of the battle 

developing in Normandy. To discuss the 

future conduct of operations in more realistic terms, Rundstedt had asked that 

either Jodi or Warlimont come to France. 

On 16 June Hitler decided to come himself. Accordingly he flew from Berchtesgaden to Metz and then drove to a spot 

near Soissons where he met Rundstedt 

and Rommel on the morning of the 17th. 

There was an irony in the meeting place. 

Hitler, the field marshals, and their aides 

gathered in a concrete bunker that had 

been designed and built in 1940 at the 

height of Hitler's success to serve as his 

headquarters for the invasion of England. 

It had never been used until this midJune meeting called to discuss measures 

to check the swelling flood of military 

disasters. The pall of defeat hung over 

the meeting. 

He [Hitler] looked sick and tired out. 

Nervously he played with his spectacles and 

with colored pencils which he held between 

his fingers. He sat bent forward on a high 

stool while the field marshals remained 

standing. His old personal magnetism 

seemed to have gone. After brief and cool 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 413 

greetings, Hitler, raising his voice, first expressed sharp dissatisfaction with the successful Allied landings, found fault with the 

local commanders, and then ordered that 

fortress Cherbourg be held at any COSt.42 

The field marshals sought in vain to impress Hitler with the need for comprehensive revision of the conduct of operations in the west. What they wanted above 

all was freedom of action, including permission to draw reserves at will from 

coastal areas not immediately threatened 

by invasion_ They deplored the dependence on fixed defense of fortified areas 

and recommended certain withdrawals 

in order to shorten their lines and mass 

their forces. They predicted the fall of 

Cherbourg and asked that future plans 

be made accordingly.43 

To Hitler any proposal to withdraw, 

whatever its motive, was evidence of defeatism. He made no direct reply but 

talked instead of how the tide would soon 

be turned by the V-weapons. The meeting 

ended without decision, but Rommel and 

Rundstedt could not have been left in 

any doubt that Hitler would continue to 

demand an absolutely rigid defense of 

every inch of ground. His decision on the 

Cotentin crisis was characteristic. 

On 14 June it had been clear to Rommel that he must reckon with an American break-through at St. Sauveur that 

42 MS # C-017 (Speidel). Speidel, Rommel's chief 

of staff, was present in the bunker during the meeting and took notes which he later expanded. See MS 

# B-718 (Speidel). 

43 MS # C-OI7 (Speidel). Rundstedt recalled after 

the war that he had proposed at the meeting the 

evacuation of southern France and withdrawal from 

Normandy in order to establish a defensive line along 

the Seine River to the Swiss border with Army Group 

B on the right, Army Group G on the left. See MS 

# B-633 (Rundstedt) and MS # B-308 (Zimmermann) . 

might cut the peninsula. He decided ac· 

cordingly that two divisions (the 709th 

and the 243 d) were sufficient for the de· 

fense of Cherbourg and that the 77th Di· 

vision should be moved to defend against 

the Americans' westward push. Seventh 

Army issued orders accordingly and provided that, if the peninsula were cut or a 

break-through threatened in the Valognes 

sector, the 709thJ 243dJ and remnants of 

the 91 st Division should fall back on 

Cherbourg.44 Against this contingency, 

LXXXIV Corps divided the Cotentin 

forces into two groups: Group von Schlieben, to be charged with the defense of 

Cherbourg and comprising chiefly the 

troops on the Montebourg line (except 

the 77th Division); and Group Hellmich, 

which with the 77th Division and all 

troops south and west of the Merderet 

would have the mission of building a defensive line along the Prairies Marecageuses north of la Haye du Puits.45 

The 77th Division apparently had 

trouble disengaging on the north front,46 

and no major moves were made on 15 

June. On the morning of the 16th General Fahrmbacher of LXXXIV Corps telephoned army that the planned division 

of forces must be carried out at once. 

Group Hellmich was already completely 

cut off from supplies and fought out; it 

could only hold for a matter of hours. 

Only two companies of the 91st Division 

and scattered elements of the 243 d Division remained between the Americans 

and the west coast. Fifteen minutes after 

Fahrmbacher had made his report and 

urgent request for immediate action, Sev44 Seventh Army, KTB l.I.-30.vI.44, 14 Jun 44. 

45 MS # B-784 (Criegern). 

46 Tel msg. CofS Seventh Army to CofS Army 

Group B, 15 Jun 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.1.-30.VI.44. 
414 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

enth Army was informed by Army Group 

B that Hitler had forbidden the planned 

withdrawal of Group von Schlieben on 

Cherbourg. 47 This meant that it would be 

impossible to shift the 77th Diuision from 

von Schlieben’s right flank, that nothing 

therefore could be done to prevent the 

cutting of the peninsula, and that the 

77th Division would be sacrificed in a 

bitter-end fight to hold Cherbourg. The 

sacrifice furthermore promised to weaken 

rather than strengthen the defense of 

Cherbourg. With limited supplies in the 

fortress and little possibility of bringing 

in more, an increase in the number of defenders would simply reduce their endurance. 

Rommel was at LXXXZV Corps headquarters when the Hitler order reached 

him late in the afternoon. In an effort to 

make the best of an impossible situation, 

Rommel then decided that the 77th Division without giving ground should send 

weak elements to the south. After Rommel had left the command post, Fahrmbather called Seventh Army to say that 

he had decided to shift the whole 77th 

Division to the vicinity of St. Sauveur. 

“The Chief of Staff [Pemsel] reminded 

him of the Fuehrer order and asked 

whether he had permission of Field Marshal Rommel for this move. . . . General 

Fahrmbacher replied that Rommel had 

not given his specific approval but that 

they had talked about these measures only 

in that sense.” 48 Army thereupon forbade 

the move. The orders earlier given to the 

77th Division to disengage and move 

south were countermanded.49 During the 

47 Tel msgs, 16 Jun 

lagen 1.I.-30.V1.44: 

44. Seventh Army, KTB An48 Ibid. 

49 Captured German orders in VII Corps G-2 Jnl. 

night of 16-17 June command in the Cotentin remained paralyzed, letting slip 

what was in the judgment of both corps 

and army commanders their last chance 

to rescue the 77th Division from the closing trap. 

Thus the time for action passed. The 

following day witnessed only anticlimax. 

On the morning of 17 June Hitler at Soissons issued a new’order. He still did not 

authorize the 77th Division to pull out to 

the south. Instead he directed Rommel to 

defend Cherbourg under all circumstances as long as possible; Schlieben was 

permitted to withdraw, but only under 

pressure. This decision ignored the fact 

that, after the American break-through 

to the coast, the country to the north 

would be undefended between Valognes 

and the west coast, and that Schlieben’s 

whole position could thus be bypassed. 

Interpreting rather freely this relaxation 

of the original stand-fast order, Seventh 

Army at once ordered the 77th Division 

to move south to assembly areas near la 

Haye du Puits50 In the afternoon through 

OKW came a second order scarcely more 

realistic. Schlieben, instead of pulling 

back into the more or less prepared positions of the Cherbourg Landfront, was 

now instructed to establish a line between 

St. Vaast-la Hougue and Vauville which 

he was to hold to the last. 

50Later, in response to a questionnaire from Hitler, Seventh Army denied that it ever gave such an 

order and that the withdrawal which actually took 

place was done on the initiative of a regimental 

commander. The available evidence, including a 

written 77th Division field order signed by General 

Stegmann, argues strongly against this version of the 

affair. See also the account by the LXXXZV Corps

chief of staff which leaves no doubt that at least 

Seventh Army approved all the moves taken. MS 

# B-784 (Criegern). 

414 

enth A rmy Was informed by A rmy Group 

B that Hitler had forbidden the planned 

withdrawal of Group von Schlieben on 

Cherbourg.47 This meant that it would be 

impossible to shift the 77th Division from 

von Schlieben's right flank, that nothing 

therefore could be done to prevent the 

cutting of the peninsula, and that the 

77th Division would be sacrificed in a 

bitter-end fight to hold Cherbourg. The 

sacrifice furthermore promised to weaken 

rather than strengthen the defense of 

Cherbourg. With limited supplies in the 

fortress and little possibility of bringing 

in more, an increase in the number of defenders would simply reduce their endurance. 

Rommel was at LXXXIV Corps headquarters when the Hitler order reached 

him late in the afternoon. In an effort to 

make the best of an impossible situation, 

Rommel then decided that the 77th Division without giving ground should send 

weak elements to the south. After Rommel had left the command post, Fahrmbacher called Seventh Army to say that 

he had decided to shift the whole 77th 

Division to the vicinity of St. Sauveur. 

"The Chief of Staff [Pemsel] reminded 

him of the Fuehrer order and asked 

whether he had permission of Field Marshal Rommel for this move .... General 

Fahrmbacher replied that Rommel had 

not given his specific approval but that 

they had talked about these measures only 

in that sense." 48 Army thereupon forbade 

the move. The orders earlier given to the 

77th Division to disengage and move 

south were countermanded. 49 During the 

47 Tel msgs, 16 Jun 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.I.-30-VI.44. 

48 Ibid. 

49 Captured German orders in VII Corps G-2 Jnl. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

night of 16-17 June command in the Cotentin remained paralyzed, letting slip 

what was in the judgment of both corps 

and army commanders their last chance 

to rescue the 77th Division from the closing trap. 

Thus the time for action passed. The 

following day witnessed only anticlimax. 

On the morning of 17 June Hitler at Soissons issued a new order. He still did not 

authorize the 77th Division to pull out to 

the south. Instead he directed Rommel to 

defend Cherbourg under all circumstances as long as possible; Schlieben was 

permitted to withdraw, but only under 

pressure. This decision ignored the fact 

that, after the American break-through 

to the coast, the country to the north 

would be undefended between Valognes 

and the west coast, and that Schlieben's 

whole position could thus be bypassed. 

Interpreting rather freely this relaxation 

of the original stand-fast order, Seventh 

Army at once ordered the 77th Division 

to move south to assembly areas near la 

Haye du Puits.50 In the afternoon through 

OKW came a second order scarcely more 

realistic. Schlieben, instead of pulling 

back into the more or less prepared positions of the Cherbourg Landfrant, was 

now instructed to establish a line between 

St. Vaast-Ia Hougue and Vauville which 

he was to hold to the last. 

50 Later, in response to a questionnaire from Hitler, Seventh Army denied that it ever gave such an 

order and that the withdrawal which actually took 

place was done on the initiative of a regimental 

commander. The available evidence, induding a 

written 77th Division field order signed by General 

Stegmann, argues strongly against this version of the 

affair. See also the account by the LXXXIV Corps 

chief of staff which leaves no doubt that at least 

Seventh Army approved all the moves taken. MS 

# B-784 (Criegern)_ 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 415 

Both the delay in making these decisions and the unworkable compromise 

that they entailed resulted in disastrous 

confusion which sacrificed the bulk of the 

77th Division without profit. Still more 

disastrous for the Germans than the tactical blunder was the principle that underlay it. The crisis of the Seventh Army) 

strained beyond endurance in its attempt 

to seal off the Allied beachhead, was to 

be met by pretending that it did not exist. 

The renewed determination to hold everything meant that in the end nothing 

could be held. The principle that withdrawals should be undertaken only after 

enemy penetrations had made them impossible to organize in orderly fashion 

meant gaining a few hours for the defense 

today at the cost of the battle tomorrow. 

While the Germans were paralyzed in 

the Cotentin, General Collins on 16 June 

prepared the final coup to strike to the 

coast, and at the same time alerted both 

the 4th and 79th Divisions for the next 

step-the drive north. The 4th Division 

was ordered to prepare for attack on Valognes; the 79th Division was to get one 

regimental combat team ready for movement on four hours' notice. The intention was to pass the 79th through the 90th 

Division as soon as the latter had reached 

its objective line froin Ie Ham to Terrede-Beauval. (See Map XXI.) Concurrently, in anticipation of an early completion of the drive to the west coast, the 

southern flank was being organized to 

hold while VII Corps turned north 

toward Cherbourg. On 15 June VIII 

Corps (Maj. Gen. Troy H. Middleton) 

had become operational with the attachment of the lOlst Airborne Division. The 

mission of VIII Corps was the organization of defensive positions from Carentan 

west across the peninsula. The 82d Airborne Division would come under its 

control and, in preparation for this, was 

ordered to attack south on 17 June to 

establish a bridgehead south of Pont 

l'Abbe about a mile and a half deep. The 

9th Division would extend its zone south, 

attacking with one regiment westward 

through the St. Sauveur bridgehead. The 

main effort of the 9th Division on 17 June 

was to be made by the 60th Infantry, attacking through N ehou to capture Hills 

145 and 133 dominating the west coast 

in the 9th Division zone. The 47th Infantry, attacking from St. Sauveur toward 

St. Lo-d'Ourville, would protect its left 

flank. The 39th Infantry would seize and 

hold the ground between HauttevilleBocage and Ste. Colombe until the 90th 

Division reached its objective. 

The attack drove ahead so fast against 

nothing more than straggler units of a 

completely disorganized enemy that original obje(:tives were changed and battalions of both the 60th and 47th Infantry 

regiments were pushed up to cut the 

coastal road at Grande Huanville and 

Barneville-sur-Mer. Escape routes to the 

south were effectively blocked when, during the night and the following morning 

(18 June), elements of the 77th Division 

attempted to carry out the ordered withdrawal to la Haye du Puits. West of Hill 

145 on the morning of 18 June, an enemy 

column, largely of artillery vehicles, was 

caught on the road and methodically destroyed by the guns of the 60th Field Artillery Battalion, abetted by infantry and 

antitank fire. This column and others 

destroyed near Barneville and north of 

Ie Valdecie presumably included much of 

the 77th Division artillery, which was 

wholly lost in the attempt to evacuate it 
416 

to the south. On the other hand, the 3d 

Battalion, 243d Artillery Regiment, successfully passed through the Americans 

at Barneville during the night.1I1 In the 

meantime a bitter night fight developed 

around St. Jacques-de-Nehou where the 

1st Battalion, 39th Infantry, attached as 

reserve to the 60th Infantry, occupied positions astride a north-south road. Elements of the 77th Division trying to move 

south attacked here before daylight on 

IS June. Riflemen fought at close quarters, without artillery support, for the 

60th Field Artillery Battalion was forced 

to displace by the attack. Mortars at 

ranges of as little as 250 yards fired some 

900 rounds. A limited withdrawal was at 

length directed and carried out in orderly 

fashion. After daylight, as enemy pressure 

let up, the battalion prepared for a counterattack. After a heavy artillery preparation reinforced by Sl-mm. mortars which 

fired their entire basic load, the battalion pushed back to its original positions, 

taking 60 prisoners and counting about 

250 enemy dead. Among the Germans 

who fell here was the 77th Division commander, Generalmajor Rudolf Stegmann, 

fatally wounded by a fighter-bomber attack. 

The 9th Division lines were not penetrated on IS June by any substantial enemy force. But the next day, after the 

357th Infantry (90th Division) had relieved the 47th Infantry near St. Lod'Ourville, a battalion of the I050th 

Grenadier Regiment (77th Division) 

captured a bridge overthe Ollande River 

along with more than a hundred Americans and enabled Oberst Rudolf Bacherer 

~1 During all the fighting since D Day and the 

withdrawal on 17 June the battalion lost only four 

guns. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

(commanding the 77th Division after the 

death of General Stegmann) to lead about 

1,400 men through to the south. 

Relief of the 47th Infantry by the 357th 

Infantry of the 90th Division was the beginning of the new phase of corps operations. Control of the 90th and of the S2d 

Airborne Division passed on 19 June to 

VIII Corps, charged with responsibility 

for the security of VII Corps' south flank. 

The 9th Division, relieved of defense of 

the ground it had won in the drive across 

the peninsula, began to regroup for the 

attack on Cherbourg in conjunction with 

the 79th and 4th Divisions. 

Advance to the Cherbourg Landfront 

Plans for the final drive on Cherbourg 

were developed during IS June by General Collins in consultation with General 

Bradley and some of the division commanders. The original plan to attack 

with the 4th and 90th Divisions, while the 

9th Division blocked the St. Lo-d'Ourville corridor on the west coast, was 

changed in favor of a stronger attack designed to move fast and take maximum 

advantage of German disintegration. A 

fresh division, the 79th, was to replace 

the 90th, which would take over the 9th 

Division responsibility for blocking along 

the west coast. Three divisions, the 9th, 

79th, and 4th, would then jump off 

abreast. (Map XXII) On the right, the 

4th Division was to bypass the coast defenses in order to advance directly on 

Cherbourg as rapidly as possible. To 

screen its right flank the 24th Cavalry 

Squadron was committed. The 4th Cavalry Squadron under 4th Cavalry Group 

control was also to be put in line to attack 

between the 9th and 79th Divisions. Thus 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 417 

VII Corps would commit its full combat 

strength in the attack. 

Through capture by the 9th Division 

of field orders of the German LXXXIV 

Corps and the 77th Division, VII Corps 

had a pretty accurate picture of the state 

of German defenses in the peninsula. 

General Collins knew of the splitting of 

German forces and of the order to General Schlieben to withdraw on the fortress Cherbourg. The last-minute attempt 

of the 77th Division to pull south of the 

9th Division lines had been cut off, and 

it could be assumed that disorganization 

existed in the western half of the German 

lines. By attacking fast and hard VII 

Corps might exploit the disorganization 

as well as push General Schlieben’s 

planned withdrawal into a rout. The VII 

Corps G-2 estimated that the enemy 

would fight delaying actions and would 

stand for a defense of Cherbourg on the 

line of hills ringing it to a depth of about 

five miles. Fixed defenses in this position 

had been reconnoitered and plotted accurately long before D Day. Although the 

exact number of German troops at General Schlieben’s disposal for the defense 

of Cherbourg could only be guessed at, 

it was known that all his major combat 

units (the 709th, 243d, 91st and 77th Divisions) existed only in fragments. The 

total enemy force locked in the peninsula 

was variously estimated at between 

twenty-five and forty thousand including 

Flak and naval personnel and Organization Todt workers. 

The estimate of enemy capabilities 

proved substantially correct. The 9th 

Division, beginning its attack at 0550, 

19 June, found nothing in front of it, 

and the 60th and 39th Infantry Regiments marched rapidly to their designated objectives between Rauville-la 

Bigot and St. Germain-le Gaillard before 

noon. The 4th Cavalry Squadron kept 

pace until it reached Rocheville. There 

it was delayed by enemy resistance and 

at noon the squadron lagged slightly behind the 9th Division. 

To keep the 9th Division attack going, it was necessary to protect its right 

flank. A battalion of the 359th Infantry 

(90th Division) was brought up to hold 

the Rocheville area. The 4th Cavalry 

Squadron was attached to the 9th Division and its zone extended northward. 

These arrangements completed by the 

middle of the afternoon, General Eddy 

ordered resumption of the attack. Still 

without opposition, the 39th Infantry 

reached Couville and St. Christophe-duFoe while the 60th Infantry, bypassing 

les Pieux, put leading elements into 

Helleville. The cavalry, delayed briefly 

by enemy artillery and small arms fire 

near Rauville-la Bigot, nevertheless kept 

abreast and entered St. Martin-le Greard 

that night. From Rocheville east the 

corps attack met increasing opposition. 

The 79th Division (Maj. Gen. Ira T. 

Wyche) 52 attacked from the line Golleville, the objective of the 90th 

Division in its week-long push north 

from the Merderet bridgehead. The 

313th Infantry (Col. Sterling A. Wood) 

on the left reached its objective, the 

Bois de la Brique, west of Valognes 

against only slight resistance. But the 

315th Infantry (Col. Porter B. Wiggins), 

which was supposed to bypass Valognes to 

ss General Wyche was graduated from West Point 

in 1911. Commissioned in the infantry he transferred 

in 1917 to the field artillery. In the 1930’s he commanded various artillery units and in 1941 became 

commander of the 74th Field Artillery Brigade. In 

May 1942 he took command of the 79th Division. 
418 

the west and cut the Cherbourg highway 

northwest of the city, was held up by fire 

from Urville and a counterattack at 

Lieusaint. At night it was still southwest 

of Valognes. General Wyche then decided to leave Wiggins there in position to 

contain the city, move Wood's regiment 

to the right of the division zone, and 

commit the 314th on its left. The 314th 

Infantry (Col. Warren A. Robinson) 

moved out during the night and came up 

abreast of Wood about dawn. 

In all the VII Corps zone, only the 4th 

Division encountered organized resistance. Since General Barton had held the 

line from Quineville to Montebourg 

Station for four days, the enemy had had 

ample time to prepare defenses against 

the anticipated thrust to Cherbourg. 

Barton ordered the 8th and 12th Infantry 

Regiments to attack abreast on a northwest axis on either side of Montebourg. 

The 24th Cavalry Squadron screened the 

right flank while the 22d Infantry was 

held in reserve. Through probing by 

patrols during the division's four days in 

place, it was known that elements of the 

Seventh A rmy Sturm Battalion and the 

729th Regiment (estimated at 1,000-

1,500 men) were dug in generally along 

the spur railroad that runs from the main 

Cherbourg line just north of Montebourg. The plan was to strike through 

this prepared line before daylight, and 

both regiments jumped off at 0300. 

Fighting all along the line was similar. 

None of the forward battalions were able 

to break the German defenses in the 

dark although at least one company 

walked right through the line without 

being fired on. Where the enemy fought, 

however, he was in deep entrenchments 

and difficult to dislodge. Control of the 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

attacking troops was tenuous and some 

units got lost. It was not until daylight 

that the attack could start moving with 

tank support. Then both regiments 

broke the German line. Schlieben began 

to withdraw. The 8th Infantry at nightfall was just south and east of Valognes; 

the 12th Infantry was on its right. The 3d 

Battalion of the 22d Infantry entered 

Montebourg at 1800 and found it deserted. Later in the evening the 22d Infantry was concentrated on the division 

right flank to take part in a three-regiment attack the next day. 

The resistance in front of the 4th Division on 19 June was actually little more 

than a gesture by General Schlieben at 

carrying out his orders to fight his way 

slowly back to fortress Cherbourg. The 

orders could scarcely have been carried 

out. On his west flank, General Schlieben 

had no positions to hold and only disorganized troops who would have been 

needlessly sacrificed if they had attempted 

a stand. The plunge forward of the 9th 

and 79th Divisions during 19 June rendered defense of the sector opposite the 

4th Division useless and dangerous. During the night, therefore, General Schlieben ordered a general disengagement on 

this front and drew all his force back to 

the fortress ring immediately defending 

Cherbourg. Delaying actions were ordered, but the battle-weary troops did 

not stop to fight them.lis 

53 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.1.-30.v1.44. Hoffmann pointed out that the Americans were apparently unaware of the gap in the 

German lines west of Valognes where the Kampfgruppe of the 77th Division had pulled out to head 

south. An attack through this gap, Hoffmann believed, either would have turned Schlieben's flank 

and prevented his withdrawal to Cherbourg or 

would at least have made that withdrawal more 

precipitate and disorganized. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 419 

When the 4th Division resumed the 

attack on 20 June, it found open country 

ahead. At first the troops advanced cautiously. They paused to investigate 

Valognes. The city was choked with 

rubble but no enemy were in sight. By 

noon it was clear that the enemy had 

broken all contact and the regiment took 

route march formations on the roads and 

walked north. In this way all arrived by 

nightfall on their objectives in a line 

from Ie Theil to the Bois de Roudou. 

This line was just in front of the main 

enemy defenses of Cherbourg, and as the 

leading companies approached they 

brushed with enemy outposts and in 

some cases came under severe hostile artillery fire. 

The experience of the 79th Division 

on 20 June was similar. Both the 313th 

and 314th Infantry Regiments advanced 

to the road running roughly east-west between the Bois de Roudou and St. 

Martin-Ie Greard. On that line both met 

resistance which clearly indicated that 

they had hit outposts of the Cherbourg defenses. Eloquent of the haste with which 

the Germans had withdrawn was the 

capture intact at one point of four light 

tanks and an 88-mm. gun and at another 

of eight tanks. The 3l5th Infantry during the day cleared stragglers from the 

Valognes area and then moved into reserve positions behind the lead regiments. 

The 9th Division, which on 19 June 

had already come up against the outer 

veil of the main enemy defenses, had 

quite a different experience on 20 June. 

On wings of optimism in the course of the 

rapid unopposed advance of 19 June, 

VII Corps had given General Eddy objectives deep inside fortress Cherbourg: 

Flottemanville-Hague, Octeville, and positions athwart the Cherbourg-Cap de 

la Hague road. 

The plan outlined on the afternoon of 

the 19th was complicated by the dual 

mission of the division: to breach the 

Cherbourg fortress by capture of what 

were thought to be its two main defenses in the 9th Division zone, Flottemanville and the Bois du Mont du Roc; 

and to block the Cap de la Hague where 

it was known the enemy had prepared 

defenses to which he might fall back for 

a prolonged last stand. The latter mission 

was given Colonel de Rohan's 60th Infantry with orders to drive straight north 

to seize positions from Hill 170 through 

Branville to the sea. Colonel Flint with 

the 39th Infantry would initially contain 

the enemy to the east while the 47th Infantry followed behind de Rohan as far 

as Vasteville, then turned east in front 

of Flint's positions to attack the Bois 

du Mont du Roc. Colonel Flint would 

support this attack with fire, then move 

on north across the rear of the 47th Infantry to attack Flottemanville. 

The advance of the 60th Infantry, 

paralleling the main enemy defenses, 

was rapid until about noon when it 

reached high ground a few hundred 

yards from its initial objective, Hill 170. 

It was slowed then by increasing enemy 

artillery fire. Delay here, however, was 

not serious, for sufficient advance had 

been made to permit the 47th Infantry 

following to come up west of its objectives and make the turn east. The 1st 

and 2d Battalions attacked abreast north 

and south of the Bois de Nerest. Both 

were stopped not far from their line of 

departure as the enemy suddenly uncovered a stiff and carefully prepared 

defense. The experience of the 2d Bat-
420 

talion was typical of what happened all 

along the front as VII Corps pressed in 

on the enemy's last bastion. Fired on by 

German outposts in houses at a crossroads southeast of Acqueville, the battalion was first checked. Then from the 

main enemy positions on hills to the 

east came withering direct and indirect 

fire from 88-mm., 20-mm., and machine 

guns. The command group of the battalion was hit by a shell burst, the commander, Lt. Col. James D. Johnston, mortally wounded, and a number of his officers injured. Unable to push forward, the 

battalion had to withdraw out of the 

area of concentrated fire. 

Since, with the 47th Infantry stopped, 

the 39th would be unable to advance past 

it toward objectives to the north, General 

Eddy promptly altered the division plan. 

Objectives at Flottemanville were assigned to the 1st and 2d Battalions of 

the 60th Infantry while the 3d Battalion 

was directed to carry out a portion of the 

regiment'S original blocking mission by 

taking positions on the crossroads formed 

by the junction of the les Pieux and 

Cherbourg roads into- Cap de la Hague. 

Again the advance north proved relatively easy and the 3d Battalion came 

within 1,000 yards of its objectives. But 

the two battalions that attempted to 

turn east were stopped virtually in their 

tracks in front of Gourbesville. The 9th 

Division ground to a halt. Road marches 

were over; hard fighting lay ahead. 

The German defenses now faced by 

VII Corps consisted of a belt of concrete 

and field fortifications disposed in a semicircle four to six miles from Cherbourg. 

Placed in commanding ground along the 

collar of steep hills, the German positions covered every approach route into 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the city. Advantage was taken of steepsided stream beds for antitank obstacles, 

and these were supplemented by ditches 

where necessary. Included within the 

ring of defense were antiaircraft batteries sited for both air and ground defense. Although most of the fixed defenses had long been known to the Americans and were overprinted on maps 

issued to all commanders, extensive reconnaissance of the positions Was ordered on 21 June in order to discover 

whether certain sectors might not be 

weakly held. 

During 20 June, after Schlie ben's retreat from the Montebourg line, the 

Germans had reorganized the Cherbourg 

Land/rant as far as possible to put regimental commanders in sectors familiar 

to them and their own troops under 

them. Foreign and miscellaneous units 

drawn back from the fighting in the 

peninsula or already present in the port 

were distributed throughout the regimental sectors. Four regimental Kampfgruppen were formed. On the west a 

group under Oberstleutnant Franz 

Mueller, commander of the 922d Regiment} comprised the remnants of the 

243 d Division in the sector between 

Vauville and Ste. Croix-Hague. The 

Land/rant fortified line from there to the 

Bricquebec-Cherbourg road was taken 

over by the 919th Regiment and the 

17th Machine Gun Battalion under 

Oberstleutnant Guenther Keil. Oberst 

Walter Koehn with the 739th Regiment 

occupied the line eastward to just south 

of Mesnil au Val, and on the east was 

Oberst Helmuth Rohrbach's 729th 

Regiment. The combat efficiency of all 

the troops now asked to make a last stand 

before the port was extremely low. Those 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-1 JULY) 421 

who had fought on the northern front 

against the 4th Division were fought out 

and the "battalions" contained not more 

than 180 effectives.G4 The miscellaneous 

troops from naval and air force security 

units and headquarters staffs were all 

green. Schlieben reported to Seventh 

Army that he was especially worried 

about these troops. "Good treatment of 

prisoners on the part of the enemy," he 

reported, "is very dangerous." 5~ On the 

other hand he was not concerned about 

supply. Ammunition was generally sufficient for immediate needs and, except 

for a shortage of machine gun cartridges, 

stocks were maintained at adequate levels 

during the defense by air drops and Uand E-boat deliveries.56 

The 9th and 79th Divisions devoted 

the day of 21 June to patrolling and reorganization while the 4th Division, still a 

little short of the enemy's ring of prepared defenses, continued the attack to 

reach the objectives of the day before 

and develop the German main line of 

resistance. The 9th Division readjusted 

its front to put its full weight in position 

to drive into Cherbourg. The 4th Cavalry Squadron was relieved on the right 

by the 39th Infantry and took over 

screen inS' of the left flank from the 60th 

54 Hoffmann (in report cited n. 53) estimated that 

a worth-while defense of the port would have required three full divisions with armored support, 

and insurance of regular resupply. Such a force, he 

believed, might have held out for several weeks, but 

even they would have to have been relieved by a 

successful attack from the south. Cf. Schlieben's estimate, MS # B-845. 

55 Seekriegsleitung/l.Abt., KTB 1.-30.VI.44, 21 Jun 

44. 

56 Air drops were modest. Between 20 and 30 June 

only 107 transport planes were used and they dropped 

a total of 188 tons of supplies. Luftwaffe Historical 

Section, Beurteilung des Krieges, 14 Aug 44. AAF 

files. 

Infantry, which was thus enabled to use 

all three of its battalions for the attack 

against Flottemanville. The reserve battalion of the 47th was committed between the other two. In short, all three 

regiments of the division were concentrated in line and the 60th and 47th, 

which would carry the brunt of the attack, had all their rifle battalions forward. The 79th Division similarly concentrated its weight for the attack by 

bringing up its reserve regiment, the 

315th Infantry, into the St. Martin-Ie 

Gn~ard area on the left flank, where it 

took over from the 9th Division. Patrols 

of both divisions probing into the enemy 

lines during the day found the enemy 

very sensitive. Attempts to move up 

brought storms of artillery and small 

arms fire all along the line and yielded 

only the negative information that the 

enemy would apparently fight hard 

everywhere. 

The attack of the 4th Division completed the development of the German 

main line of resistance. The 22d Infantry, ordered to thrust straight north 

to cut the main road from Cherbourg 

east to St. Pierre-Eglise, put the 3d Battalion on its objective, Hill 158, which 

was on the Cherbourg road and just 

southwest of the heavily defended 

Maupertus airfield. The advance was 

resisted, however, and the 1st Battalion 

was held up 500 yards short of the hill. 

Both battalions, moreover, found large 

though apparently unorganized German 

forces to their rear near Gonneville, and 

for four days supply trains had to fight 

their way up with tank escort. 

The 8th and 12th Infantry Regiments 

during 21 June attacked northwest into 

the main Cherbourg defenses. The 8th 
422 

Infantry's objective was high ground 800 

yards northwest of the Bois de Roudou. 

The attack plan called for the advance 

of the 1 st and 3d battalions north 

through the woods while the 2d Battalion 

attacked northwest and west from Rufasses. Enemy structures suspected to be 

V-weapon sites had been observed in the 

corridor between the Bois de Roudou 

and the Bois du Coudray; the regiment's 

first mission was to clean these out. The 

1st and 3d battalions fought their way 

out of the woods, meeting heavy fire 

from unfinished concrete shelters at the 

northwest tip. The 3d Battalion fought 

through to the edge of its objective. 

Attack by the 2d Battalion from the east 

succeeded in forcing the German position at Bourdonnerie crossroads. A 

platoon of tanks deployed in line was 

closely followed by a company of infantry. Despite limited maneuver room, 

the attack carried as the tanks, unhindered by the low hedgerows, moved easily 

cross country. After the 2d Battalion had 

passed through to the base of its objective, Germans came back into the 

.crossroads position and had to be cleaned 

out during the night and the next morning. In all, 300 prisoners were flushed 

out of the area by heavy concentrations 

of mortar and cannon fire. 

The 12th Infantry, attacking through 

the Bois du Coudray, at first met little 

opposition. It arrived at the northwest 

edge of the woods on the banks of the 

Saire River before heavy enemy fire and 

a blown bridge stopped the advance. 

At the edge of the principal enemy defenses, Col. James S. Luckett, the regimental commander, decided not to push 

the attack further that day. 

On the evening of 21 June, VII Corps, 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

with all three divisions drawn up tight 

against the Cherbourg fortress, was ready 

for the final assault. 

The Fall of Cherbourg 

The early capture of Cherbourg was 

given dramatic urgency by a four-day 

storm over the English Channel which 

struck without warning on 19 June. It 

struck just as the machinery for delivering supplies across the beaches had begun 

to work smoothly and at full capacity. 

Initially considerable delay in the 

planned build-up had been caused by the 

stubborn German opposition to V Corps. 

It had been four days before the advance 

of V Corps inland had established the 

planned beachhead maintenance area. 

During those four days engineers, working to organize the beach to receive reinforcements and supplies, were hampered by artillery and sniper fire. On the 

other hand enemy air activity was much 

lighter than had been expected and 

damage from the sporadic raids was negligible throughout the month. The peak 

of enemy air activity, as a matter of fact, 

coincided with the onset of the storm 

when, on the night of 19-20 June, 116 

German aircraft were over the beaches 

and shipping lanes. 

The first V Corps dumps opened during the night of 6-7 June despite chaotic 

conditions on the beach. On 7 June engineers finished the marking of the 

beaches. On the same day construction 

of the artificial port off OMAHA began on 

schedule with the sinking of the first 

blockships to form the outer breakwater. 

No artificial port was planned for UTAH, 

but a line of blockships to provide sheltered water was towed in beginning on 8 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 423 

June. Two of these ships were sunk by 

German coastal batteries approximately 

in their proper position. The American 

Navy sank the rest and the work was completed on 13 June. 

The immediate success of the landings 

at UTAH made beach organization there 

much easier than at OMAHA. However, the 

unexpectedly stiff resistance which held 

up the 4th Division's push northward 

meant that the maintenance area which 

was planned to be extended to Quineville had to be confined to the original 

landing beaches together with a third 

beach opened later on D Day. Sporadic 

enemy artillery fire continued to harass 

supply operations until after the capture 

of the Quineville ridge on 14 June. 

Unloading thus fell behind schedule 

on both American beaches. Beginning 

on D plus 2 on OMAHA and D plus 3 on 

UTAH, it was greatly speeded up by drying out LST's. This process of grounding 

the craft on a falling tide and unloading 

directly to the shore had been rejected 

in the planning period for fear that the 

beached LST's might break their backs. 

Tried from necessity, it proved so successful that it became standard practice, 

eliminating the time-consuming transshipment of supplies by ferry craft.~1 

,Between 8 and 12 June inland dumps 

replaced the beach dumps, and the supply system was integrated on the 13th 

under First Army control. Beach maintenance began to be supplemented about 

the middle of June with the opening of 

three minor ports: Grandcamp-les Bains 

and Isigny and Port-en-Bessin. The lat-

~7 [Clifford Jones] NEPTUNE: Training. Mounting. 

the Artificial Ports (The Administrative and Logistical History of the ETO: Part VI). MS. II. 72-73. 

Hist Div files. 

ter, which could be used by coasters 

drawing up to twelve feet, was jointly 

operated by Americans and British. 

On 18 June the build-up of men and 

supplies, though still slightly less than 

planned, was approaching the target 

figures. The deficiency, moreover, was 

balanced by smaller combat losses and 

lower materiel consumption than expected. At the end of 18 June about 

116,000 tons of supplies, 41,000 vehicles, 

and 314,514 troops had come ashore in 

the U .S. zone.~8 The British had at the 

same time landed approximately 102,000 

tons of supplies, 54,000 vehicles. and 

314,547 troops. 59 

On the morning of 19 June strong 

winds began to blow from the northeast. 

Before noon ferrying operations were 

suspended on both beaches and antiaircraft personnel had to be taken off the 

outer breakwater of the port of OMAHA 

because of the heavy seas. In the evening 

the wind velocities increased to 25-32 

knots. Scores of small craft were driven 

ashore. Some were tossed so high above 

normal high-water mark by the combination of storm and spring tides that. 

though undamaged, they could not be 

refloated for ten days. Others were destroyed against the sea walls and rocks. 

On 20 June the storm continued; the 

artificial port showed signs of breaking 

up. The floating breakwater of bombardons broke its moorings, casting all 

twenty-four bombardons adrift.60 Some 

piled into the pier; others washed up on 

~8Ibid., II. 175ff. 

~9 Figures as of afternoon 18 June. Cosintrep 36, 

20 Jun 44. SHAEF AG file 370.2/11. 

60 Bombardons were huge air-filled cylindrical 

floats. constructed of rubberized canvas and reinforced concrete. Each was 200 feet long and had a 

12-foot beam and 13-foot draft. 
UTAH BEACH DURING THE BUILD-UP. Scene (above) at a beach headquarters, and (below) aerial view of beach showing breakwater of sunken ships. 
OMAHA BEACH DURING THE BUILD-UP. Reinforcements of men and 

equipment moving inland (above), and (below) unloading directly to the shore 

from LST's grounded on the beach. 
426 

land. Strenuous efforts were made to 

bring at least ammunition ashore, but 

the only ships that could unload were 

a few small coasters that beached at low 

tide. On the night of 21 June the artificial port's pierheads were carried away 

and the bridging connecting the piers 

with the shore was twisted. Landing craft 

were piled on the beaches. Winds began 

to moderate the next day but still not 

enough to permit resumption of operations. Unloading did not begin until 23 

June when DUKW's were able to navigate. 

Damage caused by the storm is impossible to assess accurately. On OMAHA 

alone 90 ferrying craft were lost plus indeterminate numbers of larger craft. 

Some 800 craft were stranded on U.S. 

and British beaches. The artificial port 

was a total loss. OMAHA Beach, littered 

with wreckage, had few open spots where 

new landings could take place when the 

seas abated. Opposite one of the OMAHA 

exits, an eyewitness at noon of 22 June 

counted 35 LCM's, 11 LCT's, 9 Rhino 

ferries, 3 LCI's, and more than twenty 

other craft chaotically piled up. UTAH 

suffered less both in craft losses and in 

beach wreckage. In the afternoon of 23 

June unloading was resumed there at 

full scale, and such congestion of beached 

craft as there was caused little difficulty 

since landings could be extended northward. 61 

61 ANCXF, Report, Vol. Ill, Rpt of Comdr Assault 

Force 0, p. II; Jones, NEPTUNE, II, 124-27. There are 

no reliable figures on ship casualties in the storm. 

The British estimate that they lost 250 ferrying 

craft. See Ltr, Col Warhurst (British Cabinet Office Hist Sec) to author, 7 Sep 48. The U.S. Navy Department could supply no estimates of American 

losses. 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

The naval commander at OMAHA, Admiral Hall, concluded that the artificial 

port had proved impractical and should 

not be reconstructed. 62 On the other 

hand, he felt that the outer breakwaters 

should be reinforced, for, despite the 

fact that they could not survive northerly 

gales, they provided the only possible 

means of getting sheltered water for 

small craft. Materials for the repair of 

the artificial port were diverted to the 

port in the British sector near Arromanches which had not been so badly 

damaged. The most important factors in 

the decision to abandon the artificial 

port project, on which so much dependence had been placed during the planning period, were, first, the discovery that 

LST's could be dried out, which meant 

faster build-up during favorable weather, 

and, second, the belief that Cherbourg 

would soon be opened and would replace OMAHA as the supply entry in the 

American zone.63 

Before the storm ended, General Collins on 21 June issued orders for the resumption of the attack on Cherbourg. 

He called attention to the new urgency 

of the objective and the fact that the 

attack was "the major effort of the 

American army." 64 

62 A naval investigator, studying the effect of the 

storm, concluded that it had proved the total impracticability of the artificial port. He pointed au t 

that the so-called storm had been only a "half-gale" 

and that, in fact, the wind had seldom exceeded 

force 6. (Force 6-up to 30 miles an hour-is referred La by seamen as a "strong breeze.") See Memo, 

Capt Robert C. Lee for Gen Crawford (SHAEF 

G-4) et ai., 26 Jun 44. SHAEF G-4 file 825.1 (Piers). 

63 Actually OMAHA continued to overshadow Cherbourg as a port of entry until the fall of the year 

and handled far more tonnage than anticipated in 

the most optimistic estimates before the invasion. 

Jones, NEPTUNE, II, 109 and 134ff. 

64 VII Corps G-3 Jnl, 21 Jun 44. 
ARTIFICIAL PORT AT OMAHA BEACH. Unloading equipment (above) on 

pier off Vierville Draw. Pier on right is under construction. Both were destroyed 

during the storm on 21 June. Breakwater of sunken ships (below). At upper left 

is les Moulins draw. 

# . - - - .,. .. "'" 

- - , 

.. - '* '" ~ , -
428 

Collins requested "air pulverization" 

of some twenty square miles before the 

jump-off, more to demoralize the Germans and force surrender than as direct 

preparation for the ground advance.6~ 

The air strike would employ the entire 

IX Bomber Command (medium bombers) as well as large numbers of U.S. 

and British fighter-bombers. The plan 

was developed under great difficulties 

not only because time was short but because all the units of the Ninth Air Force 

participating in the attack were based 

in England. Although Maj. Gen. Elwood 

R. Quesada, commander of the IX 

Tactical Air Command, was able to consult with Generals Bradley and Collins, 

the final plan was made in England with 

no First Army representatives present. 

It was flown to the Continent on the 

morning of 22 June. 

All air prepara1ion was to be concentrated in the zones of the 79th and 9th 

Divisions south and southwest of Cherbourg. (Map XXIII) Starting 80 minutes 

before H Hour, four squadrons of 

Typhoons of the 2d Tactical Air Force 

(RAF) were to attack with rockets 

throughout the northern portion of the 

attack zone concentrating on enemy antiaircraft positions. Following them, six 

squadrons of Mustangs also belonging to 

the British tactical air forces would 

strafe throughout the area. From H 

minus 60 minutes twelve groups of U.S. 

Ninth Air Force fighter-bombers would 

bomb and strafe enemy strong points in 

front of the American lines, attacking in 

waves at five-minute intervals. As ground 

troops moved out, all eleven groups of 

the IX Bomber Command were to bomb 

6~ Rpt by XIX Corps observers: Watson-Hickey 

Notes. 18 Jun. in XIX Corps G-li In!. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

eleven defended localities in a pattern 

bom bing designed to constitute a kind of 

rolling barrage in front of the ground 

attack. Despite the large number of aircraft involved, the bombs to be dropped 

amounted to only about 1,100 tons over 

a wide area. The attack was not intended 

as a "carpet" bombing of the type later 

used at Caen and in the St. L6 breakout. 

The idea was to achieve the maximum 

demoralization of an enemy who, because 

he was already in a state of hopeless siege, 

might be expected to have an already 

weakened morale. 

The hopelessness of the German position was pointed out to the Cherbourg 

garrison in a multilingual broadcast 

(German, Russian, Polish, and French) 

on the night of 21 June when General 

Collins demanded the immediate surrender of Cherbourg. General Schlieben 

was given until 0900 the following morning to capitulate. But the ultimatum 

expired without answer from General 

Schlieben. Preparations were therefore 

completed for the assault. 

Attack into Cherbourg itself was to be 

made by the 9th and 79th Divisions while 

the 4th Division sealed off the city from 

the east. The 9th Division, making its 

main effort on its right, would seize 

Octeville while the 79th Division captured the nose of high ground which 

terminated in Fort du Roule overlooking 

Cherbourg from the south. This would 

bring both divisions up on the high 

ground immediately ringing the port. 

The 4th Division on the right was to 

capture Tourlaville and send patrols 

from there to the sea. H Hour was set 

for 1400. 

Bombing began according to plan at 

1240. 22 June. From the testimony of 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 429 

prisoners, it appears that the air attacks 

were successful in their main purpose of 

weakening German will to resist, though 

the results were not apparent during the 

first day's action. For twenty minutes 

hundreds of fighters dived, strafed, and 

skip-bombed from altitudes as low as 

300 feet. Twenty-four were lost to enemy 

flak. The attacks were entirely unopposed 

by any German planes, and there was no 

cover anywhere from which the enemy 

could not be flushed by the ubiquitous 

fire from the skies. The end of the nervewracking attack signaled only the beginning of an hour of relentless bombing 

-wave after wave (375 planes in all) 

flying out of the west and loosing their 

bombs methodically on or near the six 

principal targets: Flottemanville-Hague. 

Martinvast, les Chevres, la Mare a 

Canards, Fort du Roule, and a defended 

locality just west of Octeville. At the 

same time, artillery shelled enemy antiaircraft batteries, with particular effectiveness in the 9th Division zone, and 

then, after troops began to move, fired 

on enemy defenses. 

All three divisions made slow advances 

during the afternoon. The 9th Division 

attacked with the 60th Infantry on the 

left and the 47th Infantry (backed by 

the 39th Infantry) on the right. The axis 

of advance remained the same: the 60th 

pointed toward Flottemanville, the 47th 

toward the Bois du Mont du Roc. The 

39th Infantry was assembled near Helleville. The 60th Infantry, attacking with 

battalions echeloned to the left to guard 

its open flank, at first moved rapidly and 

captured Acqueville within half an hour 

of the jump-off. The 47th similarly 

moved past Crossroads 114 where it had 

been held up on 21 June and pushed one 

battalion beyond Beaudienville. But the 

latter advance was made by bypassing 

the enemy at the crossroads and it had to 

be halted in the early evening to permit 

mopping up. At the end of 22 June, 

forward battalions were dug in on the 

slopes of Hill 171 just west of the Bois 

du Mont du Roc. The 60th Infantry 

pressed the attack to the edge of enemy 

fortifications at Flottemanville but could 

not penetrate the position before dark. 

The 79th Division, attacking with 

three regiments abreast, came up against 

similarly stubborn enemy resistance. The 

313th Infantry, making the division's 

main effort along the Valognes-Cherbourg highway, was first stopped by the 

les Chevres strong point which straddled 

the road. The German line was broken 

by the 3d Battalion on the left and rolled 

up while the 1st Battalion attacked 

frontally. After reorganization, the regiment pushed on against lighter resistance 

to reach a point just south of its next 

major obstacle-the fortified antiaircraft 

position at la Mare a Canards. The 315th 

Infantry meanwhile spent the day fighting to clear the Hardinvast area. The 

314th Infantry fought in the draws east 

of Tollevast until after dark, when one 

battalion slipped around the enemy positions and made contact with the 313th 

Infantry west of Crossroads 177. At this 

point the 314th was only a few hundred 

yards from a communications bunker 

which contained the switchboard for the 

entire Cherbourg Land/rant. The bunker 

was not discovered and remained to 

function for a day or so behind the 

American lines, reporting to Schlieben 

some details of American movements. 66 

66 Hoffmann Report. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 

1.1.-30.VI.44. 
430 

The three regiments of the 4th Division experienced hard, confused fighting 

on 22 June which netted only small 

gains. The main effort was made by the 

12th Infantry attacking northwest from 

the northern tip of the Bois du Coudray 

with the mission of seizing Tourlaville. 

But in confused fighting, during which 

the enemy continually filtered to the rear 

of the forward battalions, the regiment 

was able to advance only a few hundred 

yards. On its right the 22d Infantry, 

which was to have attacked from positions near Gonneville to take Digosville 

and so support the effort of the 12th Infantry, found itself surrounded by the 

enemy and spent the whole day trying to 

clear its own rear areas to keep its supply 

routes open. The 8th Infantry on the 

division left flank had the mission of 

capturing high ground east of la Glacerie 

in the triangle between the Trotebec and 

its principal tributary, where it would 

be pinched out by the northwest advance 

of the 12th Infantry on Tourlaville. 

Attacking from the north edge of the 

Bois de Roudou, the regiment made 

little progress. One of its battalions, attempting to envelop the enemy line, was 

caught by delayed enemy fire from prepared hedgerow positions and by tree 

burst artillery fire; it lost thirty-one 

killed and ninety-two wounded. 

Although the day of 22 June ended 

with slight gains for VII Corps achieved 

against desperate enemy resistance all 

along the line, there were nevertheless 

signs that continued pressure might soon 

crumble the Cherbourg defenses. Everywhere troops met loosely organized 

Kampfgruppen containing not only fragments of infantry units but labor troops, 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

military police, and naval and coast artillery personnel. 

That the final stand Was hopeless and 

could not last long was perfectly clear to 

General Schlieben. On 22 June he had 

received from Hitler full authority for 

the entire defense of the port together 

with a ringing admonition to do his duty. 

"Even if worst comes to worst," said Hitler, "it is your duty to defend the last 

bunker and leave to the enemy not a 

harbor but a field of ruins .... The German people and the whole world are 

watching your fight; on it depends the 

conduct and result of operations to smash 

the beachheads, and the honor of the 

German Army and of your own name." 67 

To this rhetoric General Schlieben replied with a few facts. He told Rommel 

that his own troops were exhausted in 

body and spirit, that the port garrison 

was over-age, untrained, and suffering 

from "bunker paralysis" (verbunkert), 

and that the leaderless remnants of the 

243d and 77th Divisions were more of a 

burden than a support. "Reinforcement," 

he concluded, "is absolutely necessary." 68 

Reinforcement was briefly contemplated the next day as the 15th Parachute 

Regiment in Brittany was alerted for 

movement by sea to Cherbourg. A few 

hours later, reports of the complete destruction and closing of the Cherbourg 

harbor caused cancellation. Dropping of 

parachute troops was considered but no 

planes were available. 

Fighting on 23 June was still heavy, 

but all three divisions made significant 

penetrations into the main German de61 Seekriegsleitung/I.Abt., KTB 1.-JO.VI.44, 22 Jun 

44. 

68 Ibid. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 431 

fenses. In the 9th Division zone, the 39th 

Infantry cleared fortified positions northwest of Beaudienville, which had been 

bypassed. The 47th Infantry completed 

the reduction of enemy defenses on Hill 

171, capturing 400 prisoners during the 

day's fighting. The two regiments thus 

established themselves firmly astride the 

ridge leading to Cherbourg inside the 

outer ring of enemy defenses. The 60th 

Infantry, after a long-delayed air bombardment and artillery concentrations on 

the Flottemanville area, moved in to 

occupy its objective with comparative 

ease in the evening. 

The 79th Division was troubled at 

first by enemy infiltrations behind the 

forward regiments. While these were 

cleared up, the 314th Infantry attacked 

the enemy positions at la Mare a Canards. 

The attack failed to achieve its objective, 

but one company worked around to the 

northwest and was able to hold there 

while the remainder of the regiment was 

withdrawn a little to await air bombardment. 

The 4th Division, though unable to 

reach its principal objective, Tourlaville, 

made good progress on 23 June as the 

attack of the 12th Infantry with tank 

support began to gather momentum. 

Tanks had not been used in the previous 

day's attack because the infantry had 

been unable to find suitable routes to 

bring them up. A route was discovered 

during the night. Two tanks attached to 

each of the forward companies of the lead 

battalion moved generally along the 

roads firing in support of the infantry 

and, on occasion, turning into the fields 

to steamroller enemy riflemen. The tanks 

apparently broke the back of German 

resistance and the advance became easier 

as it neared the objective. In the evening 

behind a rolling artillery barrage laid 

close to their front, the troops marched 

up a hill that commanded the approaches 

to Cherbourg and dug in for the night, 

ready for the final assault in Tourlaville. 

The 22d Infantry again on 23 June was 

occupied mainly with clearing enemy 

from its own sector. One battalion, eventually released for attack northwest, was 

stopped at once by heavy German fire. 

The 8th Infantry, while scoring only 

minor advances during the day, had one 

notable success when the 3d Battalion 

launched an attack at the very moment 

when the enemy was forming for counterattack. Finding the Germans lying 

head to heel along some hedgerows, the 

battalion opened rifle and tank fire and 

routed them with heavy losses. 

With the penetrations of 23 June into 

the outer ring of the Cherbourg fortress, 

the battle for the port entered its final 

phase. General Schlie ben reported on 

the morning of the 24th that he had no 

more reserves and that he had given 

orders to his troops to defend to the last 

cartridge. The fall of Cherbourg, he 

said, is inevitable. "The only question 

is whether it is possible to postpone it 

for a few days." 69 

On 24 June VII Corps closed in on 

the city. The 9th Division overran three 

defended Luftwaffe installations as the 

47th and 39th Infantry Regiments attacked along the ridge northeast into 

Octeville while the 60th Infantry held 

and cleared the north flank. Enemy fire 

was often heavy but, when the American 

69 Ibid., 24 Jun 44. 
432 

infantry closed in, the defense crumbled. 

The 39th Infantry in the evening halted 

and established positions in front of 

Octeville under corps orders not to become involved in the city that day. The 

47th Infantry, after assisting the 39th 

in the capture of an antiaircraft emplacement, turned north toward the old 

French fort of Equeurdreville, the German coastal battery north of it, and the 

Redoute des Fourches. With the coming of darkness, however, attack on these 

positions was postponed. 

In the 79th Division zone the 314th 

Infantry, supported by dive-bombing 

P-47's of the Ninth Air Force, cleared 

la Mare a Canards and pushed on to 

within sight of Fort du Roule. Three attempts to break through to the fort were 

frustrated by fire from the direction of 

Octeville on the division's dangling left 

flank. The 315th Infantry on the left was 

far behind, still engaged at Hardinvast. 

The 313th Infantry, on the other flank, 

kept pace, veering slightly eastward to reduce resistance west of la Glacerie and at 

Hameau Gringor. At the latter position 

320 prisoners and several artillery pieces 

were taken. 

The whole Cherbourg defense was collapsing and nowhere more completely 

than on the east. But the collapse was preceded by some bitter last stands that exacted heavy toll of some of the attacking 

units. The 8th Infantry making its last attack before being pinched out between 

the 12th Infantry and 79th Division, hit 

determined resistance east of la Glacerie. 

The Germans here, defending with light 

artillery, antiaircraft guns, mortars, and 

machine guns, threw back the first American attack. The second attempt made 

with tank support got around to the east 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

of the enemy position and the Germans 

pulled out. The cost of the day's fighting 

to the 8th Infantry was thirty-seven killed, 

including Lt. Col. Conrad Simmons, the 

1st Battalion commander. The 12th Infantry, again making the main divisional effort, now with one battalion of 

the 22d Infantry attached, by evening 

had occupied the last high ground before 

Tourlaville, from which the city of Cherbourg was visible. In the attack Lt. Col. 

John W. Merrill, who had taken command of the 1st Battalion the day before, 

was killed. One of the hardest fights in 

the area was fought at Digosville where 

the enemy stood to defend an artillery 

position. The position was overrun by 

one company with tank support, after a 

dive-bombing attack by twelve P-47's. 

The enemy, in withdrawing, left six field 

pieces. Tourlaville was occupied that 

night without a fight. In the day's advance the 12th Infantry took 800 prisoners. 

General Schlieben in the evening reported: "Concentrated enemy fire and 

bombing attacks have split the front. 

Numerous batter'ies have been put out 

of action or have worn out. Combat efficiency has fallen off considerably. The 

troops squeezed into a small area will 

hardly be able to withstand an attack on 

the 25th." 70 

American materiel superiority would 

be still further increased on 25 June by 

naval bombardment of the Cherbourg 

batteries arranged by General Bradley to 

coincide with the final ground assault. 

The bombardment was to be carried out 

by a task force of three battleships, four 

cruisers, and screening destroyers. 

70 Ibid. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 433 

AMERICAN ARTILLERY IN ACTION AGAINST CHERBOURG. This is a 

J55-mm. howitzer of the 79th Division. 

Meanwhile VII Corps closed in. On the 

right, the 12th Infantry scarcely paused 

on reaching its objective of 24 June. Continuing the attack through the night and 

into the day of the 25th, Colonel Luckett 

pushed hard to accelerate the enemy collapse. The.lst Battalion had a sharp fight 

to capture the coastal battery north of 

Tourlaville, but in early afternoon the 

enemy garrison of 400 finally surrendered, abandoning, among other things, 

three 8-inch guns. The other two battalions patrolled to the coast. In position 

blocking the eastern approaches to Cherbourg, the regiment and the division had 

completed their original mission. Early 

in the afternoon of 25 June, however, 

General Collins altered the division 

boundary so that the 4th Division could 

share in the capture of the city. All three 

battalions of the 12th Infantry entered 

Cherbourg during the evening. Two battal ions cleared the city streets in the eastern portion as far as the limit of the division's zone, hampered only by scattered 

fire and mines. The 1st Battalion fought 

all night to reduce pillboxes of beach fortifications east of the Fort des Flamands, 

but it was not until early the next morning when tanks were brought up that 350 

Germans finally decided to surrender. 

Then at last the 4th Division's part in the 

capture of Cherbourg was complete. 

On the opposite side of the city, the 

47th Infantry of the 9th Division was 

fighting in the suburbs during 25 June. 

After pushing down the ridge .toward 

Octeville with the 39th Infantry, the 47th 
434 

had turned north in the evening of 24 

June to attack Equeurdreville and had 

pushed one battalion to within 500 yards 

of the German fort there. The fort was a 

formidable-appearing position on top of a 

hill surrounded by a dry moat like a medieval fortress. It was used, however, only 

as an observation post for the coastal battery on the reverse slope and was not well 

defended from the south. In the morning 

of 25 June the fort was shelled and one 

company of the 2d Battalion attacked 

after a mortar barrage. In fifteen minutes 

the German garrison surrendered. Two 

companies then pushed rapidly into 

Equeurdreville and a platoon got to the 

beach, but it was withdrawn for the night. 

At the same time the 3d Battalion reduced the Redoute des Fourches with 

heavy artillery support. The enemy's 

right had now collapsed as thoroughly as 

his left on the day before, although a 

node of resistance in Octeville held up 

the 39th Infantry. The 9th Division took 

more than 1,000 prisoners in the day's 

fighting. 

Schlieben radioed: "Loss of the city 

shortly is unavoidable .... 2,000 wounded 

[are] without a possibility of being 

moved. Is the destruction of the remaining troops necessary as part of the general 

picture in view of the failure of effective 

counterattacks? Directive urgently requested." 

In the early afternoon, Schlieben noted 

the opening of the naval bombardment. 

"In addition to superiority in materiel 

and artillery, air force and tanks," he reported, "heavy fire from the sea has 

started, directed by spotter planes." Actually the weight of the bombardment on 

the Cherbourg defenses was much less 

than planned, for the Allied warships 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

were forced to engage in counterbattery 

fire with enemy shore batteries on Cap de 

la Hague. Nevertheless the added pressure on the German defenses was intolerable. "I must state in the line of duty," 

Schlieben concluded, "that further sacrifices cannot alter anything." 

To this Rommel replied by radio: 

"You will continue to fight until the last 

cartridge in accordance with the order 

from the Fuehrer." 71 

In the 79th Division zone, just such a 

fanatic defense was in progress where the 

garrison of Fort du Roule south of Cherbourg chose to fight it out. This fort, principal objective of the 79th Division, was 

one of the most formidable of the Cherbourg bastions. It was built into the face 

of a rocky promontory above the city and 

housed coastal guns commanding the entire harbor area. The guns were in lower 

levels under the edge of the cliff. In the 

upper level were mortars and machine 

guns in concrete pillboxes defending the 

fort from landward attack. On the southeast was an antitank ditch. 

Fort du Roule was attacked on the 

morning of 25 June by the 2d and 3d Battalions of the 314th Infantry, after a bombardment by a squadron of P-47's which 

largely missed its mark and did no appreciable damage. While the guns of the 

311 th Field Artillery Battalion laid fire 

on the fort, the 3d Battalion led off the 

attack, but was halted at a draw 700 yards 

from the fort. Here it was greeted with a 

hail of small arms fire from enemy dug 

in on the forward slope. Lacking artillery (which was fully engaged in neutralizing Fort du Roule) the 3d and 2d Battalions massed their machine gun fire on 

71 Ibid., 25 Jun 44. 
FORT DU ROULE with Cherbourg in background. 
436 

the German line. Most of the defenders 

were killed and the few survivors retreated to the fort. The 2d Battalion then 

took over the attack under the covering 

fire of the 3d Battalion. The attackers 

came under heavy machine gun fire from 

pillboxes as well as shelling from the direction of Octeville. 

Reduction of the positions now became 

a matter largely of the courage and initiative of individuals and small groups. Cpl. 

John D. Kelly's platoon of Company E 

was hugging the ground immobilized by 

German machine gun fire from a pillbox. 

Kelly took a ten-foot pole charge, crawled 

up the slope through enemy fire, and fixed 

the charge, but the explosion was ineffective. He returned with another charge 

and this time blew off the ends of the 

German machine guns. A third time 

Kelly climbed the slope, blew open the 

rear door of the pillbox, and hurled hand 

grenades inside until the enemy survivors 

came out and surrendered. In the 3d Battalion zone, Company K was stopped by 

88-mm. and machine gun fire. Here 1 st 

Lt. Carlos C. Ogden, who had just taken 

over the company from its wounded commander, armed himself with rifle and 

hand grenades and advanced alone under 

fire toward the enemy emplacements. Despite a head wound, Ogden continued up 

the slope until from a place of vantage he 

fired a rifle grenade that destroyed the 

88-mm gun. With hand grenades he then 

knocked out the machine guns, receiving 

a second wound but enabling his company to resume the advance.72 Through 

these acts and others, portions of the German garrison began to surrender. By mid72 Both Kelly and Ogden were awarded the Medal 

of Honor. Kelly died of wounds in a subsequent action. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

nigh t the 314th Infantry was in possession 

of the upper defenses of the fort. 

The 313th Infantry in the meantime 

attacked from Hameau Gringor into the 

flats southeast of Cherbourg. Troops entered the outskirts of the city but could 

not penetrate in strength because they 

came under fire from guns in the lower 

levels of Fort du Roule, still uncaptured. 

The fort was finally reduced on 26 June 

by lowering demolitions from the top 

levels, by antitank fire from guns in the 

city, and by assault of a demolition team 

under S jSgt. Paul A. Hurst around the 

precipitous west side of the cliff. Both the 

313th and 314th Infantry Regiments 

cleared the city in their zones during the 

day. Street fighting was only sporadic. 

The heaviest resistance fell on the left 

flank of the 314th Infantry, left open by 

the slower, more difficult progress of the 

9th Division in the western half of the 

city. 

The attempt of the 47th Infantry to 

clear the northwest section of the city was 

checked by the Germans' stubborn daylong defense of a thick-walled arsenal on 

whose parapets were emplaced antitank, 

antiaircraft, and machine guns. Artillery 

support was rendered difficult by the bad 

weather and smoke and dust of enemy 

port demolitions. Assault of the arsenal 

was postponed until the morning of 27 

June when an elaborately supported 

three-battalion attack was planned. Before it took place, however, a psychological warfare unit broadcast an ultimatum; 

shortly thereafter white flags were flown 

and Generalmajor Robert Sattler, deputy 

commander of the Cherbourg fortress, 

surrendered the 400 men under his immediate control to Colonel Smythe, commander of the 47th Infantry. 
HOUSE-TO-HOlJSE SEARCH IN CHERBOURG 
438 

A more dramatic surrender had occurred on 26 June when the 39th Infantry 

advancing on Octeville learned from a 

prisoner that General Schlieben was in 

an underground shelter at St. Sauveur on 

the southern outskirts of Cherbourg. 

Fighting in the vicinity of Schlieben's 

command post had taken place during 

25 June and Schlieben had directed it 

until he was driven underground by 

American artillery fire. He stayed on 

there for about twenty-four hours, isolated and helpless. At 1506, 26 June, he 

got through a final radio message to Seventh Army: "Documents burned, codes 

destroyed." 73 After that, communications 

were broken off. 

The two companies of the 39th Infantry sent to take him advanced through 

enemy artillery and N ebelwerfer fire 

from Octeville to the St. Sauveur tunnel 

entrance. A prisoner was sent into the 

shelter to demand surrender, but the demand was refused. Tank destroyers were 

then brought up to fire into two of the 

three tunnel entrances while preparations 

were made to blow up the stronghold. A 

few rounds were sufficient to bring the 

enemy out. Some 800 Germans in all, including both General Schlieben and Admiral Hennecke, Naval Commander Normandy) capitulated to General Eddy. 

General Schlieben, however, still concerned with gaining time, declined to 

make a general surrender of the Cherbourg fortress. 74 The 39th Infantry there· 

fore pushed its attack northward to the 

coast. In the city it received another surrender of about 400 troops that had for73Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44. 26 Jun 44. 

Seekriegsleitung/l.Abt., KTB reports the same meso 

sage under date of 25 June (evidently an error). 

See Schlieben's account. MS # B-845. 

74 MS # B-845 (Schlieben). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tified themselves in the city hall. They 

gave up when convinced of General 

Schlieben's capture and after being promised protection from French snipers. 

With the surrender of General Schlieben 

on 26 June and of his deputy, General 

Sattler, the following day, all organized 

resistance in Cherbourg ceased. The primary objective of First Army in the 

assault phase of OVERLORD had been 

achieved. 

But this was not the end. Cherbourg 

had fallen, but some fighting continued. 

General Schlieben had surrendered, but 

some 6,000 of his men remained to fight 

on in the Cap de la Hague. The anticlimax was often as bitter as the main 

event and men died making secure what 

they and their comrades had captured. 

There was no doubt of the eventual outcome of that afterfight-what the operations reports call "mopping up" -but it 

still had to be fought. 

End of a Phase 

On both sides of the captured port the 

enemy held prepared defenses. On the 

east the defense ran from Gonneville, 

through the Maupertus airfield, to Cap 

Levy; on the west the main line of resistance cut the Cap de la Hague from 

Gruchy to Vauville with advance positions from Querqueville to Vauville. (See 

Map XXII.) While the bulk of VII 

Corps' three divisions threw their weight 

against Cherbourg, the 22d Infantry and 

the 24th Cavalry Squadron screened the 

east flank and the 60th Infantry with the 

4th Cavalry Group (-) blocked off Cap 

de la Hague on the west. 

On the east the 22d Infantry had been 

continuously engaged, containing the 
AMERICAN INFANTRY CAPTAIN WITH CHERBOURG PRISONERS 
440 

enemy in the Maupertus area and mopping up the supply routes to the rear. On 

25 June when Cherbourg was tightly 

ringed and units had penetrated its suburbs, the 22d Infantry was ordered to attack to clear the Maupertus airfield. The 

attack jumped off at 1100, 26 June, with 

all three battalions abreast and a troop of 

cavalry on each flank. The Americans 

fought all day against determined enemy 

resistance and did not occupy the airport 

until the 27th. Thereafter the regiment 

pivoted north and speedily overran the 

last fortified positions to the coast. Batterie Hamburg) a naval coastal battery 

with four 240-mm. guns, was silenced by 

fire from the 44th Field Artillery Battalion and surrendered 990 troops. With 

that, organized resistance northeast of 

Cherbourg collapsed. Cavalry reconnoitering east to Barfleur found the area 

unoccupied. 

The clearing of Cap de la Hague was 

expected to be more difficult, for it was estimated that about 3,000 enemy troops 

still held out there. The corps reorganized. The 79th Division moved south on 

28 June to reorganize under VIII Corps 

for the coming drive southward out of the 

Cotentin. The 4th Division took over the 

security of Cherbourg, and the 9th Division was relieved to undertake the sweep 

of Cap de la Hague. 75 General Eddy prepared for the attack during 27 and 28 

June; the 47th Infantry assembled in the 

Henneville area and the 39th west of Octeville, joining the 60th which was in position near Ste. Croix-Hague. Patrols re75 The 4th Division was in turn relieved by the 

lOIst Airborne Division, and on 30 June it, too, had 

started moving south for the new offensive. 4th Div 

AAR. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

connoitered to the northwest. The 

regrouping took place under more or less 

continuous shelling from enemy batteries 

in the cape. Neither air strikes by fighterbombers and mediums against known 

German batteries nor counterbattery artillery fire reduced the enemy fire. 

The 9th Division attacked on the morning of 29 June with the 47th Infantry advancing up the north coast, the 60th 

Infantry in the center attacking astride 

the main cape highway, and the 4th Cavalry Group (-) advancing in a narrow 

zone on the left. Very little resistance was 

met anywhere until troops reached the 

line just southeast of Beaumont-Hague. 

The 47th Infantry swept through fortified 

but unoccupied positions to seize the 

ridge at Nicolle by midafternoon and 

then attacked across a stream to a known 

fortified area which was thought to be an 

outpost of the main German defensive 

line running from Gruchy across the cape 

to Vauville. Under heavy preparatory fire 

from two battalions, two companies assaulted the position and in a two-hour 

fight captured 250 prisoners. The 60th 

Infantry meanwhile reached the main 

road junction southeast of BeaumontHague before suffering check. There the 

enemy had taken a stand behind an antitank ditch defended by antitank guns and 

emplaced machine guns which in a siJ)gularly barren terrain had clear fields of fire. 

The 1 st Battalion was stopped, but the 3d 

Battalion with tank destroyer and tank 

support smashed through the north end 

of the line just south of Fleury. It came 

within about 1,000 yards of BeaumontHague but did not attempt to go farther 

inasmuch as the Germans still held at the 

road junction. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 441 

The road junction was overrun the next 

day (30 June) by the 2d Battalion. Just 

beyond it Capt. Stephen W. Sprindis led 

his Company E in a classic infantry charge 

over open ground with all three platoons 

advancing in a line of skirmishers firing 

as they charged. Despite the lack of artillery support the men kept going against 

enemy machine gun and mortar fire. At 

the same time Company F on the right 

advanced with tanks up the main road. 

Both attacks gathered momentum against 

an enemy whose zeal for fighting was 

easily dampened in these last days, and the 

two companies drove into BeaumontHague. 

While the 60th's attack broke the center 

of the main German defense line, the 47th 

Infantry smashed through Gruchy, coastal anchor of the line, and Greville to the 

southwest. Greville was entered by the 

2d Battalion, after a heavy artillery concentration, while tank fire neutralized 

some pillboxes. Enemy entrenched near 

the town had to be routed out with hand 

grenades, but the strong point actually 

fell with unexpected ease. The 2d Battalion had more trouble at Gruchy where 

the Germans were dug in along a ridge 

line to the west and south and brought 

considerable mortar fire to bear on the 

attackers. However, a two-battalion concentration of artillery in the early afternoon discouraged the defense here, too, 

and the thoroughly beaten enemy came 

out of his holes to relinquish his last 

chance for a co-ordinated defense of any 

part of the Cherbourg peninsula. The 

drive up the cape continued but little remained except to clear out a few isolated 

strong points and round up thousands of 

prisoners. The senior German com· 

mander, Colonel Keil, was captured about 

midnight on 30 June. The mop-up, netting about 6,000 prisoners, or twice the 

number estimated to be in the cape, was 

completed by that afternoon. 

The last harbor forts in the Cherbourg 

area, after enduring heavy tank destroyer 

fire and dive-bombing attacks, at last surrendered on 29 June. Before that, engineers and naval personnel had begun 

detailed reconnaissance of the extent of 

the damage to the port. What they found 

was not encouraging. Col. Alvin G. 

Viney, who prepared the original engineer plan for port rehabilitation, wrote: 

"The demolition of the port of Cherbourg is a masterful job, beyond a doubt 

the most complete, intensive, and bestplanned demolition in history." 76 The 

harbor was strewn with a variety of different types of mines. All basins in the military and commercial port were blocked 

with sunken ships. The Gare Maritime, 

containing the electrical control system 

and heating plant for the port, was demolished and 20,000 cubic yards of masonry 

were blown into the large deep basin {hat 

had been used in peacetime for docking 

Atlantic liners. The entrance of this basin 

was completely blocked by two large ships. 

Quay walls were severely damaged. 

Cranes were demolished in all areas. The 

left breakwater for the inner harbor was 

cratered so that the sea poured through. 

The whole port was as nearly a wreck 

as demolitions could make it. For this 

work of destruction Hitler awarded the 

Knight's Cross to Admiral Hennecke the 

day after his capture by VII Corps troops, 

76 Cited in [Herbert E. French, Morton Yarman, 

and Henry G. Elliott] Cherbourg-Gateway to 

France, MS, Ch. I, p. 13. Hist Div files. 
442 

calling the job "a feat unprecedented in 

the annals of coastal defense." 77 

Planning estimates based on experience at Naples had calculated that Cherbourg could begin operations three days 

after its capture. In reality it was almost 

three weeks before the port was opened at 

all and months before it began to handle 

cargo in quantity. The mine sweeping of 

the western portion of the harbor was not 

completed until 14 J ul y, and not until the 

end of September were all the obstructions cleared from the harbor. The work 

of reconstructing port facilities began before the last forts had surrendered. The 

advance party of the 1 056th Engineer Port 

Construction and Repair Group arrived 

in Cherbourg on 27 June.78 The first task 

was the clearing of a beach area (the 

Nouvelle Plage), a fashionable bathing 

beach in peacetime, now designed by the 

engineers for use by DUKW's. But the 

first cargo was landed by DUK W over this 

beach only on 16 July.79 

The capture of Cherbourg completed 

a distinct phase of operations. The final77 Destruction had begun as early as 7 June and 

was carried on methodically by naval personnel until 

the final surrender. The KTB of Navy Group West 

has a daily account of the progress of demolitions. 

The only comfort for the Americans was the surprisingly small damage to the city itself and the fact 

that the rail network of the port could be repaired 

with relative ease. 

78 Reconstruction was supervised by the 4th Port 

Hq. 

79 Little by little the port capacity was increased 

until in November Cherbourg handled more than 

half of all the cargo landed in France for the American armies, discharging 433.201 tons, or an average 

of about 14,500 tons a day. This compared with a 

pre-D-day planning estimate of 8,500 tons a day. Most 

dramatically it contrasted to a total peacetime cargo 

handling for the entire year of 1937 of only 325,150 

tons_ For details of port reconstruction see French, 

Yannan, and Elliott, Cherbourg-Gateway to France, 

Ch. III. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ity was marked as well on other fronts. 

While VII Corps advanced on the port, 

the Germans made their last plans for decisive offensive action in Normandy. On 

20 June OKW ordered Rundstedt to prepare a co-ordinated counterattack with 

six panzer divisions to annihilate American forces in the vicinity of Balleroy, and 

drive north generally along the Allied 

interarmy boundary toward Bayeux.8o 

(Map XXIV) The six divisions included 

three that had not yet arrived (the 1st SS, 

9th SS, and 10th SS Panzer Divisions), one 

that was assembled immediately behind 

the front (the 2d SS), 81 and two that were 

already in the line (Panzer Lehr and the 

12th SS). The latter two were to be relieved as soon as possible by two infantry 

divisions (the 276th and 277th) being 

brought up from southern France. The 

main attack was to be preceded by an attack to wipe out the British beachhead 

east of the Orne which would remove the 

potentially most dangerous threat of deep 

penetration in the direction of Paris. 

The scheme of 20 June was ambitious 

far beyond German capabilities. Because 

of the time required to move troops into 

position, it was out of the question to 

launch successive major attacks. The 

thrusts at Balleroy and east of the Orne, 

therefore, would have to be made simultaneously, which meant that neither attack could have adequate artillery support. There were guns enough but too 

few shells. Estimated to be available were 

150 pieces of GHQ artillery (including 

80 Der Westen. 

81 Seventh Army, KTB 1.1.-30.VI.44, 18 Jun 44. The 

2d SS Panzer Division was considerably delayed 

in its march from near Toulon by harassing attacks 

by the French maquis. It closed at last in assembly 

areas near Torigni-sur-Vire about 18 June, when it 

passed to Seventh Army reserve. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 443 

twelve heavy battalions) and 487 division 

artillery pieces. But the requirement of 

ammunition for sustained offensive action was calculated at 14,000 tons. 82 In 

view of the fact that ammunition on hand 

was already insufficient for defensive missions, the additional requirement was 

fantastically outside the realm of possibility. 

Even if this problem could have been 

solved, it remained doubtful whether the 

Allies would sit still long enough to enable the Germans to relieve the armor in 

the line. Rundstedt therefore viewed the 

plan without much hope. Nevertheless 

preparations were got under way. All 

available armor was to be brought again 

under the unified command of General 

Geyr, who with his reconstituted staff of 

Panzer Group West would take over the 

entire section between the Seine and 

Drame Rivers with four corps, XLVII 

Panzer Corps, I SS Panzer Corps, II SS 

Panzer Corps, and LXXXVI Infantry 

Corps (east of the Orne). Seventh Army 

with two corps (LXXXIV Infantry and 

II Parachute) would have a purely defensive mission from St. La to the west 

coast.83 

In the next few days the rapid collapse 

of General Schlieben's forces in the Cotentin caused Hitler to flirt with the notion of a relieving attack up the west coast. 

Rundstedt, ordered to study the possibility, replied that he had no forces available 

for such an attack, that he would not have 

82 Army Group B, Munition estimate, 21 Jun 44. 

Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen, Chefsachen 1.1.-30.-

Vl.44. 

83 German information here and following is from 

Der Westen; Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.1.-

JO.vI_44; MS # T-121 (Zimmermann et al.); MS 

# B-466 (Geyr); MS # B-633 (Rundstedt); and 

MS # B-672 (Buttlar-Brandenfels). 

any for several days at least. In any case, 

he thought it unwiSe to shift his weight 

from the Caen front. On the other hand, 

fearing that the American capture of 

Cherbourg would lead to a considerable 

strengthening of the Allied west flank, 

Rundstedt wanted to build a strong defense from Portbail along the south edge 

of the Prairies Marecageuses and along 

the Vire to St. La in order to hold Bradley 

while preparing his own counterattack 

toward Bayeux. Although such a temporary diversion of force to the defense 

would delay the counterattack, Rundstedt 

counted it well worth while to be able to 

operate without interruption from a 

series of emergencies that would continue 

to nibble away his striking power. 

The decision was so made, but it could 

not be carried out, for an emergency was 

already in the making in the British zone. 

On 18 June General Montgomery, in his 

first written directive since the beginning 

of operations on the Continent, signaled 

his intention of stepping up his attack. 

He pointed out: "After the very great intensity of the initial few days, we had 

to slow down the tempo of the operation" 

to get a sound position against possible enemy counterattack and build up strength 

to push on. "All this is good," he continued, "but we are now ready to pass on 

to other things, and reap the harvest." 

The harvest he had in mind included 

Cherbourg (which General Collins was 

well on the way to capturing) and Caen as 

the "first step in the full development of 

our plans." He therefore ordered the attack by Second British Army to begin at 

once to take Caen, which he regarded as 

"really the key to Cherbourg." Its capture, 

he added, "will release forces which are 

now locked up in ensuring that our left 
444 

flank holds secure." 84 But the Caen attack could not be begun at once. On 19 

June, Montgomery changed the scheme 

of maneuver and scheduled the jump-off 

for 22-23 June. Weather then intervened 

to delay the landing of 8 Corps troops. 

On the morning of 25 June, 30 Corps at 

last began a preliminary thrust east of 

Tilly-sur-Seulles. The main attack was to 

be made the following day when 8 Corps 

with one armored and two infantry divisions would pass through the 3d Canadian 

Division and advance on the axis St. Mauvieu-Esquay-Amaye-sur-Orne to establish itself southeast of Caen in the Vimont 

-Bourguebus-Bretteville-sur-Laize area. 85 

The push of 25 June resulted in only 

small gains for 30 Corps but alarmed the 

Germans, because it pressed hard against 

the already worn-down Panzer Lehr and 

12th SS Panzer Divisions. As the I SS 

Panzer Corps) holding this sector, had no 

reserves, Seventh Army attached to it the 

advance battalion of the 1st SS Panzer Division just beginning to close in forward 

areas. 86 

The opening of the British 8 Corps attack the next day forced Seventh Army 

to scramble further for reinforcements. 

Two battalions of the 2d SS Panzer Division) which had been in reserve behind 

the II Parachute Corps) one tank battalion of the 2d Panzer Division) portions 

of the 21 st Panzer Division relieved from 

the bridgehead east of the Orne, the 7th 

Werter Brigade) and one artillery battalion were ordered brought up at once. 

84 In First Army file, Directives 21 A Gp. See 

Pogue, The Supreme Command, a volume in preparation in this series, for discussion in detail of Montgomery's operations and intentions in the Caen area. 

86 Information supplied by the British Cabinet 

Office Hist Sec. 

86 Seventh Army, KTB 11.-30.1'1.44, 25 Jun 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

In addition Rommel ordered the II SS 

Panzer Corps to speed its assembly in areas 

north and northeast of Vireo The 2d SS 

Panzer Division was to be attached and 

the entire corps would attack at once the 

flank of the British penetration generally 

along the axis of the ViUers-Bocage-Caen 

highway. The emergency requiring immediate piecemeal commitment of the 

II SS Panzer Corps was considered so urgent that for two nights (25 and 26 June) 

all supply movements were ruled off the 

roads so that the armor could move forward. But even with this priority the 

corps could not get in position to attack 

until 29 June. 87 

On that day came another emergency. 

General Gerow launched a limited-objective attack with the recently arrived 3d 

Armored Division at Villiers-Fossard. 

The purpose was simply to wipe out an 

enemy salient in the 29th Division lines 

and so secure a more favorable line of departure for the forthcoming resumption 

of the 29th Division's drive toward St. La. 

Seventh Army) however, continually 

worried over the weakness of the I I Parachute Corps) demanded that the Kampfgruppe of the 2d SS Panzer Division attached to II SS Panzer Corps be returned 

to reserve positions behind the St. La 

front. The crisis at St. La passed when the 

3d Armored Division, having achieved .its 

main objectives on 30 June, halted. 

But the German plans for counterattack on the east had already been hopelessly compromised. On 28 June General 

Geyr took command of the sector between 

the Seine and the Drame Rivers but under circumstances which, instead of giving 

him a free hand, forced him to continue 

81 Ibid. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 445 

the piecemeal measures already started. 

General Dollmann died that day of a 

heart attack. Generaloberst der WaffenSS Paul Hausser, commander of II SS 

Panzer Corps) replaced him and temporarily took command of the entire front 

including Panzer Group West. This arrangement was made pending more farreaching reshuffling, which Rommel and 

Rundstedt had been summoned to 

Berchtesgaden to discuss. In their absence no radical decisions could be made. 

In consequence, therefore, Geyr had no 

recourse but to order II SS Panzer Corps 

to attack with the 9th SS and 10th SS 

Panzer Divisions as planned against the 

west flank of the deep British penetration. 88 The attack began the afternoon of 

29 June and had largely spent itself by 

nightfall. Although it made some temporary gains in reducing the British 

bridgehead over the Odon, the two divisions exhausted themselves in generally 

indecisive struggles for local objectives. 

On the 30th the II SS Panzer Corps was 

ordered on the defensive. 89 

General Montgomery, after identification of the concentration of German 

armored units on his front, had already 

made a similar decision. Orders to Second 

British Army were to continue offensive 

tactics and "develop operations for the 

capture of CAEN as opportunity offersand the sooner the better." But the 

army's mission was to "hold the main 

enemy forces in the area between CAEN 

and VILLIERS BOCAGE" and "to have 

no set-backs." General Montgomery also 

88 Geyr angrily told army that "by this order the 

panzer group is already sold out." Tel msg, 28 Jun 

44, Geyr to CofS Seventh Army. Seventh Army, KTB 

Anlagen l.l.-30.Vl.44. 

8D MS # B-466 (Geyr). 

warned of the possibility of "a fullblooded enemy counterattack" between 

Caen and Villiers-Bocage and to meet this 

threat directed that the 7th Armoured 

Division be pulled out of line and held 

in army reserve.DO 

In the meantime Rommel and Rundstedt journeyed to Berchtesgaden. Rundstedt had to make the entire trip by car. 

When he arrived, Hitler kept him waiting six hours. Tired and angry, Rundstedt remarked to Keitel that it should 

cause no surprise "upstairs" if an old and 

sick man like himself should fall dead 

some day like General Dollmann.91 It was 

an inauspicious beginning for a meeting 

which did nothing to reconcile the tactical 

thinking of Hitler and that of his field 

marshals or to restore the shattered confidence on either side. 

The meeting was long and private; only 

Hitler, Rommel, Rundstedt, Keitel, and 

JodI were present.92 When it was over 

Hitler made an announcement for the 

record in which he simply restated the 

stand-fast tactics he had always advocated 

for the west. "The overpowering air superiority of the enemy," he said, "and 

his very effective naval artillery limit the 

possibilities of a large-scale attack on our 

part .... We must not allow mobile warfare to develop, since the enemy surpasses 

us by far in mobility due to his air superiority and his superabundance of motor 

vehicles and fuel. Therefore everything 

depends on our confining him to his 

bridgehead by building up a front to 

block it off, and then on fighting a war of 

DO Dir, 21 A Gp, 30 Jun 44. First Army file, Directives 21 A Gp. 

D1 MS # B-633 (Rundstedt). 

D2 Conf, 29 Jun-l Jul 44, ONI, Fuehrer Conferences, 1944. 
446 

attrition to wear him down and force him 

back, using every method of guerrilla war· 

fare .... " 93 It is clear that Rommel and 

Rundstedt argued in the meeting against 

this conception, perhaps with some heat 

since they were convinced of the desperateness of the situation in France. But 

what they said has not been recorded. 

On the following day an order went out 

from OKW giving effect to Hitler's 

roping-off policy.94 It canceled the attack 

planned on the west flank to drive toward 

Cherbourg; it declared that an attack to 

split the British and U.S. bridgeheads was 

no longer possible because the necessary 

troops could not be disengaged in the face 

of Allied pressure; it recognized that the 

LXXXIV Corps was not in condition to 

attack; and, finally, it admitted that an 

attack east of the Orne was contingent on 

the arrival of the 16th Luftwaffe Field Division and the withdrawal of Allied naval 

forces. Having thus abandoned all 

thought of offensive action, OKW told 

Seventh Army that its principal mission 

was to avoid being pushed back into open 

country. For that purpose it was initially 

to hold the 2d SS Panzer Division in reserve for flank attacks against any Allied 

drive south. The time had not yet come, 

OKW continued, to weaken the Kanalkueste defense, but preparations for the 

transfer of troops from Fifteenth Army to 

the Normandy battle front should be 

made. 

In effect the order said: Hold on-go on 

doing what you have been doing. But the 

high commanders in the west by the end 

of June had become convinced that the 

tactics so far pursued offered no hope for 

93 Ibid. 

94 Der Westen; d. Seekriegsleitungj l.Abt., KTB 

1.-30.VI.44, 30 Jun 44. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

victory and meant only the inexorable 

and profitless wearing-down of the German strength. Probably Rommel and 

Rundstedt made that point to Hitler in 

the 29 June meeting. On their return to 

France they put it clearly on the record. 

In their absence, General Geyr of Panzer 

Group West and General Hausser, the 

new commander of Seventh Army) had 

prepared estimates of the situation, substantially along the same lines, calling 

for an evacuation of the Caen pocket, 

the establishment of a shorter line 

(Orne River-Bully-Avenay-Villers-Bocage-vicinity of Caumont) outside the 

range of naval artillery, and the relief 

and refreshment of the armored divisions 

to re-create a counterattack force. 95 To 

these estimates, so completely at variance 

with Hitler's newest order, Rommel gave 

his complete approval and sent them on 

to OB WEST. There was a notable air of 

haste about the proceedings. The documents left Rommel's headquarters at 

about midnight, 30 June. A few minutes 

later Army Group B approved the beginning of the evacuation of Caen.96 At 0200, 

1 July, Rommel's proposals arrived at OB 

WEST and an hour and a half later Rundstedt had endorsed and forwarded them 

to 0 K W, adding a request for a free hand 

in carrying out the planned evacuation 

of the Caen pocket.97 They arrived at 

OKW at 0700. OKW recommended their 

rejection, commenting that they were 

95 Tel msg, 30 Jun 44, Geyr to CofS Seventh Army, 

30 Jun 44. Seventh Army, KTB Anlagen 1.I.-30.VI.44. 

For text of estimates see Rad, Army Group B to OB 

WEST, 30 Jun 44. Army Gmup B, Ia Operations Befehle 9.VI.-31.VIll.44. 

96 Rad, Army Group B to Seventh Army, 1 Jul 44. 

Army Group B, Ia Operations Befehle 9.vI.-31.VllI.-

44. 

970B WEST, KTB 1.-31.VIl.44, 1 Ju144. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 447 

tantamount to a decision to pull out of 

France and that the question was simply 

whether to retreat to the West Wall or to 

fight it out in place to the last man. Hitler 

wanted to fight it out. His decision 

reached Rundstedt at 1740. OB WEST 

was ordered to hold every position then 

occupied and halt every threatened breakthrough by stubborn defense in place or 

local counterattack.98

The decision certainly came as no surprise. Why, then, was it so elaborately 

called for? Were the generals in the west 

concerned only with setting the record 

straight, believing they could no longer 

hope to make their ideas prevail, and unwilling therefore to accept responsibility 

without power? Did they feel, rather, that 

Hitler, confronted with the unanimous 

opinion of the military leaders in France, 

might at the last moment defer to their 

judgment? Whatever the reason back of 

the demarche of 1 July, it had the effect 

of marking an irreconcilable opposition 

between OB WEST and Hitler. The 

aftermath was swift. On 2 July Hitler’s 

adjutant entered the OB WEST command post and, in the Fuehrer’s name, 

presented to Rundstedt the oak leaf to the 

Knight’s Cross together with a polite 

handwritten note from Hitler relieving 

the field marshal of his command on 

grounds of age and health.99 An order was 

delivered at the same time relieving General Geyr as commander of Panzer Group 

West. When Rommel heard of these 

changes, he is reputed to have said, “I will 

be next.” 100 Rundstedt turned over his 

command to Generalfeldmarschall Guen98 Der Westen. 

99OB WEST, KTB I.-31.VII.44, 2 Jul 44; MS # 

B-633 (Rundstedt). 

100 MS # B-466 (Geyr).

ther von Kluge on 3 July. The following 

morning Geyr was relieved by General 

der Panzertruppen Heinrich Eberbach. 

Operations in France were then entering a new phase. General Bradley had 

already launched his first full-scale attack 

south in an attempt to push out the lodgment. The Second British Army would 

shortly resume its attack for Caen. Hitler’s decision to attempt a permanent 

roping-off of the Allied beachheads was 

to be put to the test. 

The Allied armies were ready for the 

test. Since D Day 929,000 men, 586,000 

tons of supplies, and 177,000 vehicles had 

been landed.101 American and British 

build-ups were roughly equal. General 

Bradley had four corps with eleven infantry and two armored divisions.102 For 

the new attack under Second British 

Army were four corps (three in the line), 

ten infantry divisions, and three armored 

divisions. 

Allied armies, however, occupied a 

lodgment considerably smaller than 

planned. Shortly after mid-June when it 

became apparent that neither the U.S. V 

Corps nor the British Second Army could 

push fast to the south, General Montgomery asked for a shift in build-up priorities 

to get a higher proportion of combat 

troops ashore. This was done in both 

British and American sectors. First Army 

got the 83d Division about a week sooner 

than planned, and combat units of XV 

Corps (borrowed from Third Army) were 

put ashore a few days ahead of the original 

schedule. Correspondingly the build-up

101 SHAEF G-3 War Room Daily Summary as of DD 

plus 27, 5 Jul 44. 

102 Including the 82d Airborne Division which was 

used in the initial attack, but excluding the 101st 

Airborne Division on guard duty in Cherbourg,

awaiting return to England. 

THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-I JULY) 447 

tantamount to a decision to pull out of 

France and that the question was simply 

whether to retreat to the West Wall or to 

fight it out in place to the last man. Hitler 

wanted to fight it out. His decision 

reached Rundstedt at 1740. OB WEST 

was ordered to hold every position then 

occupied and halt every threatened breakthrough by stubborn defense in place or 

local counterattack.98 

The decision certainly came as no surprise. Why, then, was it so elaborately 

called for? Were the generals in the west 

concerned only with setting the record 

straight, believing they could no longer 

hope to make their ideas prevail, and unwilling therefore to accept responsibility 

without power? Did they feel, rather, that 

Hitler, confronted with the unanimous 

opinion of the military leaders in France, 

might at the last moment defer to their 

judgment? Whatever the reason back of 

the demarche of I July, it' had the effect 

of marking an irreconcilable opposition 

between OB WEST and Hitler. The 

aftermath was swift. On 2 July Hitler's 

adjutant entered the OB WEST command post and, in the Fuehrer's name, 

presented to Rundstedt the oak leaf to the 

Knight's Cross together with a polite 

handwritten note from Hitler relieving 

the field marshal of his command on 

grounds of age and health. 99 An order was 

delivered at the same time relieving General Geyr as commander of Panzer Group 

West. When Rommel heard of these 

changes, he is reputed to have said, "I will 

be next." 100 Rundstedt turned over his 

command to Generalfeldmarschall Guen98 Der Westen. 

990B WEST, KTB 1.-31.Vll.44, 2 Jul 44; MS # 

B-633 (Rundstedt). 

100 MS # B-466 (Geyr). 

ther von Kluge on 3 July. The following 

morning Geyr was relieved by General 

der Panzertruppen Heinrich Eberbach. 

Operations in France were then entering a new phase. General Bradley had 

already launched his first full-scale attack 

south in an attempt to push out the lodgment. The Second British Army would 

shortly resume its attack for Caen. Hitler's decision to attempt a permanent 

roping-off of the Allied beachheads was 

to be put to the test. 

The Allied armies were ready for the 

test. Since D Day 929,000 men, 586,000 

tons of supplies, and 177,000 vehicles had 

been landed. lol American and British 

build-ups were roughly equaL General 

Bradley had four corps with eleven infantry and two armored divisions. 102 For 

the new attack under Second British 

Army were four corps (three in the line), 

ten infantry divisions, and three armored 

divisions. 

Allied armies, however, occupied a 

lodgment considerably smaller than 

planned. Shortly after mid-June when it 

became apparent that neither the U.S. V 

Corps nor the British Second Army could 

push fast to the south, General Montgomery asked for a shift in build-up priorities 

to get a higher proportion of combat 

troops ashore. This was done in both 

British and American sectors. First Army 

got the 83d Division about a week sooner 

than planned, and combat units of XV 

Corps (borrowed from Third Army) were 

put ashore a few days ahead of the original 

schedule. Correspondingly the build-up 

101 SHAEF G-3 War Room Daily Summary as of D 

plus 27, 5 Jul 44. 

102 Including the 82d Airborne Division which was 

used in the initial attack, but excluding the lOIst 

Airborne Division on guard duty in Cherbourg, 

awaiting return to England. 
448 

of service and supporting troops was reduced. The result was at the end of June 

an increasing disproportion of combat 

and service elements. The disproportion 

could be borne because the shallowness 

of the bridgehead meant reduced requirements for supply and administrative overhead. It involved, however, a considerable risk. As long as Allied armies 

advanced slowly, administration and supply constituted no special problem. If 

the increasing pressure of Eisenhower's 

forces cracked the German front and war 

of movement suddenly developed, the 

undermanned supply lines would be 

severely taxed. This possibility at the end 

of June was a source of some concern to 

the SHAEF command, but in view of the 

limited lodgment the risk had to be accepted. 103 

The slow advance southward, and especially the failure to push out into open 

country south and southeast of Caen, also 

meant a reduction in the planned program of airfield construction. This was, 

however, much less serious than planners 

had anticipated. By dint of improvisation 

Ninth Air Force engineers were able to 

layout fields in country that planners had 

considered unsuitable for air strips. In 

early July about one-third of the Ninth 

Air Force fighters and fighter-bombers 

were based on the Continent. It was true, 

however, that the available space for airfields in Normandy was virtually taken 

up at that time and that the fields constructed on a temporary basis were requiring an ever increasing proportion of 

engineer labor to maintain them. In 

short, from an air force point of view, the 

lodgment secured at the end of June was 

103 Memo, Cen Bull for SAC, Jun 44. SHAEF C-3 

file (Complete Planning for OVERLORD Buildup). 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

relatively satisfactory for the moment but 

would not long remain SO.104 

The failure to make anticipated territorial gains was the only major respect in 

which the OVERLORD operation had fallen 

short of planning calculations. For the 

rest, the success achieved by Allied combined arms outstripped the plan. While 

the planners had always held their breath 

over the risks of the UTAH Beach assault, 

the airborne landings had in fact achieved 

such complete tactical success that the 

seaborne infantry had had little to do but 

walk ashore. Only at OMAHA had the fortified coast line proved to be the hard crust 

that planners had counted on finding 

everywhere. There the planners' worries 

about the capacity of naval guns and support craft to deal with concrete defenses 

proved justified. On the other hand, the 

effectiveness of naval and air power in 

hindering the forming of German reserves 

for counterattack exceeded expectations. 

Throughout the beachhead battles the 

confused German command, and in some 

cases the inferior quality of green or nonGerman enemy troops, provided a bonus 

for the Allies which did not figure in the 

planning. Perhaps the biggest and most 

important surprise was the proved ability 

of the combined air forces and French 

saboteurs to cripple the enemy's transportation system. It would be difficult to 

overestimate the handicaps imposed on 

the enemy by his lack of mobility. It was 

the primary reason why the big counterattack that figured in all Allied estimates 

never materialized. 

There was reason on I July for the 

Allies to be satisfied with their achieve104 Air force logistics on the Continent will be covered in the seventh volume of Army Air Forces in 

World War II. 
THE CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG (8 JUNE-l JULY) 449 

ment to date, but there was no time to 

indulge that satisfaction. The problems 

of the next step were all-absorbing. The 

next step was to break out of Normandy. 

Scarcely an Allied soldier from Eisenhower down was not eager to see his last 

hedgerow and unleash the tanks in open 

country. But before that could happen 

some of the bloodiest battles of Normandy still had be fought. The beginning had been good; it had carried out the 

plan at least in the essentials that counted. 

But it was only the beginning; still in the 

incalculable future lay the final objective 

of operation OVERLORD-the thrust into 

the heart of Hitler's Germany. 
Appendix A 

DIGEST OF OPERATION 

"OVERLORD" 

Object. 

I. The object of Operation "Overlord" is to mount and carry out an operation, with forces and equipment established in the United Kingdom, and with 

target date the I st May, 1944, to secure a 

lodgement on the Continent from which 

further offensive operations can be developed. The lodgement area must contain sufficient port facilities to maintain 

a force of some twenty-six to thirty divisions, and enable that force to be augmented by follow-up shipments from the 

United States or elsewhere of additional 

divisions and supporting units at the rate 

of three to five divisions per month. 

Selection of a Lodgement Area. 

2. In order to provide sufficient port 

facilities to maintain these large forces, it 

will be necessary to select a lodgement 

area which includes a group of major 

ports. We must plan on the assumption 

that ports, on capture, will be seriously 

damaged and probably blocked. It will 

take some time to restore normal facilities. We shall thus be forced to rely on 

maintenance over beaches for an extended period. 

3. A study of the beaches on the Belgian and Channel coasts shows that the 

beaches with the highest capacity for passing vehicles and stores inland are those 

in the Pas de Calais,· and the Caen tCotentin t area. Of these, the Caen 

beaches are the most favourable, as they 

are, unlike the others, sheltered from the 

prevailing winds. Naval and air considerations point to the area between the Pas 

de Calais and the Coten tin as the most 

suitable for the initial landing, air factors 

of optimum air support and rapid provision of airfields indicating the Pas de 

Calais as the best choice, with Caen as an 

acceptable alternative. 

4. Thus, taking beach capacity and air 

and naval considerations together, it appears that either the Pas de Calais area 

or the Caen-Cotentin area is the most 

suitable for the initial main landing. 

5. As the area for the initial landing, 

the Pas de Calais has many obvious advantages such that good air support and 

quick turn round for our shi pping can be 

achieved. On the other hand, it is a focal 

point of the enemy fighters disposed for 

defence, and maximum enemy air activity can be brought to bear over this area 

with the minimum movement of his air 

forces. Moreover, the Pas de Calais is the 

most strongly defended area on the whole 

French coast. The defences would require 

very heavy and sustained bombardment 

from sea and air: penetration would be 

slow, and the result of the bombardment 

• "Pas de Calais area" has been assumed as the 

area between Gravelines and the River Somme. 

t "Caen area" is taken as that between the River 

Orne and the base of the Cotentin Peninsula. 

t The "Cotentin" Peninsula is the peninsula in 

which Cherbourg is situated. 
APPENDIX A 

of beach exits would severely limit the 

rate of build-up. Further, this area does 

not offer good opportunities for expansion. It would be necessary to develop the 

bridgehead to include either the Belgian 

ports as far as Antwerp or the Channel 

ports Westwards to include Havre and 

Rauen. But both an advance to Antwerp 

across the numerous water obstacles, and 

a long flank march of some 120 miles to 

the Seine ports must be considered unsound operations of war unless the German forces are in a state not far short of 

final collapse. 

6. In the Caen-Cotentin area it would 

be possible to make our initial landing 

either partly on the Cotentin Peninsula 

and partly on the Caen beaches, wholly 

in the Cotentin or wholly on the Caen 

beaches. An attack with part of our 

forces in the Cotentin and part on the 

Caen beaches, is, however, considered to 

be unsound. It would entail dividing our 

limited forces by the low-lying marshy 

ground and intricate river system at the 

neck of the Cotentin Peninsula; thus exposing them to defeat in detail. 

7. An attack against the Cotentin 

Peninsula, on the other hand, has a 

reasonable chance of success, and would 

ensure the early capture of the port of 

Cherbourg. Unfortunately, very few airfields exist in the Cotentin, and that area 

is not suitable for rapid airfield development. Furthermore, the narrow neck of 

the Peninsula would give the Germans 

an easy task in preventing us from breaking out and expanding our initial bridgehead. Moreover, during the period of our 

consolidation in the Cotentin the Germans would have time to reinforce their 

coastal troops in the Caen area, rendering 

451 

a subsequent amphibious assault in that 

area much more difficult. 

8. There remains the attack on the 

Caen beaches. The Caen sector is weakly 

held; the defences are relatively light and 

the beaches are of high capacity and sheltered from the prevailing winds. Inland 

the terrain is suitable for airfield development and for the consolidation of the initial bridgehead; and much of it is unfavourable for counter-attacks by panzer 

divisions. Maximum enemy air opposition can only be brought to bear at the 

expense of the enemy air defence screen 

covering the approaches to Germany; and 

the limited number of enemy airfields 

within range of the Caen area facilitates 

local neutralisation of the German fighter 

force. The sector suffers from the disadvantage that considerable effort will be 

required to provide adequate air support 

to our assault forces and some time must 

elapse before the capture of a major port. 

After a landing in the Caen sector it 

would be necessary to seize either the 

Seine group of ports or the Brittany group 

of ports. To seize the Seine ports would 

entail forcing a crossing of the Seine, 

which is likely to require greater forces 

than we can build up through the Caen 

beaches and the port of Cherbourg. It 

should, however, be possible to seize the 

Brittany ports between Cherbourg and 

Nante1' and on them build up sufficient 

forces for our final advance Eastwards. 

Provided that the necessary air situation can first be achieved, the chances of 

a successful attack and of rapid subsequent development are so much greater 

in this sector than in any other that it is 

considered that the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. 
452 

The Lodgement Area Selected. 

9. In the light of these factors, it is considered that our initial landing on the 

Continent should be effected in the Caen 

area, with a view to the eventual seizure 

of a lodgement area comprising the Cherbourg-Brittany group of ports (from 

Cherbourg to Nantes). 

Opening Phase up to the Capture 

of Cherbourg. 

10. The opening phase in the seizing 

of this lodgement area would be the effecting of a landing in the Caen sector 

with a view to the early capture and development of airfield sites in the Caen 

area, and of the port of Cherbourg. 

11. The main limiting factors affecting 

such an operation are the possibility of 

attaining the necessary air situation; the 

number of offensive divisions which the 

enemy can make available for counter 

attack in the Caen area; the availability 

of landing ships and craft and of transport 

aircraft; and the capacity of the beaches 

and ports in the sector. 

12. Althpugh the strength of the 

G.A.F. available in 1944 on the Western 

front cannot be forecast at this stage, we 

can confidently expect that we shall have 

a vast numerical superiority in bomber 

forces. The first-line strength of the German fighter force is, however, showing a 

steady increase and although it is unlikely 

to equal the size of the force at our disposal, there is no doubt that our fighters 

will have a very large commitment entailing dispersal and operations at maximum intensity. Our fighters will also be 

operating under serious tactical disadvantages in the early stages, which will 

CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

largely offset their numerical superiority. 

Before the assault takes place, therefore, 

it will be necessary to reduce the effectiveness of the G.A.F., particularly that part 

which can be brought to bear against the 

Caen area. 

13. The necessary air situation to ensure a reasonable chance of success will 

therefore require that the maximum 

number of German fighter forces are contained in the Low Countries and NorthWest Germany, that the effectiveness of 

the fighter defence in the Caen area is 

reduced and that air reinforcements are 

prevented from arriving in the early 

stages from the Mediterranean. Above 

all, it will be necessary to reduce the overall strength of the German fighter force 

between now and the date of the operation by destruction of the sources of su pply, by the infliction of casualties by 

bringing on air battles, and, immediately 

prior to the assault, by the disorganization of G.A.F. installations and control 

system in the Caen area. 

14. As it is impossible to forecast with 

any accuracy the number and location of 

German formations in reserve in 1944, 

while, on the other hand, the forces available to us have been laid down, an attempt has been made in this paper to determine the wisest employment of our 

own forces and then to determine- the 

maximum number of German formations 

which they can reasonably overcome. 

Apart from the air situation, which is an 

over-riding factor, the practicability of 

this plan will depend principally on the 

number, effectiveness, and availability 

of German divisions present in France 

and the Low Countries in relation to our 

own capabilities. This consideration IS 

discussed below (paragraph 35). 
APPENDIX A 

15. A maximum of thirty and a minimum of twenty-six equivalent divisions 

are likely to be available in the United 

Kingdom for cross-Channel operations on 

the 1 st May 1944. Further build-up can 

be at the rate of three to five divisions per 

month. 

16. Landing ships and craft have been 

provided to lift the equivalent of three 

assault divisions and two follow-up divisions, without "overheads," and it has 

been assumed that the equivalent of an 

additional two divisions can be afloat in 

ships. 

17. Airborne forces amounting to two 

airborne divisions and some five or six 

parachute regiments will be available, 

but, largely owing to shortage of transport aircraft, it is only possible to lift the 

equivalent of two-thirds of one airborne 

division simultaneously, on the basis of 

present forecasts. 

18. Even if additional landing ships 

and craft could be made available, the 

beaches in the Caen area would preclude 

the landing of forces greater than the 

equivalent of the three assault and two 

follow-up divisions, for which craft have 

ahead y been provided. Nevertheless, an 

all-round increase of at least 10 per cent. 

in landing ships and craft is highly desirable in order to provide a greater margin for contingencies within the framework of the existing plan. Futhermore, 

sufficient lift for a further assault division 

could most usefully be employed in an 

additional landing on other beaches. 

19. There is no port of any capacity 

within the sector although there are a 

number of small ports of limited value. 

Maintenance will, therefore, of necessity 

be largely over the beaches until it is 

possible to capture and open up the port 

453 

of Cherbourg. In view of the possibilities 

of interruption by bad weather it will be 

essential to provide early some form of 

improvised sheltered waters. 

20. Assuming optimum weather conditions, it should be possible to build up 

the force over the beaches to a total by 

D plus 6 of the equivalent of some eleven 

divisions and five tank brigades and thereafter to land one division a day until 

about D plus 24. 

Proposed Plan. 

Preliminary Phase. 

21. During the preliminary phase, 

which must start forthwith, all possible 

means including air and sea action, propaganda, political and economic pressure, 

and sabotage, must be integrated into a 

combined offensive aimed at softening 

the German resistance. In particular, air 

action should be directed towards the 

reduction of the German air forces on the 

Western front, the progressive destruction of the German economic system and 

the undermining of German morale. 

22. In order to contain the maximum 

German forces away from the Caen area 

diversionary operations should be staged 

against other areas such as the Pas de 

Calais ~nd the Mediterranean Coast of 

France. 

Preparatory Phase. 

23. During this phase air action will 

be intensified against the G.A.F., particularly in North-West France, with a 

view to reducing the effectiveness of the 

G.A.F. in that area, and will be extended 

to include attacks against communications more directly associated with move-
454 

ment of German reserves which might 

affect the Caen area. Three naval assault 

forces will be assembled with the naval 

escorts and loaded at ports along the 

South Coast of England. Two naval assault forces carrying the follow-up forces 

will also be assembled and loaded, one in 

the Thames Estuary and one on the West 

Coast. 

The Assault. 

24. After a very short air bombardment of the beach defences three assault 

divisions will be landed simultaneously 

on the Caen beaches, followed up on 

D Day by the equivalent of two tank 

brigades (United States regiments) and a 

brigade group (United States regimental 

combat team). At the same time, airborne 

forces will be used to seize the town of 

Caen; and subsidiary operations by commandos and possibly by airborne forces 

will be undertaken to neutralize certain 

coast defences and seize certain important river crossings. The object of the 

assault forces will be to seize the general 

line Grandcamp-Bayeux-Caen. 

Follow-up and Build-up Phase. 

25. Subsequent action will take the 

form of a strong thrust Southwards and 

South-Westwards with a view to destroying enemy forces, acquiring sites for airfields, and gaining depth for a turning 

movement into the Cotentin Peninsula 

directed on Cherbourg. When sufficient 

depth has been gained a force will advance into the Cotentin and seize Cherbourg. At the same time a thrust will be 

made to deepen the bridgehead SouthEastwards in order to cover the construcCROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

tion and operation of additional airfields 

in the area South-East of Caen. 

26. It is considered that, within fourteen days of the initial assault, Cherbourg 

should be captured and the bridgehead 

extended to include the general line 

Trouville-Alencon-Mont St. Michel. By 

this date, moreover, it should have been 

possible to land some eighteen divisions 

and to have in operation about fourteen 

airfields from which twenty-eight to 

thirty-three fighter-type squadrons should 

be operating. 

Further Developments after Capture 

of Cherbourg. 

27. After the capture of Cherbourg the 

Supreme Allied Commander will have to 

decide whether to initiate operations to 

seize the Seine ports or whether he must 

content himself with first occupying the 

Brittany ports. In this decision he will 

have to be guided largely by the situation 

of the enemy forces. If the German resistance is sufficiently weak, an immediate 

advance could be made to seize Havre and 

Rouen. On the other hand, the more 

probable situation is that the Germans 

will have retired with the bulk of their 

forces to hold Paris and the line of the 

Seine, where they can best be covered by 

their air forces from North-East France 

and where they may possibly be reinforced by formations from Russia. Elsewhere they may move a few divisions from 

Southern France to hold the crossings of 

the Loire and will leave the existing defensive divisions in Brittany. 

It will therefore most probably be 

necessary for us to seize the Brittany ports 
APPENDIX A 

first, in order to build up sufficient forces 

with which we can eventually force the 

passage of the Seine. 

28. Under these circumstances, the 

most suitable plan would appear to be to 

secure first the left flank and to gain sufficient airfields for subsequent operations. 

This would be done by extending the 

bridgehead to the line of the River Eure 

from Dreux to Rouen and thence along 

the line of the Seine to the sea, seizing at 

the same time Chartres, Orleans and 

Tours. 

29. Under cover of these operations a 

force would be employed in capturing 

the Brittany ports; the first step being a 

thrust Southwards to seize Nantes and 

St. Nazaire, followed by subsidiary operations to capture Brest and the various 

small ports of the Brittany Peninsula. 

30. This action would complete the 

occupation of our initial lodgement area 

and would secure sufficient major ports 

for the maintenance of at least thirty divisions. As soon as the organization of the 

L. of C. in this lodgement area allowed, 

and sufficient air forces had been established, operations would then be begun 

to force the line of the Seine, and to 

capture Paris and the Seine ports. As 

opportunity offered, subsidiary action 

would also be taken to clear the Germans 

from the Biscay ports to facilitate the 

entry of additional American troops and 

the feeding of the French population. 

Command and Control. 

31. In carrying out Operation "Overlord" administrative control would be 

greatly simplified if the principie were 

adopted that the United States forces were 

455 

normally on the right of the line and the 

British and Canadian forces on the left. 

Major Conditions Affecting Success 

of the Operation. 

32. It will be seen that the plan for 

the initial landing is based on two main 

principles-concentration of force and 

tactical surprise. Concentration of the 

assault forces is considered essential if 

we are to ensure adequate air support and 

if our limited assault forces are to avoid 

defeat in detail. An attempt has been 

made to obtain tactical surprise by landing in a lightly defended area-presum· 

ably lightly defended as, due to its distance from a major port, the Germans 

consider a landing there unlikely to be 

successful. This action, of course, presupposes that we can offset the absence of 

a port in the initial stages by the provision 

of improvised sheltered waters. It is believed that this can be accomplished. 

33. The operation calls for a much 

higher standard of performance on the 

part of the naval assault forces than any 

previous operation. This will depend 

upon their being formed in sufficient time 

to permit of adequate training. 

34. Above all, it is essential that there 

should be an over-all reduction in the 

German fighter force between now and 

the time of the surface assault. From now 

onwards every practical method of achieving this end must be employed. This condition, above all others, will dictate the 

date by which the amphibious assault can 

be launched. 

35. The next condition is that the 

number of German offensive divisions in 
456 

reserve must not exceed a certain figure 

on the target date if the operation is to 

have a reasonable chance of success. The 

German reserves in France and the Low 

Countries as a whole, excluding divisions 

holding the coast, G.A.F. divisions and 

training divisions, should not exceed on 

the day of the assault twelve full-strength 

first-quality divisions. In addition, the 

Germans should not be able to transfer 

more than fifteen first-quality divisions 

from Russia during the first two months. 

Moreover, on the target date the divisions 

in reserve should be so located that the 

number of first-quality divisions which 

the Germans could deploy in the Caen 

area to support the divisions holding the 

coast should not exceed three divisions 

on D Day, five divisions on D plus 2, or 

nine divisions by D plus 8. 

During the preliminary period, therefore, every effort must be made to dissipate and divert German formations, 

lower their fighting efficiency and disrupt 

communications. 

36. Finally, there is the question of 

maintenance. Maintenance will have to 

be carried out over beaches for a period 

of some three months for a number of 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

formations, varying from a maximum of 

eighteen divisions in the first month to 

twelve divisions in the second month, 

rapidly diminishing to nil in the third 

month. Unless adequate measures are 

taken to provide sheltered waters by artificial means, the operation will be at the 

mercy of the weather. Moreover, special 

facilities and equipment will be required 

to prevent undue damage to craft during 

this extended period. Immediate action 

for the provision of the necessary requirements is essential. 

37. Given these conditions-a reduced 

G.A.F., a limitation in the number or 

effectiveness of German offensive formations in France, and adequate arrangements to provide improvised sheltered 

waters-it is considered that Operation 

"Overlord" has a reasonable prospect of 

success. To ens UTe these conditions being 

attained by the 1st May, 1944, action must 

start now and every possible effort made 

by all means in our power to soften German resistance and to speed up our own 

preparations. 

Offices of the War Cabinet) S. W.1) 

30th July) 1943 
Appendix B 

DIRECTIVE TO SUPREME COMMANDER, 

ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE 

1. You are hereby designated as Supreme Allied Commander of the forces 

placed under your orders for operations for liberation of Europe from Germans. 

Your title will be Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force. 

2. Task. You will enter the continent of Europe and, in conjunction with the 

other United Nations, undertake operations aimed at the heart of Germany and 

the destruction of her armed forces. The date for entering the Continent is the 

month of May, 1944. After adequate channel ports have been secured, exploitation will be directed towards securing an area that will facilitate both ground 

and air operations against the enemy. 

3. Notwithstanding the target date above you will be prepared at any time 

to take immediate advantage of favorable circumstances, such as withdrawal 

by the enemy on your front, to effect a reentry into the Continent with such 

forces as you have available at the time; a general plan for this operation when 

approved will be furnished for your assistance. 

4. Command. You are responsible to the Combined Chiefs of Staff and will 

exercise command generally in accordance with the diagram at Appendix. Direct 

communication with the United States and British Chiefs of Staff is authorized 

in the interest of facilitating your operations and for arranging necessary logistic 

support. 

5. Logistics. In the United Kingdom the responsibility for logistics organization, concentration, movement and supply of forces to meet the requirements of 

your plan will rest with British Service Ministries so far as British ForCeS are concerned. So far as United States Forces are concerned, this responsibility will rest 

with the United States War and Navy Departments. You will be responsible for 

the coordination of logistical arrangements on the continent. You will also be 

responsible for coordinating the requirements of British and United States forces 

under your command. 

6. Coordination of operations of other Forces and Agencies. In preparation for 

your assault on enemy occupied Europe, Sea and Air Forces agencies of sabotage, 

subversion and propaganda, acting under a variety of authorities are now in action. 

You may recommend any variation in these activities which may seem to you 

desirable. 

7. Relationship to United Nations Forces in other areas. Responsibility will 

rest with the Combined Chiefs of Staff for supplying information relating to operations of the Forces of the u. s. s. R. for your guidance in timing your operations. 

It is understood that the Soviet Forces will launch an offensive at about the 
458 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

same time as OVE.RLORD with the object of preventing the German forces from 

transferring from the Eastern to the Western front. The AJlied Commander 

in Chief, Mediterranean Theater, will conduct operations designed to assist your 

operation, including the launching of an attack against the south of France at about 

tbe same time as OVERWRD. The scope and timing of his operations will be de· 

cided by the Combined Chiefs of Staff. You will establish contact with him and 

submit to the Combined Chiefs of Staff YOUT views and recommendations regarding operations from the Mediterranean in support of your allack from the United 

Kingdom. The Combined Chiefs of Staff will place under your command the 

forces operating in Southern France as soon as you are in a position to assume 

such command. You will submit timely recommendations compatible with this 

regard. 

S. Relationship with Allied Govetnments-the re-establishment Of Civil Gov-

""ments and Liberated Allied Territories and. the administration of enemy 

territories. Further instructions will be issued to you on these subjects at a later 

date. 
Appendix C 

Top Secret 

The Fuehrer 

and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces 

OKW fWFSt/Op.Nr.: 001031/42 g.Kdos. 

D ire c t i v e No. 40 

Subj: Command Organization on the Coasts 

I.) General Situation: 

Fuehrer Headquarters 

23 March 1942 

25 Copies 

Copy No .... 

In the days to come the coasts of Europe will be seriously exposed to the 

danger of enemy landings. 

The enemy's choice of time and place for landing operations will not be based 

solely on strategic considerations. Reverses in other theaters of operations, obligations toward his allies, and political motives may prompt the enemy to arrive at 

decisions that would be unlikely to result from purely military deliberations. 

Even enemy landing operations with limited objectives will-insofar as the 

enemy does establish himself on the coast at all-seriously affect our own plans 

in any case. They will disrupt our coastwise shipping and tie down strong Army 

and Luftwaffe forces which thereby would become unavailable for commitment 

at critical points. Particularly grave dangers will arise if the enemy succeeds in 

taking our airfields, or in establishing air bases in the territory that he has captured. 

Moreover, our military installations and war industries that are in many 

instances located along or close to the coast, and which in part have valuable 

equipment, invite local raids by the enemy. 

Special attention must be paiq to British preparations for landings on the open 

coast, for which numerous armored landing craft suitable for the transportation 

of combat vehicles and heavy weapons are available. Large-scale parachute and 

glider operations are likewise to be expected. 

II.) General Tactical Instructions for Coastal Defense: 

1.) Coastal defense is a task for the Armed Forces, and requires particularly 

close and complete co-operation of all the services. 

2.) Timely recognition of the preparations, assembly, and approach of the 

enemy for a landing operation must be the goal of the intelligence service as well 

as that of continual reconnaissance by Navy and Luftwaffe. 

Embarkation operations or transport fleets at sea must subsequently be the 

target for the concentration of all suitable air and naval forces, with the object 

of destroying the enemy as far off our coast as possible. 
460 CROSS-CHANNEL A TT ACK 

However, because the enemy may employ skillful deception and take advantage of poor visibility, thereby catching us completely by surprise, all troops that 

might be exposed to such surprise operations must always be fully prepared for 

defensive action. 

Counteracting the well-known tendency of the troops to relax their alertness 

as time goes on will be one of the most important command functions. 

3.) Recent battle experiences have taught us that in fighting for the beacheswhich include coastal waters within the range of medium coastal artilleryresponsibility for the preparation and execution of defensive operations must 

unequivocally and unreservedly be concentrated in the hands of one man. 

All available forces and equipment of the several services, the organizations 

and formations outside of the armed forces, as well as the German civil agencies 

in the zone of operations will be committed by the responsible commander for the 

destruction of enemy transport facilities and invasion forces. That commitment 

must lead to the collapse of the enemy attack before, if possible, but at the latest 

upon the actual landing. 

An immediate counterattack must annihilate landed enemy forces, or throw 

them back into the sea. All instruments of warfare-regardless of the service, or 

the formation outside of the armed forces to which they might belong-are to be 

jointly committed toward that end. Nevertheless, shore-based Navy supply establishments must not be hampered in their essential functions, nor Luftwaffe ground 

organizations and Flak protection of airfields impaired in their efficiency, unless 

they have become directly affected by ground combat operations. 

No headquarters and no unit may initiate a retrograde movement in such a 

situation. Wherever Germans are committed on or near the coast, they must be 

armed and trained for active combat. 

The enemy must be kept from establishing himself on any island which in 

enemy hands would constitute a threat to the mainland or coastwise shipping. 

4.) Disposition of forces and improvement of fortifications are to be so made 

that the main defensive effort lies in those coastal sectors that are the most probable 

sites for enemy landings (fortified areas) . 

Those remaining coastal sectors that are vulnerable to coups de main of even 

small units must be protected by means of a strongpoint type of defense, utilizing, 

if possible, the support of shore batteries. All installations of military and militaryeconomic importance will be included in that strongpoint defense system. 

The same rules apply to offshore islands. Coastal sectors that are less endangered 

will be patrolled. 

5.) The several services will establish a uniform definition of coastal sectors, 

if necessary on the basis of a final decision on the part of the responsible commander 

named in III.) 1.) below. 

6.) By means of proportionate allocation of forces, improvement of positions (perimeter defense), and stockpiling of supplies, the fortified areas and 
APPENDIX C 

strongpoints must be enabled to hold out even against superior enemy forces for 

extended periods of time. 

Fortified areas and strongpoints are to be held to the last. They must never 

be forced to surrender because of a shortage of ammunition, rations, or water. 

7.) The commander responsible according to III.) 1.) below, issues orders 

for coastal security, and assures a speedy evaluation, collation, and dissemination 

to authorized headquarters and civil agencies of intelligence procured by all the 

services. 

Upon the first indication of an imminent enemy operation, that commander is 

authorized to issue the necessary orders for unified and complementary reconnaissance by sea and air. 

8.) All elements stationed in the vicinity of the coast, whether headquarters 

or units of the Armed Forces, or organizations or formations outside of the Armed 

Forces, will forego the niceties of peacetime protocol. Their quarters, security 

measures, equipment, state of alert, and utilization of local resources will be governed solely by the necessity of countering every enemy raid with the utmost speed 

and force. Wherever the military situation demands, the civilian population will be 

evacuated at once. 

III.) Command: 

1.) The following authorities are responsible for the preparation and conduct 

of defense on coasts under German control: 

a) in the Eastern Theater of Operations (excluding Finland), the army 

commanders designated by OKH; 

b) in the coastal sector under the control of Army Lapland, the Commanding General of Army Lapland; 

c) in Norway, tlie Armed Forces Commander, Norway; 

d) in Denmark, the Commander of German Troops in Denmark; 

e) in the occupied West (including the Netherlands), the Commander in 

Chief West; 

In matters pertaining to coastal defense, the commanders mentioned in 

categories d) and e) above are under the direct control of OKW. 

f) in the Balkans (including the occupied islands), the Armed Forces 

Commander Southeast; 

g) in the Baltic and the Ukraine, the Armed Forces Commanders Baltic 

and Ukraine; 

h) in the Zone of Interior, the commanding admirals. 

2.) Within the framework of coastal defense missions, the commanders designated in III.) 1.) above, will have command authority over tactical headquarters 

of the services, the German civil authorities as well as units and organizations outside of the armed forces that are located within their respective areas. In exercising 

that authority, the commanders will issue tactical, organizational, and supply 

orders necessary for coastal defense, and insure their execution. They will influence 

461 
462 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

training to whatever extent is necessary for preparing their forces for ground operations. The required data will be put at their disposal. 

3.) Orders and ,measures implementing this directive will give priority to the 

following: 

a) inclusion within fortified areas or strongpoints of all installations important militarily or to the war economy, particularly those of the Navy (submarine 

bases) and the Luftwaffe; 

b) unified direction of coastal surveillance; 

c) infantry defenses of fortified areas and strongpoints; 

d) infantry defenses of isolated installations outside of fortified areas and 

strongpoints, such as coastal patrol and aircraft warning stations; 

e) artillery defenses against ground targets (in installing new shore batteries 

and displacing those in position, the requirements of naval warfare will receive 

priority) ; 

f) defense preparedness of fortified establishments, their structural improvement, and the stockpiling of reserve supplies, as well as defensive preparedness and 

stockpiling of supplies in isolated installations outside of those establishments 

(including supply with all weapons necessary for defense, mines, hand grenades, 

flame throwers, obstacle material, and similar items) ; 

g) signal communications; 

h) tests of the state of alert as well as infantry and artillery training within 

the framework of the defensive missions. 

4.) Similar authority will be vested in the commanders of local headquarters 

down to sector commands, insofar as they have been made responsible for the defense of coastal sectors. 

The commanders enumerated in III.) 1.) above, will generally confer such 

responsibilities on commanding generals of army divisions that are committed for 

coastal defense, and in Crete, on the Fortress Commander Crete. 

In individual sectors and subsectors, and particularly in establishments that 

have definitely been designated as air or naval bases, the local Luftwaffe or Navy 

commanders are to be put in charge of the entire defense, insofar as their other 

missions permit them to assume those responsibilities. 

5.) Naval and strategic air forces are subject to the control of the Navy or 

Luftwaffe, respectively. However, in case of enemy attacks on the coast they arewithin the framework of their tactical capabilities-bound to comply with requests 

from the commanders responsible for defensive operations. For that reason they 

must be included in the exchange of military intelligence, in preparation for their 

future employment. Close contact must be maintained with their respective higher 

headquarters. 

IV.) Special missions of the several services within the framework of coastal defense: 

1.) Navy:. 

a) organization and protection of coastwise shipping; 
APPENDIX C 

b) training and commitment of the entire coastal artillery against sea 

targets; 

c) commitment of naval forces. 

2.) Luftwaffe: 

a) air defense in the coastal areas. 

This mission does not affect the right of local defense commanders to direct 

the assembly of Flak artillery suited and available for commitment against enemy 

invasion forces. 

b) improvement of the Luftwaffe ground organization and its protection 

against air and surprise ground attacks on airfields that have not been sufficiently 

protected by their inclusion in the coastal defense system. 

c) commitment of strategic air forces. 

Instances of overlapping control resulting from those special missions 

must be accepted as unavoidable. 

V.) As of I April 1942. all instructions and orders not in agreement with the present 

directive are rescinded. 

New combat directives issued by the responsible commander pursuant to my 

directive will be submitted to me through OKW. 

signed: Adolf Hitler 

463 
Appendix D 

Top Secret 

The Fuehrer 

OKW /WFSt/Op.No. 662656/43 g.K. Chefs 

Directive No. 51 

Fuehrer Headquarters 

3 November 1943 

27 Copies 

Copy No .... 

For the last two and one-half years the bitter and costly struggle against Bolshevism has made the utmost demands upon the bulk of our military resources and 

energies. This commitment was in keeping with the seriousness of the danger, and 

the over-all situation. The situation has since changed. The threat from the East 

remains, but an even greater danger looms in the West: the Anglo-American landing! In the East, the vastness of the space will, as a last resort, permit a loss of territory 

even on a major scale, without suffering a mortal blow to Germany's chance for 

survival. 

Not so in the West! If the enemy here succeeds in penetrating our defenses on 

a wide front, consequences of staggering proportions will follow within a short time. 

All signs point to an offensive against the Western Front of Europe no later than 

spring, and perhaps earlier. 

For that reason, I can no longer justify the further weakening of the West in 

favor of other theaters of war. I have therefore decided to strengthen the defenses 

in the West, particularly at places from which we shall launch our long-range war 

against England. For those are the very points at which the enemy must and will 

attack; there-unless all indications are misleading-will be fought the decisive 

invasion battle. 

Holding attacks and diversions on other fronts are to be expected. Not even 

the possibility of a large-scale offensive against Denmark may be excluded. It 

would pose greater nautical problems and could be less effectively supported from 

the air, but would nevertheless produce the greatest political and strategic impact 

if it were to succeed. 

During the opening phase of the battle, the entire striking power of the enemy 

will of necessity be directed against our forces manning the coast. Only an all-out 

effort in the construction of fortifications, an unsurpassed effort that will enlist all 

available manpower and physical resources of Germany and the occupied areas, 

will be able to strengthen our defenses along the coasts within the short time that 

still appears to be left to us. 

Stationary weapons (heavy AT guns, immobile tanks to be dug-in, coast 

artillery, shore-defense guns, mines, etc.) arriving in Denmark and the occupied 
APPENDIX D 

West within the near future will be heavily concentrated in points of main defensive effort at the most vulnerable coastal sectors. At the same time, we must take 

the calculated risk that for the present we may be unable to improve our defenses 

in less threatened sectors. 

Should the enemy nevertheless force a landing by concentrating his armed 

might, he must be hit by the full fury of our counterattack. For this mission ample 

and speedy reinforcements of men and materiel, as well as intensive training must 

transform available larger units into first-rate, fully mobile general reserves suitable for offensive operations. The counterattack of these units will prevent the 

enlargement of the beachhead, and throw the enemy back into the sea. 

In addition, well-planned emergency measures, prepared down to the last 

detail, must enable us instantly to throw against the invader every fit man and 

machine from coastal sectors not under attack and from the home front. 

The anticipated strong attacks by air and sea must be relentlessly countered 

by Air Force and Navy with all their available resources. I therefore order the 

following: 

A) Army: 

1.) The Chief of the Army General Staff and the Inspector General of Panzer 

Troops will submit to me as soon as possible a schedule covering arms, tanks, 

assault guns, motor vehicles, and ammunition to be allocated to the Western Front 

and Denmark within the next three months. That schedule will conform to the new 

situation. The following considerations will be basic: 

a) Sufficient mobility for all panzer and panzer grenadier divisions in the 

West, and equipment of each of those units by December 1943 with 93 Mark IV 

tanks or assault guns, as well as large numbers of antitank weapons. 

Accelerated reorganization of the 20 Luftwaffe Field Divisions into an 

effective mobile reserve force by the end of 1943. This reorganization is to include 

the issue of assault guns. 

Accelerated issue of all authorized weapons to the SS Panzer Grenadier 

Division Hitler Jugend," the 21st Panzer Division, and the infantry and reserve 

divisions stationed in Jutland. 

b) Additional shipments of Mark IV tanks, assault guns, and heavy AT 

guns to the reserve panzer divisions stationed in the West and in Denmark, as 

well as to the Assault Gun Training Battalion in Denmark. 

c) In November and December, monthly allotments of 100 heavy AT guns 

models 40 and 43 (half of these to be mobile) in addition to those required for 

newly activated units in the West and in Denmark. 

d) Allotment of large numbers of weapons (including about 1,000 machine 

guns) for augmenting the armament of those static divisions that are committed 

for roastal defense in the West and in Denmark, and for standardizing the equipment of elements that are to be withdrawn from sectors not under attack. 

• In this month (November 1943) this division was converted to a Panzer division (12th SS). 

465 
466 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

e) Ample supply of close-combat AT weapons to units in vulnerable sectors. 

f) Improvement of artillery and AT defenses in units stationed in Denmark, 

as well as those committed for coastal protection in the occupied West. Strengthening of GHQ artillery. 

2.) The units and elements stationed in the West or in Denmark, as well as 

panzer, assault gun, and AT units to be activated in the West, must not be transferred to other fronts without my permission. The Chief of the Army General Staff, 

or the Inspector General of Panzer Troops will submit to me a report through the 

Armed Forces Operations Staff as soon as the issue of equipment to the panzer and 

assault gun battalions, as well as to the AT battalions and companies, has been 

completed. 

3.) Beyond similar measures taken in the past, the Commander in Chief West 

will establish timetables for, and conduct maneuvers and command post exercises 

on, the procedure for bringing up units from sectors not under attack. These units 

will be made capable of performing offensive missions, however limited. In that 

connection I demand that sectors not threatened by the enemy be ruthlessly 

stripped of all forces except small guard detachments. For sectors from which reserves are withdrawn, security and guard detachments must be set aside from 

security and alarm units. Labor forces drawn largely from the native population 

must likewise be organized in those sectors, in order to keep open whatever roads 

might be destroyed by the enemy air force. 

4.) The Commander of German Troops in Denmark will take measures in 

the area under his control in compliance with paragraph 3 above. 

5.) Pursuant to separate orders, the Chief of Army Equipment and Commander of the Replacement Army will form Kampfgruppen in regimental strength, 

security battalions, and engineer construction battalions from training cadres, 

trainees, schools, and instruction and convalescent units in the Zone of the Interior. 

These troops must be ready for shipment on 48 hours' notice. 

Furthermore, other available personnel are to be organized into battalions 

of replacements and equipped with the available weapons, so that the anticipated 

heavy losses can quickly be replaced. 

B) Luftwaffe: 

The offensive and defensive effectiveness of Luftwaffe units in the West and 

in Denmark will be increased to meet the changed situation. To that end, preparations will be made for the release of units suited for commitment in the anti-invasion 

effort, that is, all flying units and mobile Flak artillery that can be spared from the 

air defenses of the home front, and from schools and training units in the Zone of 

the Interior. All those units are to be earmarked for the West and possibly Denmark. 

The Luftwaffe ground organization in southern Norway, Denmark, northwestern Germany, and the West will be expanded and supplied in a way that will 

-by the most far-reaching decentralization of own forces--deny targets to the 

enemy bombers, and split the enemy's offensive effort in case of large-scale opera-
APPENDIX D 

tions. Particularly important in that connection will be our fighter forces. Possibilities for their commitment must be increased by the establishment of numerous 

advance landing fields. Special emphasis is to be placed on good camouflage. I 

expect also that the Luftwaffe will unstintingly furnish all available forces, by 

stripping them from less threatened areas. 

C) Navy: 

The Navy will prepare the strongest possible forces suitable for attacking the 

enemy landing fleets. Coastal defense installations in the process of construction will 

be completed with the utmost speed. The emplacing of additional coastal batteries 

and the possibility of laying further flanking mine fields should be investigated. 

All school, training, and other shore-based personnel fit for ground combat 

must be prepared for commitment so that, without undue delay, they can at least be 

employed as security forces within the zone of the enemy landing operations. 

While preparing the reinforcement of the defenses in the West, the Navy must 

keep in mind that it might be called upon to repulse simultaneous enemy landings 

in Norway and Denmark. In that connection, I attach particular importance to the 

assembly of numerous V-boats in the northern area. A temporary weakening of 

V-boat forces in the Atlantic must be risked. 

D) SS: 

The Reichsfuehrer-SS will determine what Waffen-SS and police forces he can 

release for combat, security, and guard duty. He is to prepare to organize effective 

combat and security forces from training, replacement, and convalescent units, as 

well as schools and other home-front establishments. 

E) The commanders in chief of the services, the Reichsfuehrer-SS, the Chief of the 

Army General Staff, the Commander in Chief West, the Chief of Army Equipment 

and Commander of the Replacement Army, the Inspector General of Panzer Troops, 

as well as the Commander of German Troops in Denmark will report to me by 15 

November all measures taken or planned. 

I expect that all agencies will make a supreme effort toward utilizing every 

moment of the remaining time in preparing for the decisive battle in the West. 

All authorities will guard against wasting time and energy in useless jurisdictional squabbles, and will direct all their efforts toward strengthening our defensive 

and offensive power. 

signed: Adolf Hitler 

467 
Appendix E 

CHRONOLOGY OF MAIN PLANNING PAPERS FROM 1 JANUARY 1944 

Date 

31 Jan 

1 Feb 

4 Feb 

10 Feb 

12 Feb 

25 Feb 

28 Feb 

28 Feb 

7 Mar 

10 Mar 

20 Mar 

26 Mar 

27 Mar 

8 Apr 

lOApr 

15 Apr 

16 Apr 

21 Apr 

24 Apr 

28 Apr 

I May 

2 May 

6 May 

8 May 

9 May 

12 May 

15 May 

Hq 

FUSA 

J oint Commanders 

Second Army (Br) 

TF 122, FUSA 

V Corps 

FUSA 

V Corps 

ANCXF 

21 A Gp 

SHAEF 

Second Army, 83 

Group (2d T AF) 

V Corps 

VII Corps 

21 A Gp, ANCXF 

ANCXF 

AEAF 

1st Div 

WNTF 

War Office 

21 AGp 

ANCXF 

Ninth AF 

82d Abn Div 

FUSAG, 9th AF, WNTF 

VII Corps 

4th Div 

Assault Force U 

Paper 

Planning Directive for OVERLORD 

NEPTUNE, Initial Joint Plan 

Outline Plan 

Joint Agreement for Amphibious Operations 

Preliminary 'OVERLORD' Plan 

Operations Plan NEPTUNE 

Planning Guide, Operation "OVERLORD" 

Operation "NEPTUNE" -N aval Plan '" 

Directive to FUSAG 

Directive to 21 A Gp, AEAF, ANCXF 

Joint Plan 

NEPTUNE Plan 

Plan of Operation, NEPTUNE 

NEPTUNE Joint Fire Plan 

Operation NEPTuNE-Naval Orders 

(ON) 

Operation NEPTuNE-Overall Air Plan 

Field Order No. 35 

Operation Plan No. 2-44 (ONWEST 

2)t 

Movement Plan 

Amended Directive to FUSAG 

Amendment No. I to ON 

IX Tactical Air Command Plan for 

Operation NEPTUNE 

Field Order No.6 

Joint Operations Plan, U.S. Forces for 

Operation OVERLORD (Revised) 

Field Order No. I 

Field Order No. 1 

Operation Order No. 3-44- (ONWESTjU-3)t 

• Superseded by Operation NEPTuNE-Naval Orders (ON). All copies ordered destroyed. 

t Changes of 4, 10. and 22 May and addenda of 29-31 May. 

t Changes of 30 May and I June. 
APPE(\lDIX E 

18 May V Corps 

18 May lOIst Abn Div 

20 May Assault Force 0 

27 May FUSA 

28 May 82d Abn Div 

28 May VII Corps 

Letter of Instruction, Amending NEPTUNE Plan 

Field Order No.1 

Operation Order No. BB-44 (ONWEST/O) 

Revision No.2 to Annex 12 (Fire Support) 

Revision of Field Order No.6 

Field Order No.1 (Corrected Copy) 

469 
Appendix F 

COMPARATIVE FIRE POWER OF THE U.S. AND GERMAN 1944-TYPE 

INFANTRY DIVISIONS 

Strength (officers and enlisted men) ...........•............ 

Rifles-carbines ........................................ . 

Pistols ............................................... . 

Submachine guns ..................................... . 

Light MG's and automatic rifles ........................ . 

Heavy MG's .......................................... . 

60-mm. mortars ....................................... . 

81-mm. mortars ....................................... . 

120-mm. mortars ..................................... . 

Bazookas ............................................. . 

Flame throwers ....................................... . 

U.S .. 50-cal. MG's; German 20-mm. AA guns ........... . 

37-mm. AT guns ...................................... . 

57-mm. AT guns ...................................... . 

75-mm. AT guns ...................................... . 

75-mm. infantry howitzers ............................. . 

105-mm. howitzers ................ , ................... . 

U.S. 15 5-mm. howitzers; German 150-mm. howitzers .... , 

• Also had 2,131 rifle grenade launchers. 

tEither bazookas or antitank rifles. 

:Eigbteen were found in the cannon companies of the infantry regimentS. 

U.S. 

14,037 

11,507 

1,228 

295 

539 

90 

90 

54 

558" 

237 

13 

57 

54t 

12 

German 1944 

12,769 

9,069 

1,981 

1,503 

566 

90 

48 

28 

108t 

20 

12 

35 

18 

36 

18§ 

§Six were infantry howitzerst two in an infantry howitzer company assigned to each infantry regiment. Bach 

howitzer company had. in addition. six 75-mm. howitzers. 
Appendix G 

DIVISIONS AVAILABLE TO GERMANY ON 6 JUNE 1944 

(BASED ON GERMAN SITUATION MAPS) 

Theater Inf type pz type 

Denmark 2 1+ 

2 Brig 

Norway 11 

Finland 10 

Eastern Front 122 25+ 

1 Brig 

OB SUEDOST (Balkans) 20 2 

OB SUEDWEST (Italy) 17+ 7 

1 Brig 

OB WEST (France and Low Countries) 41+ 11 

I.Rgt 

Zone of Interior 3+ 1+ 

1 Brig 2 Brig 

TOTAL GERMAN DIVISIONS 226+ 47+ 

2 Brig 5 Brig 

lRgt 

AXIS SATELLITES 

Finnish, Eastern Front and Finland 14+ 1 

8 Brig 

Romanian, Eastern Front and Romania 17+ 1 

5 Brig 

Hungarian, Eastern Front and Hungary 9+ 2 

3 Brig 

Bulgarian, Occupation Duty in Balkans and Bulgaria 11 

Italian, In Zone of Interior 4 

TOTAL AXIS SATELLITE DIVISIONS 5::;+ 4 

16 Brig 

Misc 

3 

17+ 

1 Brig 

3 

1 

9 

4+ 

2 Brig 

37+ 

3 Brig 

1 Brig 

2 

5 

7+ 

1 Brig 
Appendix H 

Table of Equivalent Ranks 

U.S. Army German Army and Air Force German WafJen--SS 

None Reichsmarschall None 

General of the Army Generalfeldmarschall Reichsfuehrer-SS 

General Generaloberst o berstgruppenfuehrer 

Lieutenant General General der Infanterie o bergru ppenfuehrer 

Artillerie 

Gebirgstruppen 

Kavallerie 

N achrichtentru ppen 

Panzertru ppen 

Pioniere 

Luftwaffe 

Flieger 

Fallschirmtruppen 

Flakartillerie 

Luftnachr ich ten tru ppen 

Major General Generalleu tnant Gruppenfuehrer 

Brigadier General Generalmajor Brigadefuehrer 

None None Oberfuehrer 

Colonel Oberst Standartenfuehrer 

Lieutenant Colonel Oberstleutnant o bersturm bannfuehrer 

Major Major Sturm bannfuehrer 

Captain Hauptmann Ha u ptsturmfuehrer 

Captain (Cavalry) Rittmeister 

First Lieutenant o berleu tnant o bersturmfuehrer 

Second Lieutenant Leutnant Untersturmfuehrer 
Appendix I 

Recipients of the Distinguished 

Service Cross 

All pertinent Army records have been 

scrutinized in the endeavor to include in 

the following list the name of every soldier that received the DSC Jor his part in 

the operations recounted in this volume. 

Inasmuch as no complete listing of DSC 

awards is maintained in any single Army 

file, it is possible that some names may inadvertently have been omitted. (P) indicates a posthumous award. 

Alexander, S/Sgt. Paul E. (P) 

Amerman, 2d Lt. Walter G. 

Anderson, 2d Lt. William A. 

Anker, 2d Lt. Leonard A. 

Appleby, T /4 Stanley P. 

Annellino, Capt. John R. 

Armstrong, T /Sgt. L. M. 

Arnold, Capt. Edgar L. 

Atchley, Pvt. John E. 

Atwell, T /4 Daniel E. 

Bailey, Maj. Woodrow W. 

Baker, Pvt. Odell 

Barba, Cpl. James N. 

Barber, Pfe. Alexander W. 

Barcellona, 2d Lt. Gaetano R. 

Beavers, 1st Lt. Harold R. 

Beitler, Capt. Kenneth E. 

Belcher, Sgt. Julius W. 

Benn, T /Sgt. William R., Jr. 

Bennet, Lt. Col. Donald V. 

Benton, S/Sgt. John L. 

Berkowitz, Pfe. Henry 

Bingham, Maj. Sidney V. 

Bleau, 2d Lt. Kenneth (P) 

Bolderson, Pfe. John D. 

Bowen, Pfe. George H. 

Briggs, Capt. Victor H. 

Brooks, 1st Lt. Elton E. 

Burgin, Pfe. James F. 

Buschlen, Sgt. Arthur B. (P) 

Canham, Col. Charles D. W. 

Cassidy, Sgt. O'Dell K. 

Cassidy, Lt. Col. Patrick F. 

Cavalierre, Pvt. Peter 

Chase, S/Sgt. Donald L. 

Chesnut, 1st Lt. Webb W. 

Clark, S/Sgt. Philip C. 

Clarke, Pvt. James A. 

Clayman, Lt. Col. Donald C. 

Coffman, S/Sgt. Ralph S. 

Colson, Sgt. Clarence 

Colwell, S/Sgt. Curtis 

Cordes, Pvt. Herman J. (P) 

Cota, Brig. Gen. Norman D. 

Cotter, Capt. John J. 

Courtney, Sgt. William J. 

Curtis, T /Sgt. Earl R. 

Cutler, 1st Lt. Robert R. 

Danforth, Cpl. Vergial E. 

Dawson, 1st Lt. Francis W. 

Dawson, Capt. Joseph T. 

Deery, T /5 John F. 

Dickinson, Pfc. Byron B. 

Dillon, 1st Lt. William T. 

Ditullio, pfc. Dominick 

Dock, T /4 Lowell L. 

Dove, Pvt. Vinton W. 

Dowdy, Lt. Col. John (P) 

Dreher, Pfe. William E., Jr. 

Dulin, Lt. Col. Thaddeus R. (P) 

Earl, Sgt. Thomas R. 

Eberle, 1st Lt. George M. 

Eddy, Maj. Gen. Manton S. 

Elder, Pfe. Leonard P. 

Elder, Capt. Ned S. 

Ellis, T /Sgt. Calvin L. 

Ernest, Capt. Charles A., III 

Evans, 2d Lt. William M. (P) 

Fair, 1st Lt. DeWitt C., Sr. 

Ferguson, 2d Lt. Forest K. 
474 

Fitzsimmons, 1st Sgt. Lawrence 

Fleishman, Pfc. Ward D. (P) 

Fournier, pfc. Edgar L. 

Fryer, Pvt. Gibson 

Gallagher, Pfc. Richard J. 

Ganabrant, Capt. John R. (P) 

Gandara, Pvt. Joe 

Gavin, Brig. Gen. James M. 

Gearing, 1st Lt. Edward N. 

George, Capt. Malcolm L. (P) 

Gettman, T /5 John 

Gibbs, Lt. Col. George W. 

Giles, 1st Lt. Carl K. 

Glider, 2d Lt. Joseph 

Goranson, Capt. Ralph E. 

Gowdy, 1st Lt. George H. 

Graff, 1st Lt. Elmer W. 

Griffin, Pfc. Harry E. 

Griffin, Pfc. John V. 

Habib, Sgt. George A. 

Haley, Capt. James W. 

Hall, Pfc. Henry H. (P) 

Hannum, 1st Lt. Craig B. (P) 

Harbauga, Pvt. Francis L. 

Hargrove, 1st Lt. Robert C. 

Harris, 1st Lt. Ernest O. (P) 

Harrison, Sgt. Bailey 

Harrison, Maj. Willard E. 

Hartman, T /5 Harry 

Heenan, Pfc. John R. 

Heim, Pvt. Marcus 

Henderson, T /Sgt. Gerald M. (P) 

Henshan, 1st Lt. Robert E. 

Hicks, Lt. Col. Herbert C. 

Horan, 2d Lt. Roger J. 

Houston, Sgt. Robert J. 

Isley, Lt. Col. Carl J. 

Jackson, Lt. Col. Charles L. 

Jenkins, S/Sgt. Floyd M. 

Jewett, Maj. Milton A. 

Johnson, Sgt. Denziel O. 

Johnson, Col. Howard R. (P) 

Jones, pfc. Aaron B. 

Jones, 1st Lt. Charles H. (P) 

Jones, 1st Lt. Henry W. 

Katsoulakos, Pvt. William (P) 

Kehaly, 1st Lt. William J. 

Kelly, Cpl. John D. (P) 

Kerchner, 2d Lt. George F. 

Kidwell, Pvt. Kenneth P. 

Kirby, T /5 Varsel (P) 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Kolodziek, Pfc. Frank S. (P) 

Krause, Lt. Col. Edward C. 

Kulp, Capt. John A. 

Lacy, 1st Lt. Joseph R. 

Langen, T /4 Robert F. 

Lanterman, 1st Lt. Raymond E. 

Larson, T /Sgt. Donald W. 

Lee, Capt. Gail B. 

Leino, Pvt. Loyd J. 

Lillyman, Capt. Frank 

Lockwood, Pvt. John A. 

LomelI, 1st Sgt. Leonard G. 

Lovell, Sgt. Warden F. 

Lutz, Pvt. Frederick P. 

Mabry, Capt. George L., Jr. 

MacConchie, 1st Lt. Howard P. 

MacNeely, Lt. Col. Carlton O. 

Mager, 2d Lt. Irvin A. (P) 

Maloney, Lt. Col. Arthur A. 

Maloney, Capt. John S. 

Mansfield, S/Sgt. Paul F. 

Marez, Pvt. Joe M. 

Masny, Capt. Otto 

Mayor, Pvt. Arthur C. 

McElyea, 2d Lt. Atwood M. 

McKissick, T /5 Howard D. 

McLaren, Pvt. Donald B. 

Meredith, S/Sgt. Iral (P) 

Merendino, Capt. Thomas N. 

Millener, Lt. Col. Raymond D. 

Miller, 1st Lt. Jesse R. 

Miller, pfc. Milan M. (P) 

Mitman, T /Sgt. Erwin F. 

Montilio, Cpl. George 

Moody, 1st Lt. William D. (P) 

Moody, Sgt. Willie W. 

Morse, 1st Lt. Verne V. 

Mullins, Lt. Col. Thornton L. (P) 

Murrin, S/Sgt. Richard C. 

Nash, Pfc. Freeman J. 

Nicoli, Sgt. Raymond E. 

Nothe!, Sgt. Henry V. 

O'Brien, Capt. Thomas F. 

Odom, 1st Sgt. Hubert 

O'Donnell, Sgt. Francis C. 

Ogden, 1st Lt. Carlos C. 

O'Neill, Lt. Col. John T. 

Orndorff, Sgt. Douglas 

Ostberg, Lt. Col. Edwin J. 

Panas, 1st Lt. James P. 

Paolini, pfc. Camillus J. 
APPENDIX I 475 

Parke, Pvt. Joseph P. 

Parker, 1st Lt. Charles H. 

Patch, Capt. Lloyd E. 

Patterson, S/Sgt. Lyman K. 

Peliarine, 2d Lt. John J. (P) 

Pence, Capt. James L. 

Perehinec, S/Sgt. Joseph P. (P) 

Perry, Capt. Edwin R. 

Peterson, S/Sgt. Gerard B. 

Peterson, Sgt. Kenneth F. 

Peterson, Pfc. Lenold C. 

Peterson, Pfc. Victor E. (P) 

Philips, Capt. Vodra C. 

Porter, Pvt. Benton L. 

Pressley, 1st Sgt. William M. 

Profit, T/Sgt. Carl D. 

Pryne, Pfc. Gordon 

Purvis, S/Sgt. Darvin D. 

Radford, S/Sgt. David N. 

Rae, Capt. Robert D. 

Ralston, Capt. Emerald M. 

Rebarchek, 1st Lt. John C. 

Reckford, Capt. John G. (P) 

Reed, 2d Lt. Richard N. 

Reeder, Col. Russell P., Jr. 

Richards, Maj. William A. (P) 

Richmond, Capt. Kimball R. 

Riggs, Pfc. William C. 

Ridgway, Maj. Gen. Matthew B. 

Ritter, T/Sgt. Ozias C. 

Roach, T/Sgt. John A. 

Roberts, Cpl. Ernest T. 

Roberts, 2d Lt. Eskoll F. 

Robinson, T/4 Earl A. 

Robinson, 1st Lt. James L. (P) 

Rogers, T/Sgt. Howard W. 

Rogers, Pfc. Lee N. 

Rosemond, Capt. St. Julien P. 

Rosen, Pfc. Sanford 

Ross, 1st Lt. Robert P. 

Ross, 2d Lt. Wesley R. 

Ruby, 2d Lt. Clarence T. 

Rudd, T/5 Jack L. 

Rudder, Lt. Col. James E. 

Samuels, Maj. Joseph T. 

Santarsiero, 2d Lt. Charles J. 

Savino, T/5 Felice J. 

Schneider, S/Sgt. George 

Schneider, Lt. Col. Max F. 

Scoroposki, 1st Sgt. Felix 

Sefchick, S/Sgt. Joseph F. 

Settineri, Capt. John 

Shaffer, T/5 Edward 

Shelby, 1st Lt. John D. 

Shindle, T/4 Elmer G. 

Shoemaker, Pvt. William J. 

Shorter, S/Sgt. Paul R. 

Skaggs, Lt. Col. Robert N. 

Smith, Pvt. Gerald E. (P) 

Smulik, T/4 Bolick 

Soliz, S/Sgt. Marcelo M. 

Songer, 1st Lt. Francis E. 

Sosnack, Pvt. Andrew 

Spaulding, 2d Lt. John M. 

Sprecher, 1st Sgt. Kenneth N. 

Sproul, Capt. Archibald 

Steiner, Lt. Col. Fred A. (P) 

Stephens, Pfc. Otto K. 

Stockwell, S/Sgt. Leeward W. 

Streczyk, Sgt. Phillip 

Strojny, S/Sgt. Raymond F. 

Sullivan, Maj. Richard P. 

Summers, S/Sgt. Harrison C. 

Sweeney, Pfc. Lawrence G. 

Synowsky, 1st Lt. John 

Talley, Col. Benjamin B. 

Taylor, Col. George A. 

Taylor, Maj. Gen. Maxwell D. 

Teague, Lt. Col. Arthur S. T. 

Tegtmeyer, Maj. Charles E. 

Thompson, Col. Paul W. 

Townsend, 2d Lt. John N. 

Tubbs, 1st Sgt. Herbert A. 

Tucker, Pvt. Albert J. 

Turner, Lt. Col. William L. (P) 

Upham, Lt. Col. John S., Jr. 

Urish, Sgt. Joseph W. 

Vandervoort, Lt. Col. Benjamin H. 

Van De Voort, 1st Lt. Leo D. 

Van Fleet, Col. James A. 

Van Valkenburg, Pvt. John J. 

Wade, S/Sgt. John E. (P) 

Washington, Maj. William R. 

Weathers, Capt. Ornery C. (P) 

Welborn, Lt. Col, John C. 

Wells, S/Sgt. James A. 

Werner, 1st Lt. Carlton G. (P) 

Wetherholt, Pfc. Lee, Jr. 

White, T/Sgt. John W. 

Whittington, Capt. George P. 

Wilk, Pfc. Theodore T. 
476 

Williams, 1st Lt. Alfred H., Jr. 

Winters, 1st Lt. Richard D. 

Woelfel, Pfe. Earl L. 

Woodward, Capt. Robert W. 

Woodward, Pfe. Russell H_ 

Wozenski, Capt. Edward F. 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Wray, 1st Lt. Waverley W. 

Wyman, Brig. Gen. Willard G. 

Zahn, Sgt. Donald E. 

Zantow, Capt. Forrest 

Zeigler, 1st Lt. Harvey J. 

Zwingman, Pvt. Otto K. 
Appendix J 

Basic Military Map Symbols* 

Symbols wtthtn a rcctanglc mdtcatc d nulttq unit. within d 

tnanglc an observation post, and wlthl” d ctrclc .I suppI\. pf”“l 

Military Units-Identification 

Anttaircraft Artillery !&I 

Armored Command El 

hrmy AK Forca ..1001 

Artillery, cxccpt Anttaircraft and Coast Arttllery El 

Cavalry, Horsr ............. lzl 

Ct\aIry, Mcchanizcd .El 

Chctnlcal Warfare Service ...... El 

Coast Artdlery .............. EEI 

Engineers ................... El 

Infantry .......... lxl 

Mcdtcal Cqs ........ .EEl 

Ordnance Dcparttncnt .............. lzl 

Quartrrmastrr Corps ................ El 

Stgnal Corps ................. El 

Tank Destroyer ................... lTDl 

Transportation Corps ................. El

Veterinary Crrps ................. 6zl 

Atrlxrnc umts arc dcsignatcd by combining a gull wing symbol

wtth the arm or scrwcc symbol: 

Airborne Artillery 111 

Airbl,rne Infantry El 

*For complete loring of symbols xc FM ZIP10, from which these arc taken 

Appendix J 

Basic Military Map Symbols* 

Symfxlls within a rectangle indIcate a military unit. within .I 

triangle an observation post, and within a CIrcle a suppI-' point. 

Military Units-Identification 

Antiaircraft Artillery 

:\rmorcd Command 

Army Air Forces 

Artillery, except Antiaircraft and Coast Artillery 

Cavalry, Horse 

Cl\'alry, Mechanized 

Chemical Warfare Service 

Coast Artillery 

Engineers 

Infantry 

Medical Corps 

Ordnance Department 

Quartermaster Corps 

Signal Corps 

Tank Destroyer 

Transportation Corps 

Veterinary Corps 

~ 

IClI 

~ 

8 

[2J 

~ 

m 

EE 

m 

[2J 

EE 

[]] 

[]] 

IT] 

ITol 

~ 

rs21 

Airborne units arc designated by combining a gull wing symbol 

with the arm or service symbol: 

Airborne Artillery 

Airborne Infantry 

·For complete listing of symbols see FM 21-30, from which these art' taken. 
478 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Size Symbols 

The following symbols placed either in boundary lines or above 

the rectangle, triangl~, or circle inclosing the identifying arm or service 

symbol indicate the size of military organization: 

Squad _ 

Section _. 

Platoon. • •• 

Company, troop, battery, Air Force flight I 

Battalion, cavalry squadron, or Air Force squadron I I 

Regiment or group; combat team (with abbreviation CT following 

identifying numeral) I I I 

Brigade, Combat Command of Armored Division, or Air Force Wing X 

Division or Command of an Air Force XX 

Corps or Air Force XXX 

Army XXXX 

Group of Armies XXXXX 

EXAMPLES 

The letter or number to the left of the symbol indicates the unit 

designation; that to the right, the designation of the parent unit to which 

it belongs. Letters or numbers above or below boundary lines designate 

the units separated by the lines: 

Company A, 137th Infantry. 

Rth Field Artillery Battalion . 

Combat Command A, 1st Armored Division 

Observation Post, 23d Infantry 

Command Post, 5th Infantry Division 

Boundary between 137th and 138th Infantry 

Weapons 

Machine gun 

Gun. 

Gun battery 

Howitzer or Mortar 

Tank 

Self-propelled gun 

A0137 

~8 

AI~II I~ 

~23 

~5 137 

-111-

138 
A-2 

AAF 

AAR 

ABDA area 

Abn 

AC 

ACofAS 

Admiral Kanalkueste 

AF 

AEAF 

AFHQ 

AGWAR 

AGp 

AKA 

Amph 

ANCXF 

ANFA 

Anlage 

APA 

l' A rmee Secrete 

ASW 

BAR 

Bazooka 

BCRA 

Belgian Gate 

Bn 

bodenstaendig 

Br 

Bull 

CC 

CCA 

CCS 

CG 

CinC 

Glossary 

Intelligence section of air staff 

Army Air Forces 

After action report 

American-British-Dutch-Australian theater 

of war covering area from Bay of Bengal to 

Australasia 

Airborne 

Air Corps 

Assistant Chief of Air Staff 

Admiral commanding Channel coast naval 

district 

Air Force 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force 

Allied Force Headquarters 

Adjutant General, War Department 

Army group 

Cargo Ship, Attack 

Amphibious 

Allied Naval Commander Expeditionary 

Force 

Hotel at Casablanca at which plenary 

meetings were held in January 1943 

Appendix or annex 

Transport Shi p, Attack 

Secret army formed by officers and men of the 

French Regular Army 

Assistant Secretary of War 

Browning Automatic Rifle 

Rocket launcher, hand-carried 

Bureau Central de Renseignements et 

d' Action (Central Intelligence and 

Operations Bureau) 

Barricade-like gates used as underwater 

obstacles 

Battalion 

Static (division) 

British; branch 

Bulletin 

Combined Commanders 

Combat Command A 

Combined Chiefs of Staff 

Commanding General 

Commander in Chief 
480 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

CO 

COA 

CofS 

COHQ 

Comdr 

Commandos 

Concertina wire 

le Conseil National de la Resistance

Corncobs 

COS 

Cosintrep 

COSSAC 

CPS 

DBST 

DD 

D Day 

DSC 

DSO 

DUKW 

E-boat 

Ersatzheer 

ETO 

ETOUSA 

FA 

FFI 

Flak 

FO 

Francs Tireurs et Partisans 

Freiwillige 

Fuesilier battalion 

FUSA 

FUSAG 

G-l 

G-Z 

G-3 

G-4 

Geschwader 

Commanding Officer 

Committee of Operations Analysts 

Chief of Staff 

Combined Operations Headquarters 

Commander 

Specially trained British assault troops 

Cylindrical portable barbed wire 

entanglement 

National Council of Resistance 

Blockships 

British Chiefs of Staff 

Combined situation and intelligence 

report 

Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied 

Commander (Designate) 

Combined Planning Staff 

Double British Summer Time 

Duplex Drive amphibious tank 

The first day of any military operation, 

specifically the day OVERLORD was 

launched 

Distinguished Service Cross 

Distinguished Service Order 

21/2ton, 6x6 amphibious truck 

Small German torpedo boat (German 

S-Boot) 

German Replacement Army 

European Theater of Operations 

European Theater of Operations, United 

States Army 

Field Artillery 

Forces Frarqaises de l'Ieur (French 

Forces of the Interior)

Antiaircraft 

Field Order 

French communist resistance group 

Volunteers 

Separate infantry and reconnaissance battalion in the German 1944type division 

First United States Army 

First United States Army Group 

Personnel section of divisional or higher staff 

Intelligence section 

Operations section 

Supply section 

Luftwaffe wing 
GLOSSARY 

GHQ 

Gkdo. 

GO 

Grossadmiral 

Hedgehog 

H ilfswillige 

Hornets 

Int sum 

Jaeger (division or other unit) 

JB 

JCS 

Jedburgh teams 

JIC 

JPS 

JSM 

JSSC 

JWPC 

KampfJuehrung 

Kampfgruppe 

KMA 

KTB 

Landesschuetzen battalion 

Landfront 

Landwirt submarines 

LCA 

LCG 

LCI 

LCM 

LCT 

LCT (R) 

LCVP 

LSH 

LST 

Luftfiotte Reich 

Luftgaukommando Westfrankreich 

Luftwaffe 

Maquisards 

General headquarters 

Generalkommando (German corps-type 

headquarters) 

General Order 

Grand-Admiral 

Portable obstacle, made of three crossed 

angle irons 

Volunteer Auxiliaries (non-German) 

88-mm. self-propelled antitank guns 

Intelligence summary 

Light infantry (division or other unit) 

Joint Board 

Joint Chiefs of Staff 

Three-man inter-Allied teams, parachuted 

into French territory to act as liaison 

between the maquis groups and SHAEF 

Joint Intelligence Committee 

Joint Planning Staff 

Joint Staff Mission 

Joint Strategic Survey Committee 

Joint War Plans Committee 

Conduct of operations 

A term loosely assigned to improvised 

combat units of various sizes, named 

usually after their commanders 

German coastal mine 

Kriegstagebuch (war diary) 

Home Guard battalion sometimes employed 

outside Germany 

481 

Landward fortifications of Cherbourg 

Submarines of "Group Landwirt/' a special 

anti-invasion force of thirty-six small V-boats 

Landing Craft, Assault 

Landing Craft, Gun 

Landing Craft, Infantry 

Landing Craft, Mechanized 

Landing Craft, Tank 

Landing Craft, Tank (Rocket) 

Landing Craft, Vehicle and Personnel 

Landing Ship, Headquarters 

Landing Ship, Tank 

German Home Air Command 

Headquarters of the Luftwaffe administrative and supply organization in western 

France 

German Air Force 

Men of the maquis 
482 

Mark III, IV 

Mark V 

Merkbuch 

M ilitaerbefehlshaber 

MLR 

MRU 

MS-Flotilla 

N ebelwerfer 

OB SUED 

OB WEST 

OKH 

OKL 

OKM 

OKW 

ONI 

OPD 

Opns 

Org. Abt. 

Organization Todt 

OSS 

Ost 

Osttruppen 

Panther 

Per Rpt 

Plan Tortue 

Plan Vert 

POD 

RAF 

Rangers 

Rhino ferry 

RN 

S-l 

SAC 

SAS 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

German medium tanks 

German medium tank with heavy armor 

and high-velocity gun 

Notebook 

Military governor 

Main Line of Resistance 

Machine Records Unit 

German mine sweepers 

Rocket projector or chemical mortar 

Oberbefehlshaber Sued, German theater 

headquarters in Italy 

Oberbefehlshaber West, Highest German 

ground headquarters of the Western Front 

Oberkommando des Heeres (Army High 

Command) 

Oberkommando der Luftwaffe (Luftwaffe 

High Command) 

Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine (Navy 

High Command) 

Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (Armed 

Forces High Command) 

Office of Naval Intelligence 

Operations Division, War Department 

General Staff 

Operations 

Organisations Abteilung (Staff subdivision 

in charge of organization) 

Paramilitary construction organization of 

the Nazi party, auxiliary to the Wehrmacht. 

Named after its founder, Dr. Todt. 

Office of Strategic Services 

East 

Non-German volunteer troops from 

east-European countries 

German Mark V tank 

Periodic report 

Resistance plan to block road traffic 

Resistance plan to cut railroads 

Plans and Operations Division 

Royal Air Force 

Specially trained American assault troops 

Barge constructed of ponton units 

Royal Navy 

Personnel section of regimental or lower 

staff 

Supreme Allied Commander 

Special Air Service 
GLOSSARY 

S-Boot 

SCAEF 

SF 

SFHQ 

SGS 

SHAEF 

SIS 

Sitrep 

SNCF 

SO 

SOE 

SPOBS 

SS 

Stuetzpunkt 

Teller mines 

Tetrahedra 

TF 

Tiger 

TkBn 

TM 

TIO 

UK 

USA 

USAFBI 

USN 

USSAFE 

USSTAF 

Vergeltung 

Verteidigungsbereich 

Volksdeutsche 

Volkswagen 

Waffen-SS 

E-boat 

Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary 

Force 

Special Force 

Special Force Headquarters 

Secretary General Staff 

Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force 

Special Intelligence Service 

Situation report 

Societe Nationale des Chemins de Fer 

(N ational French railroad system) 

Special Operations 

Special Operations Executive 

Special Observers 

SchutzstafJel (Elite Guard) 

Strong point 

German antitank mines 

Pyramid-shaped steel antitank obstacles 

Task Force 

German Mark VI tank 

Tank Battalion 

Technical Manual 

Table of Organization 

United Kingdom 

United States Army 

United States Army Forces in the 

British Isles 

United States Navy 

United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe 

United States Strategic Air Forces 

Vengeance 

Defensive areas 

Citizens of a country other than Germany 

who were considered Germans racially 

German jeep 

Combat arm of the SS, in effect a partial 

duplication of the German Army 

WD War Department 

WDCSA War Department Chief of Staff, U.S. Army 

Wehrmachtbefehlshaber Niederlande Armed Forces Commander Netherlands 

Wehnnachtfuehrungsstab Armed Forces Operations Staff 

Werfer Mortars; rocket launchers 

WFSt Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab (Armed Forces 

vViderstandsnest 

WP 

Operations Staff) 

Resistance nest 

War Plans 

483 
484 

XAP 

Y Day 

Zweite Stellung 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Merchant cargo ship 

Target date for any military operation, 

specifically target date for OVERLORD 

German secondary defense position 
ABC-I 

ANVIL 

ARCADIA 

BOLERO 

BUCCANEER 

COCKADE 

CROSSBOW 

DRAGOON 

ECLIPSE 

EUREKA 

FABIUS 

FORTITUDE 

GYMNAST 

HARLEQUIN 

JUPITER 

MAGNET 

MULBERRIES 

NEPTUNE 

OMAHA 

OVERLORD 

PIRATE 

POINTBLANK 

QUADRANT 

Code Names 

Agreements reached at Washington Conference, January-March 1941 

The planned 1944 Allied invasion of Southern 

France in the Toulon-Marseille area 

U.S.-British staff conference at Washington, December1941-January1942 

The build-up of troops and supplies in the United 

Kingdom in preparation for a cross-Channel attack 

Operation planned against the Andaman Islands, 

Bay of Bengal, 21 June-IS November 1943 

Diversionary operations in 1943 to pin down German 

forces in the west 

The anticipated enemy pilotless aircraft offensive 

against England in 1944 

Allied invasion of southern coast of France, 15 August 

1944, planned under the code name ANVIL 

Plan for the initial phase of military occupation of 

Germany 

The Tehran Conference, 26 November-2 December 

1943 

Amphibious landing exercises of all assault forces except Force U, early May 1944 

Threat operation in 1944 directed against the Pasde-Calais area 

1941 plan for invasion of North Africa 

Loading exercise in connection with operation 

COCKADE, September 1943 

Plan to attack Norway 

1942 build-up of U.S. forces in Northern Ireland 

Artificial harbors for OVERLORD 

Actual 1944 operations within OVERLORD. This code 

name was used for security reasons after September 

1943 on all OVERLORD planning papers which referred 

to the target area and date. 

Beach assaulted by troops of U.S. V Corps, 6 June 

1944 

Plan for the invasion of northwest Europe, spring 

1944 

1943 exercise by Force J (British and Canadian) 

The Combined Bomber Offensive from the United 

Kingdom against Germany 

The first Quebec Conference, August 1943 
486 

RANKIN 

RATTLE 

ROUNDHAMMER 

ROUNDUP 

SEELOEWE (SEA LION) 

SEXTANT 

SKYSCRAPER 

SLEDGEHAMMER 

STARKEY 

TIGER 

TINDALL 

TORCH 

TRIDENT 

UTAH 

WADHAM 

ZITADELLE 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Plan for return to the Continent in the event of 

German deterioration 

Conference held by the Combined Operations Headquarters in 1943 to discuss amphibious tactics and 

techniques 

Code name used at the Washington Conference in 

May 1943 to designate a modified ROUNDUP invasion 

Various 1941-43 plans for a cross-Channel attack in 

the final phases of the war 

The German planned invasion of England in 1940-

41 

The Cairo Conference, 22-26 November 1943 

A cross-Channel attack plan drawn by the Combined 

Commanders in spring of 1943 

Plan for limited-objective attack across the Channel 

in 1942 designed either to take advantage of a crack 

in German morale or as “sacrifice” operation to aid 

Russians 

Threat directed in 1943 against the Pas-de-Calais 

Invasion exercise of Force U (VII Corps) 

Threat directed against Norway in 1943 

Allied invasion of North and Northwest Africa, 1942 

Washington Conference, May 1943 

Beach assaulted by troops of U.S. VII Corps, 6 June 

1944 

Threat directed against the Cotentin in 1943 

German offensive in Russia, spring 1943 

486 

RANKIN 

RATTLE 

ROUNDHAMMER 

ROUNDUP 

SEELOEWE (SEA LION) 

SEXTANT 

SKYSCRAPER 

SLEDGEHAMMER 

STARKEY 

TIGER 

TINDALL 

TORCH 

TRIDENT 

UTAH 

WAD HAM 

ZITADELLE 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Plan for return to the Continent in the event of 

German deterioration 

Conference held by the Combined Operations Headquarters in 1943 to discuss amphibious tactics and 

techniques 

Code name used at the Washington Conference in 

May 1943 to designate a modified ROUNDUP invasion 

Various 1941-43 plans for a cross-Channel attack in 

the final phases of the war 

The German planned invasion of England in 1940-

41 

The Cairo Conference, 22-26 November 1943 

A cross-Channel attack plan drawn by the Combined 

Commanders in spring of 1943 

Plan for limited-objective attack across the Channel 

in 1942 designed either to take advantage of a crack 

in German morale or as "sacrifice" operation to aid 

Russians 

Threat directed in 1943 against the Pas-de-Calais 

Invasion exercise of Force U (VII Corps) 

Threat directed against Norway in 1943 

Allied invasion of North and Northwest Africa, 1942 

Washington Conference, May 1943 

Beach assaulted by troops of U.S. VII Corps, 6 June 

1944 

Threat directed against the Cotentin in 1943 

German offensive in Russia, spring 1943 
Bibliographical Note 

Cross-Channel Attack is based almost 

entirely on documents now in the custody 

of the Department of the Army. These 

range from the official records of the Combined Chiefs of Staff to the operational 

journals of combat battalions; they include all the records of the German Army 

which have not been destroyed or sent to 

the USSR. Quantitatively the archives 

containing material relevant to this book 

are measured literally in scores of tons. 

Evidently no one researcher could have 

examined the whole record. In the past 

five years, however, the combined researches of Department of the Army historians have sifted through the bulk of it. 

While the author cannot claim a definitive exploitation of all the sources, he can 

at least reasonably hope that the available 

documents of major interest have not escaped his attention. Free access was had 

to all relevant material regardless of classification. 

Primary Sources 

I 

The formal record of the wartime proceedings of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff 

and the Combined Chiefs of Staff consists 

of minutes of their meetings together 

with papers embodying all the proposals 

which they formally considered. This 

record includes minutes of the plenary 

conferences presided over by President 

Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill. 

Rounding out the Joint and Combined 

record are the thousands of cables between Roosevelt and Churchill, between 

the War Department and the theater, between the British Chiefs of Staff and their 

military mission in Washington, and between various commanders and planners. 

Light is thrown on many of the official 

ambiguities by the personal letters and 

cables between General Marshall and 

General Eisenhower. 

The heart of the material for the present volume is the very large collection of 

SHAEF documents. Again cables, letters, 

memoranda, and minutes of both routine 

and special staff meetings recording the 

day-to-day work of the headquarters comprise the bulk of the collection. Besides 

these, however, SHAEF collected extracts 

from memoranda by the British Chiefs of 

Staff and their affiliated planning bodies 

as well as minutes of those British Chiefs 

of Staff meetings at which OVERLORD matters were discussed. Finally SHAEF inherited most of the records of its predecessors, COSSAC and the Combined Commanders. In supplementing the written 

record a series of interviews conducted by 

Forrest C. Pogue of the ETO Section of 

the Historical Division in 1946 with British commanders and planners proved very 

useful particularly in filling in background to important decisions. The author has interviewed and corresponded 

with a number of American commanders. 

The bulk of the narrative of operations 

is based on preliminary studies by War 

Department historians (see below), but 

these were checked and supplemented by 

reference to the primary sources. The latter consist of unit journals, after action 

reports, and interviews conducted by historical officers with participants in most 
488 

cases immediately after the battle. The 

unit journals contain most of the contemporaneous incoming and outgoing messages of the headquarters involved together with overlays of troop dispositions, 

reports, intelligence estimates, and other 

supporting documents. These constitute 

the principal primary sources for the history of operations during June 1944 except for the action of the two airborne 

divisions. No contemporary record of any 

value for the historian was kept by the 

airborne units. This lack was fortunately remedied in good part by the extensive interviews conducted by Colonel 

S. L. A. Marshall with airborne officers 

and men during June and July 1944. 

The much abbreviated accounts of 

British operations are largely based on information supplied by the British Cabinet Office Historical Section. 

II 

Information on German preparations 

and combat comes from original records 

of the German Army and from manuscript histories prepared after the war by 

more than two hundred German general 

and general staff officers working under 

direction of Col. Harold E. Potter, USA. 

Original documents include army headquarters war diaries (KTB's) and their 

supporting papers, special orders, reports, 

telegrams, and conference minutes. Although a large number of documents 

were destroyed by German order or by 

Allied looters, and a considerable number 

were sent to the Soviet Union, the collection remaining available to the Western 

historian is still relatively rich for the preD-Day story of the German Army in 

France. In contrast, few original records 

of German operations in Normandy surCROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

vided the annihilation of von Schlieben's 

force in the Cotentin and the later August 

collapse of the Seventh Army. The principal extant source is the Seventh Army 

KTB. This is supplemented by the postwar accounts of various unit commanders 

and staff officers. The War Diary of Army 

Group B has been lost and only a few of 

the supporting documents remain. The 

OB WEST diary has been preserved only 

from 1 July 1944. 

Some use was made of German naval 

and air force records. The U.S. Navy Department has duplicates and microfilms 

of original German Navy documents held 

by the British Admiralty. Especially useful for the present work were the war diaries of Admiral Doenitz and of Admiral 

Krancke, Naval Commander in the West. 

Luftwaffe records are particularly spotty. 

Most useful were those preserved by the 

Luftwaffe Historical Section in the Von 

Rohden Collection, now at the Air University, Maxwell Field (microfilms in the 

Library of Congress). 

III 

Following is a guide to some of the 

principal documents and document collections. 

AAF files. Army Air Force files containing operational records of the Eighth and 

Ninth Air Forces. Now at the Air University, Maxwell Field, Montgomery, Alabama. 

Adm. file. Administrative file; contains 

miscellaneous papers mostly from nonoperational headquarters in the period before D Day. Like the Pre-Invasion file 

(q.v.) it includes chiefly documents which 

were rescued from destruction or dispersion by historians in the European theaters. 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 

Barker papers. Personal papers, chiefly 

correspondence, of Maj. Gen. Ray W. 

Barker (ret.) specially made available by 

him to War Department historians. 

CC. Combined Commanders' papers 

filed in SHAEF SGS files (q.v.). A duplicate collection is in the Pre-Invasion file 

(q.v.). 

CCS. Combined Chiefs of Staff papers 

and minutes of meetings. These are all 

contained in the OPD files (q.v.). CCS 

papers are memoranda, reports, reprints 

of cables, etc., prepared by the U.S. or 

British Chiefs of Staff or by their subordinate agencies and submitted for combined discussion. Minutes of the meetings are not stenographic. Notes were 

kept by U.S. and British secretaries. The 

minutes in final form were specifically 

and individually approved by each of the 

Combined Chiefs. 

cos. British Chiefs of Staff papers and 

minutes of meetings. Selections of memoranda and excerpts of minutes relating to 

matters of interest to SHAEF are bound 

and separately filed with the SHAEF SGS 

collection (q.v.). The few COS papers 

preserved in other special SHAEF files 

are so cited in the footnotes. 

COSSAC. Designates papers officially 

issued by General Morgan's headquarters and the minutes of COSSAC staff 

meetings. All such documents are to be 

found separately bound in the SHAEF 

SGS files (q.v.). 

CIS file. Contains documents filed during the war in the Office of the Chief of 

Staff. Now held as a separate collection by 

Historical Records Section, Departmental Record Branch, AGO. 

Dep CIS file. A small collection of documents which during the war were filed 

in the office of the Deputy Chief of Staff. 

489 

N ow held in a separate collection by Historical Record Section, AGO. 

Diary of CinCo MS diary of the Office 

of the Commander in Chief, kept for General Eisenhower by his naval aide, Capt. 

Harry C. Butcher. It was begun in July 

1942 just before Eisenhower became commander in chief of the Mediterranean 

Theater of Operations. Edited excerpts 

have been printed by Butcher in My 

Three Years with Eisenhower (New York, 

1946). 

Eisenhower Personal Files. Contains 

communications between General Eisenhower and General Marshall including 

both personal letters and cables which 

had limited distribution and were not 

sent to regular operational files. 

ETa file. Files of the European theater 

headquarters now held by the Organization Records Branch, Records Administration Center, AGO. 

FUSA file. Administrative and pre-DDay planning papers of First U.S. Army 

now held by the Organization Records 

Branch, AGO. 

Hist Div files. A miscellaneous collection of documents chiefly comprising material prepared or collected by War Department historians. It includes interviews, responses to special questionnaires, 

manuscript histories, and certain British 

documents not found in U.S. operational 

files. 

]CS. Joint (U.S.) Chiefs of Staff papers 

and minutes of meetings. Copies of all 

JCS documents cited can be found in 

OPD files (q.v.). The JCS papers include 

memoranda by the Joint Chiefs as a body, 

by individual members, and by subordinate agencies. Minutes of the meetings 

were not stenographic. Cf. note under 

CCS. 
490 

JIC. Joint Intelligence Committee 

(British) estimates found, unless otherwise noted, in SHAEF SGS files (q.v.) in 

separately bound collection of JIC papers. 

JPS. Joint Planning Staff (U.S.) papers 

and minutes of meetings. Copies of JPS 

documents are in OPD ABC files, which 

include in most cases not only the final 

planners' memoranda, but OPD drafts, 

discussions, and working notes. 

jWPC. Joint War Planning Committee (U.S.) papers, many of which were reissued as JPS or JCS documents. All cited 

are in OPD files. Cf. note under JPS. 

Navy Dept files. The manuscript studies of U.S. operations and the occasional 

documents cited are in the Office of Naval 

Record. German documents are in the 

so-called Tambach collection which contains carbon duplicates and microfilms of 

German originals held by the British Admiralty office. 

OPD files. Collection of the Operations Division of the War Department. 

They include the central files bearing the 

OPD decimal classification, and two separate collections: one kept by the Strategy 

and Policy Group within OPD which is 

identified by the initials ABC, and one 

kept by the Executive Group identified as 

the Exec file. 

Pre-Inv file. The Pre-Invasion files contain miscellaneous papers on planning 

and strategy originating with or collected 

by various headquarters in the European 

theater before the invasion. The documents were turned over to War Department historians in the theater during 

1944, and are now held by the Historical 

Records Section, AGO. 

SHAEF files. Files of the Supreme 

Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary 

Force. This is a very large collection of all 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

the working papers of the staff sections of 

General Eisenhower's headquarters together with records of COSSAC, the Combined Commanders, and the British 

Chiefs of Staff. Files of each of the five 

general staff sections and of the Secretary 

of the General Staff (SGS) and the Adjutant General (AG) are separate, each 

containing the papers of chief concern to 

the respective section. For the present 

work the richest files are those of SGS, 

G-3, and AG. The SGS section actually 

contains the bulk of the important cables, 

memos, minutes, and planning papers 

with which SHAEF was concerned. Files 

are held by the Historical Records Section, AGO. 

12th A Gp file. Operational files of the 

12th Army Group with certain planning 

papers from the preinvasion period when 

the headquarters was designated 1st Army 

Group. Files now separately held by the 

Historical Records Section, AGO. 

USSTAF file. Comprises documents 

specially collected by the chief USST AF 

historian. Formerly in the Air Force Historical Section office, some of these papers 

have been transferred to the Spaatz file in 

the Library of Congress. Others can be 

found in AAF files at the Air University, 

Maxwell Field, Montgomery, Alabama. 

WD Cable log. The large collection of 

caJ:>les which cleared through the War Department Message Center, filed by date in 

incoming and outgoing books. 

Secondary Sources 

I 

Unpublished preliminary historical 

studies by Army, Navy, and Air Force historians greatly facilitated the task of research into subjects peripheral to the 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 

main narrative. Especially useful was the 

series, The Administrative and Logistical 

History of the European Theater of Operations. The eleven volumes of special 

studies on such matters as training, manpower, planning, and supply were written 

by Army historians in the European Theater of Operations under the direction of 

Maj. Roland G. Ruppenthal, assistant 

theater historian, USFET. The Administrative History, U.S. Naval Forces in Europe, on file in the Historical Division, 

contains material on naval organization 

for the assault. Other manuscript studies 

of naval admi'nistrative history, on file in 

the Navy Department, were consulted 

chiefly for aspects of the submarine war 

and landing craft procurement. Of some 

help were two manuscript histories of the 

Ninth Air Force, one by Lt. Col. Robert 

H. George and one by Col. William B. 

Reed, both in Air Force files. The 1500-

page history of the French Forces of the 

Interior, prepared by Capt. Lucien Galimand, Capt. Marcel Vigneras, and Maj. 

R. A. Bourne-Paterson, is an important 

compilation of information on the French 

Resistance, drafted in 1945 from documents that have since been widely scattered. From interview material, Col. S. 

L. A. Marshall made a series of small-unit 

studies of airborne operations in Normandy. These manuscripts in Historical 

Division files are often brilliantly illuminating as to the nature of the fighting 

in the Cotentin. 

II 

Published sources include official reports and dispatches of commanders, special studies generally for limited distribution, official histories, unofficial histories, 

and memoirs .. 

491 

Of the dispatches and reports, most of 

which are not very useful for historical 

purposes, special mention need be made 

only of "Despatch of Air Chief Marshal 

Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory," Fourth Supplement to the London Gazette No. 

37838,31 December 1946; and Report by 

Allied Naval Commander-in-Chief Expeditionary Force on Operation NEPTUNE 

(London, 1944),3 vols. Both of these reports are exceptionally full. A pertinent 

special study particularly valuable for the 

OVERLORD story is George E. Mowry, 

Landing Craft and the WPB (Civilian 

Production Administration, Historical 

Reports on War Administration: WPB 

Special Study No. 11) (Washington, 

1946). 

The Historical Division of the Department of the Army has published in the 

AMERICAN FORCES IN ACTION 

series, two preliminary narratives of U.S. 

operations in Normandy in June 1944 

which cover most of the fighting described 

in Cross-Channel Attack. These narratives are [Charles H. Taylor] Omaha 

Beachhead (Washington, 1945) and [R. 

G. Ruppenthal] Utah Beach to Cherbourg (Washington, 1947). Fully docu· 

mented manuscripts of both studies are 

on file in the Historical Division. This 

documentation has not been repeated in 

the present volume. Official histories of 

the U.S. Navy and Air Forces are just be· 

ginning to appear and for the most part 

those so far published do not cover the period with which this volume is chiefly concerned. However, some use has been 

made of the first two volumes of Wesley 

F. Craven and James L. Cate (eds.), The 

Army Air Forces in World War II (Chicago, 1947 and 1948). In addition, portions of that work still in manuscript have 
492 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

been made available to the author by the 

Air Force Historical Section. The published volumes of the semiofficial naval 

history, Samuel E. Morison, The Battle 

of the Atlantic (Boston, 1948), and idem, 

Operations in North African Waters 

(Boston, 1947), bear only indirectly on the 

subjects of this volume. Col. C. P. Stacey, 

The Canadian Army, 1939-1945 (An 

Oficial Historical Summary) (Ottawa, 

1948), a preliminary work, is the only official account of British or Dominion 

forces to appear so far. 

Semiofficial histories exist for most U.S. 

combat units but few go beyond the bare 

outlines of after action reports colored by 

accounts of individual exploits. A noteworthy exception is the history of the 

101st Airborne Division: Leonard Rapport and Arthur Norwood, Jr., Rendezvous With Destiny (Washington, 1948). 

Of the unofficial histories touching 

OVERLORD far the best now in print is Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins: 

An Intimate History (New York, 1948). 

A revised edition with supplementary material was published in 1950. Henry L. 

Stimson and McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (New York, 

1948) is a fine volume of memoirs and a 

valuable contribution to the strategy story 

at the highest level. Some use has been 

made of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade 

in Europe (New York, 1948) and Lt. Gen. 

Frederick E. Morgan, Overture to Overlord (New York, 1950), although these 

books deal with subjects abundantly covered by the primary sources consulted. 

Captain Harry C. Butcher, My Three 

Years With Eisenhower (New York, 1948) 

is not the “personal diary” of Captain 

Butcher as advertised but a collection of 

excerpts from the personal and official diary of General Eisenhower kept for him 

by Captain Butcher. Winston S. Churchill, The Grand AEZiance (New York, 1950) 

touches only on the very beginnings of 

the OVERLORD story. 

492 

been made available to the author by the 

Air Force Historical Section. The published volumes of the semiofficial naval 

history, Samuel E. Morison, The Battle 

of the Atlantic (Boston, 1948), and idem, 

Operations in North African Waters 

(Boston, 1947), bear only indirectly on the 

subjects of this volume. Col. C. P. Stacey, 

The Canadian Army, 1939-1945 (An 

Official Historical Summary) (Ottawa, 

1948), a preliminary work, is the only official account of British or Dominion 

forces to appear so far. 

Semiofficial histories exist for most U.S. 

combat units but few go beyond the bare 

outlines of after action reports colored by 

accounts of individual exploits. A noteworthy exception is the history of the 

lOlst Airborne Division: Leonard Rapport and Arthur Norwood, Jr., Rendezvous With Destiny (Washington, 1948). 

Of the unofficial histories touching 

OVERLORD far the best now in print is Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins: 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

An Intimate History (New York, 1948). 

A revised edition with supplementary material was published in 1950. Henry L. 

Stimson and McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (N ew York, 

1948) is a fine volume of memoirs and a 

valuable contribution to the strategy story 

at the highest level. Some use has been 

made of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade 

in Europe (New York, 1948) and Lt. Gen. 

Frederick E. Morgan, Overture to Overlord (New York, 1950), although these 

books deal with subjects abundantly covered by the primary sources consulted. 

Captain Harry C. Butcher, My Three 

Years With Eisenhower (N ew York, 1948) 

is not the "personal diary" of Captain 

Butcher as advertised but a collection of 

excerpts from the personal and official diary of General Eisenhower kept for him 

by Captain Butcher. Winston S. Churchill, The Grand Alliance (New York, 1950) 

touches only on the very beginnings of 

the OVERLORD story. 
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II 

The following volumes have been published or are in press: 

The War Department 

Chief of Staff Prewar Plans and Preparations 

Washington Command Post: The Operations Division 

Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1941-1942 

Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1943-1944 

Global Logistics and Strategy: 1940--1943 

Global Logistics and Strategy: 1943-1945 

The Army and Economic Mobilization 

The Army and Industrial Manpower 

The Army Ground Forces 

The Organization of Ground Combat Troops 

The Procurement and Training of Ground Combat Troops 

The Army Service Forces 

The Organization and Role of the Army Service Forces 

The Western Hemisphere 

The Framework of Hemisphere Defense 

Guarding the United States and Its Outposts 

The War in the Pacific 

The Fall of the Philippines 

Guadalcanal: The First Offensive 

Victory in Papua 

CARTWHEEL: The Reduction of Rabaul 

Seizure of the Gilberts and Marshalls 

Campaign in the Marianas 

The Approach to the Philippines 

Leyte: The Return to the Philippines 

Triumph in the Philippines 

Okinawa: The Last Battle 

Strategy and Command: The First Two Years 

The Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West 

Sicily and the Surrender of Italy 

Salerno to Cassino 

Cassino to the Alps 

The European Theater of Operations 

Cross-Channel Attack 

Breakout and Pursuit 

The Lorraine Campaign 

The Siegfried Line Campaign 

The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge 

The Last Offensive 

The Supreme Command 
494 CROSSCHANNEL ATTACK 

Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume I 

Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume II 

The Middle East Theater 

The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia 

The China-Burma-India Theater 

Stilwell’s Mission to China 

Stilwell’s Command Problems 

Time Run,s Out in CBI 

The Technical Services 

The Chemical Warfare Service: Organizing for War 

The Chemical Warfare Service: From Laboratory to Field 

The Chemical Warfare Service: Chemicals in Combat 

The Corps of Engineers: Troops and Equipment

The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Japan 

The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany 

The Corps of Engineers: Military Construction in the United States 

The Medical Department: Hospitalization and Evacuation; Zone of Interior 

The Medical Dqartment: Medical Service in the Mediterranean and Minor 

Theaters 

The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater of Operations 

The Ordnance Department: Planning Munitions for War 

The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply 

The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront 

The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume I 

The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume II 

The Quartermaster Corps: Operations in the War Against Japan 

The Quartermaster Corps: Operations in the War Against Germany 

The Signal Corps: The Emergency 

The Signal Corps: The Test 

The Signal Corps: The Outcome 

The Transportation Corps: Responsibilities, Organization, and Operations 

The Transportation Corps: Movements, Training, and Supply 

The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas 

Special Studies 

Chronology: 1941-I 945 

Military Relations Between the United States and Canada: 1939-l 945 

Rearming the French 

Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt 

The Women’s Army Corps+ 

Civil Affairs: Soldiers Become Governors 

Buying Aircraft: Materie l Procurement for the Army Air Forces 

The Employment of Negro Troops 

Manhattan: The U.S. Army and the Atomic Bomb 

Pictorial Record 

The War Against Germany and Italy: Mediterranean and Adjacent Areas 

The War Against Germany: Europe and Adjacent Areas 

The War Against Japan 

494 CROS~CHANNELATTACK 

Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume I 

Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume II 

The Middle East Theater 

The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia 

The China-Burma-India Theater 

Stilwell's Mission to China 

Stilwell's Command Problems 

Time Runs Out in CBI 

The Technical Services 

The Chemical Warfare Service: Organizingfor War 

The Chemical Warfare Service: From Laboratory to Field 

The Chemical Warfare Service: Chemicals in Combat 

The Corps of Engineers: Troops and Equipment 

The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Japan 

The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany 

The Corps of Engineers: Military Construction in the United States 

The Medical Department: Hospitalization and Evacuation; Zone of Interior 

The Medical Department: Medical Service in the Mediterranean and Minor 

Theaters 

The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater of Operations 

The Ordnance Department: Planning Munitions for War 

The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply 

The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront 

The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume I 

The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume II 

The Quartermaster Corps: operations in the War Against Japan 

The Quartermaster Corps: operations in the War Against Germany 

The Signal Corps: The Emergency 

The Signal Corps: The Test 

The Signal Corps: The Outcome 

The Transportation Corps: Responsibilities, Organization, and operations 

The Transportation Corps: Movements, Training, and Supply 

The Transportation Corps: operations Overseas 

Special Studies 

Chronology: 1941-1945 

Military Relations Between the United States and Canada: 1939-1945 

Rearming the French 

Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt 

The Women's Army Corps 

Civil Affairs: Soldiers Become Governors 

Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the Army Air Forces 

The Employment of Negro Troops 

Manhattan: The U.S. Army and the Atomic Bomb 

Pictorial Record 

The War Against Germany and Italy: Mediterranean and Adjacent Areas 

The War Against Germany: Europe and Adjacent Areas 

The War Against Japan 
Index 

ABC-l: 2, 19 

A-20’s: 393 

Abbeville: 12 

Acqueville: 420,429 

Addeville: 287, 288 

Administrative branch of COSSAC: 51-52 

Adriatic: 92n, 122n 

Aegean Sea: 119 

Aerial photographs: 177,215,259 

Africa. See North Africa. 

Agy: 339,365,367 

Air attacks: 21, 26ln. 333, 334, 335, 360, 365. See also 

Air forces; Air support: Air-ground co-operation; 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force; Bomber Command, IX; Combined Bomber Offensive; Eighth 

Air Force; Ninth Air Force; Royal Air Force. 

on bridges: 348,349 

on Cherbourg: 428-29 

on coastal fortifications: 300-01, 302 

on enemy troops: 348,360,373 

on railroads: 365,378-79,408-l 1 

Air branch of COSSAC: 51.52 

Air build-up schedule: June 1942, 19-21 

Air Forces, Allied. See Allied Expeditionary Air Force. 

Air Forces, British. See Royal Air Force. 

Air Forces, German. See Luftwaffe. 

Air Forces, U. S. See also Eighth Air Force: Ninth Air 

Force; Twelfth Air Force; Fifteenth Air Force. 

begins air build-up: 19-21 

and bombing of French railroads: 217-30 

Combined Bomber Offensive: 207-17 

command problems: 111-112, 218, 219-20 

establishment of USSAFE (USSTAF): 213 

intensification of air war against Germany in spring 

of 1943: 86 

TORCH interferes with build-up: 47 

Air-ground cooperation: 217,428,432 

Air offensive, Allied: 45,75-76,86. See also Allied Expeditionary Air Force: Combined Bomber Offensive. 

Air OP’s: 197 

Air reconnaissance: 258,275 

Air supply: 421n 

and French Resistance: 201-04,207 

German: 360,421 

Air support: 319,326,335 

Air Support Command: 214 

Air supremacy 

as factor in choice of assault area: 56 

as factor in the D-Day decision: 272 

Airborne assault 

first contact with seaborne forces: 283 

initial German reaction to: 278,293-300 

size of forces in: 279 

Airborne Brigade, 2d: 402n 

Airborne division: 356n 

in Outline OVERLORD: 75 

proposed reorganization: 184, 184n 

Airborne Division, 82d; 158n 164, 184, 280-282, 300, 

302, 329,356n, 364,396,402n, 415,416,447n 

airborne assault; 289-93,289n 

assault plans: 185, 186, 269 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 401, 402, 403, 408 

casualties: 300, 300n, 329 

effort to secure beachhead: 342,344, 345 

Airborne Division, IOlst 

airborne assault: 278-89 

assault plans: 185-86,269 

assault training: 164 

casualties: 284, 284n, 288 

drive on Carentan: 352-65 

Airborne plannicg: 183-86 

Airborne supply. See Air supply. 

Airborne troops, Allied use considered a new tactic 

by Germans: 396n 

Airborne troops, German. See Parachute Divisions, 

German. 

Aircraft 

in air build-up schedule of June 1942: 20-21 

in antisubmarine warfare: 84 

controversy over theater priority: 34-35 

pilotless: 138-40, 215-17,412,413 

transport: 167, 279 

Aircraft industry, German, bomber offensive against: 

209-10 

Airfields 

construction: 448 

role in Outline OVERLORD: 78 

AKA’s (cargo ships): 170, 172 

Albania: 122 

D’Albiac, Air Vice Marshal Sir John Henry: 54, 54n 

Alexander, Field Marshal Harold R.: 87, 111,116,169. 

172, 173 

Algiers: 87n 

Allen, Lt. Col. Ray C.: 356 

Allen, Major Richard J.: 287,287n 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force: 108. 111, 112, 213, 

215,217,218,219, 220,222,223,224, 334,408-11. 

See also Air Forces, British: Air Forces, U. S. 

Allied Force Headquarters: 46 

Index 

ABC-I: 2, 19 

A-20's: 393 

Abbeville: 12 

Acqueville: 420,429 

Addeville: 287, 288 

Administrative branch of COSSAC: 51-52 

Adriatic: 92n, 122n 

Aegean Sea: Il9 

Aerial photographs: 177,215,259 

Africa. See North Africa. 

Agy: 339, 365, 367 

Air attacks: 21, 261n, 333, 334, 335, 360, 365. See also 

Air forces; Air support; Air-ground co-operation; 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force; Bomber Command, IX; Combined Bomber Offensive; Eighth 

Air Force; Ninth Air Force; Royal Air Force. 

on bridges: 348, 349 

on Cherbourg: 428-29 

on coastal fortifications: 300-01, 302 

on enemy troops: 348, 360, 373 

on railroads: 365, 378-79, 408-11 

Air branch of COSSAC: 51,52 

Air build-up schedule: June 1942, 19-21 

Air Forces, Allied. See Allied Expeditionary Air Force. 

Air Forces, British. See Royal Air Force. 

Air Forces, German. See Luftwaffe. 

Air Forces, U. S. See also Eighth Air Force; Ninth Air 

Force; Twelfth Air Force; Fifteenth Air Force. 

begins air build-up: 19-21 

and bombing of French railroads: 217-30 

Combined Bomber Offensive: 207-17 

command problems: IlI-Il2, 218, 219-20 

establishment of USSAFE (USSTAF): 213 

intensification of air war against Germany in spring 

of 1943: 86 

TORCH interferes with build-up: 47 

Air-ground cooperation: 217,428,432 

Air offensive, Allied: 45,75-76,86. See also Allied Expeditionary Air Force: Combined Bomber Offensive. 

Air OP's: 197 

Air reconnaissance: 258,275 

Air supply: 421n 

and French Resistance: 201-04, 207 

German: 360,421 

Air support: 319,326,335 

Air Support Command: 214 

Ai!' supremacy 

as factor in choice of assault area: 56 

as factor in the D-Day decision: 272 

Airborne assault 

first contact with seaborne forces: 283 

initial German reaction to: 278,293-300 

size of forces in: 279 

Airborne Brigade, 2d: 402n 

Airborne division: 356n 

in Outline OVERLORD: 75 

proposed reorganization: 184, 184n 

Airborne Division, 82d; 158n, 164, 184, 280-282, 300, 

302,329,356n,364,396,402n,415,416,447n 

airborne assault; 289-93, 289n 

assault plans: 185, 186,269 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 401. 402. 403. 408 

casualties: 300, 300n, 329 

effort to secure beachhead: 342.344,345 

Airborne Division. lOlst 

airborne assault: 278-89 

assault plans: 185-86. 269 

assault training: 164 

casualties: 284. 284n. 288 

drive on Carentan: 352-65 

Airborne plannifig: 183-86 

Airborne supply. See Air supply. 

Airborne troops. Allied use considered a new tactic 

by Germans: 396n 

Airborne troops, German. See Parachute Divisions, 

German. 

Aircraft 

in air build-up schedule of June 1942: 20-21 

in antisubmarine warfare: 84 

controversy over theater priority: 34-35 

pilotless: 138-40,215-17,412,413 

transport: 167, 279 

Aircraft industry. German, bomber offensive against: 

209-10 

Airfields 

construction: 448 

role in Outline OVERLORD: 78 

AKA's (cargo ships): 170.172 

Albania: 122 

D'Albiac. Air Vice Marshal Sir John Henry: 54.54n 

Alexander. Field Marshal Harold R.: 87. III, 116. 169, 

172.173 

Algiers: 87n 

Allen. Lt. Col. Ray C.: 356 

Allen. Major Richard J.: 287. 287n 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force: 108. Ill. Il2. 215. 

215.217.218,219.220.222.223.224.334.408-11. 

See also Air Forces. British; Air Forces, U. S. 

Allied Force Headquarters: 46 
496 

Allied Naval Expeditionary Force (ANCXF): 160-62 

Amaye-sur-Orne: 444 

Ambush, by Germans: 364 

Amfreville: 291-92,396,398,401 

Amiens: 373 

Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet: 160n 

Amphibious tactics: 54-55, 164, 188-89, 190-93 

Amy: 382 

Ancon: 301 

Andaman Islands: 126 

Andrews, Lt. Gen. Frank M.: 46,53 

Angers: 378n 

Anglo-American military conferences of 1941: 2 

Anglo-American military co-operation, early groundwork laid for: 1-6 

Angoville-au-Plain: 287,288,347 

Anguerny: 373 

ANCXF (Allied Naval Expeditionary Force): 160-62 

Anisy: 373 

Antiaircraft battalion, German: 240 

Antiairlanding obstacles: 263-64, 287. See also Gliden;, 

Antipersonnel mines: 264 

Antisubmarine warfare. See Submarine, German. 

Antitank battalion, German organization: 240 

Antitank obstacles: 420 

Antwerp: 8, 72 

ANVIL, 76n, 92n, 126, 127, 164-73, 173n. See also 

France, Southern. 

Amio: 172, 185-86, 232, 234 

APA's (transports): 170 

ARCADIA Conference: 8-9, 10, 15, 21n, 32n, 106 

Argentan: 181 

Armed Forces Commander Netherlands (Wehrmarhtbefehlshaber Niederlande) 130, 242 

Armed Forces High Command (OKW): 133, 133n 

Armee Secrete, I': 199-200 

Armies, Allied 

Second British. See British units. 

Eighth British: 78n, 86--87, 158--60 

First Canadian: 53, 114 

First U. S. See First U. S. Army. 

Third U. S.: 188, 188n, 447 

Fifth U. S.: 169 

Seventh U. S.: 86 

Armies, German. See German units. 

Armies, Italian. See Italian Fourth Army. 

Armor, versus naval artillery: 153, 446. See also 

Tanks. 

Armored Divisions 

1st: 19 

2d: 158n, 269,361,365,377 

3d: 444 

5th: 567 

Armored Field Artillery Battalions 

14th: 365 

58th: 313 

65th: 348, 356 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Armored Infantry Battalions 

3d, 41st Armored Infantry: 361,365 

2d, 66th Armored Infantry: 365 

Armored reconnaissance battalion, German: 240 

Army branch of COSSAC: 51 

Arnold, Lt. Gen. Henry H.: 3, 19-20,34,44 

biographical sketch: 19n 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 208, 210, 211 

and controversy over bombing of French railroads: 

221 

plan for the establishment of an airhead in the 

Evreux-Dreux area: 185 

on struggle for air supremacy: 211 

Arras: 12 

Arromanches: 180n, 426 

Arromanches-Ies-Bains: 72 

Artificial ports: 73, 166, 272n, 422-23, 423-26, 426n 

Artillery, Allied: 356,375,376,388,390. 392.402.431 

D-Day losses on Omaha: 309-13 

direct support: 369, 376 

experiments in firing from landing craft: 197 

interdiction: 406 

preparation: 302, 356, 361, 382, 383, 390, 416, 441 

Artillery, German: 176-77,236-37,238-39,240,241, 

280n.297, 342, 387.470 

Asnelles-sur-Mer: 331 

Assault area, analysis of conditions essential for: 56 

Assault divisions, structural changes: 191-92 

Assault exercises: 162--64. 269-70 

Assault forces 

organization and tactics: 190-93 

training: 162-64 

Assault Training Center: 162--64, 191,270 

Atlantic convoy system: 84 

Atlantic Wall: 41, 136, 147, 151, 152, 155, 264--65. 

See also Antilanding obstacles; Beach obstacles; 

Obstacles, underwater. 

construction of secondary defenses: 156 

Hitler demands 15.000 concrete strong points for: 

137 

Hitler orders completion of by 1 May 1943: 137 

propaganda value: 140 

Rommel's construction program: 252-53 

rumors of impregnability: 176 

status of in May 1944: 262--64 

supplies for construction curtailed by Allied air 

attacks: 227 

work begun on: 132 

Attacks 

concentric: 297, 360--64 

limited-objective: 348, 373. 377, 380--82 

night: 416,418 

Audouville-Ia-Hubert: 280.282. 304, 344 

Augusta: 305 

Aure River: 73, 187n, 337, 339, 353. 367--68, 369, 375 

Australia: 23,24. 25 

Authie: 348n, 349 

Auville-sur-le-Vey: 359,361 
INDEX 

Auxiliaries, German (Hilfswillige): 145 

Avranches: 188, 349, 371, 374, 383 

Azeville: 341,342,386,390-92 

"B" message: 205-06 

B-24's: 301 

Bacherer, Oberst Rudolph: 416 

Badoglio, Marshal Pietro: 87 

Baldwin: 322n 

Balkans: 9,35,37,41,121, 122n, 125, 144,202,231-32 

Ballard, Lt. Col. Robert A.: 288 

Ball-bearing plants: 211n 

Balleroy: 371,442 

Baltic: 179 

Banes du Grand Vey: 182 

Bandieuville: 290 

Barbed wire: 390, 393 

Barber, Brig. Gen. Harry A.: 392 

Barfleur: 440 

Barges: 60n 

Barker, Gen. Ray W.: 22, 31, 32, 52, 55, 56, 60, 77, 

91n, 94, 106n, 1l0-ll, 166 

Barneville·sur-Mer: 415 

Barquette,la: 280,286-87,288, 347, 357 

Barre de Semilly, la: 377 

Barton, Maj. Gen. Raymond 0.: 302, 302n, 342, 

390-92,393,418. See also Infantry Division, 4th. 

Barton: 322 

Bas Village de Dodainville: 341,390 

Basse Addeville: 287 

Bassin it Flot: 361-64 

Battalion, Fuesilier: 237 

Battalions. See Antitank Battalions; Armored Field 

Artillery Battalions; Armored Infantry Battal· 

ions; Chemical Battalions; Engineer Battalions; 

Engineer Combat Battalions; Field Artillery Bat· 

talions; Glider Infantry Battalions; Infantry 

Battalions; Parachute Field Artillery Battalions; 

Parachute Infantry Battalions; Ranger Battal· 

ions; Tank Battalions. 

Battalions, German. See German units. 

Batterie Hamburg: 440 

Batterie Marcouf: 341n 

Baupte: 364, 365,402,403n 

Bay of Biscay: 179,208,232,233 

Bayfield: 301 

Bayonets: 359,392 

Bazenville: 330 

Bazooka: 368, 390 

BCRA (Bureau Central de Renseignements et 

d'Action): 198-99, 200, 205 

Beach defenses. See also Beach obstacles; Underwater 

obstacles. 

as factor in choice of assault area: 56 

plan for neutralizing: 194 

Beach drenching: 301-02,313,319 

Beach exits: 283,309,321,324,336 

497 

Beach obstacles: 177,192-93, 263-u4, 315-17, 336. Set: 

also Underwater obstacles. 

Beaches 

confusion on: 327 

cratering of: 196n 

terrain: 308-09 

Beachheads, effort to secure: 336-51 

Beaudienville: 429,431 

Beaumont: 287,348 

Beaumont-Hague: 440,441 

Beauvais: 289 

Begue: French radio operator, 201 

Belgian Gates: 250, 359 

Belgium, 12 

as an assault area: 56-57, 59 

rail destruction in: 223, 224 

Benouville: 332 

Beny-Bocage, Ie: 370 

Berchtesgaden: 445-46, 

Berigny: 370, 373 

Berlin, raids on: 214 

Bessin: 180, 181, 182 

Beuzeville·au-Plain: 281,289,329,341 

Beuzeville-la-Bastille:: 289, 401-02 

Bicycles, used by Germans: 239, 254, 334, 338. 367. 

379n 

Bidault, Georges: 199 

Bieville: 332 

Bingham, Maj. Sidney V., Jr.: 318, 318n 

Biniville: 406 

Birmingham: 160n 

Bissom, Ie: 341 

Blaskowitz, Generaloberst Johannes: 248, 248n 

Blay: 340 

Blockhouses: 341, 390 

Blockships: 272n, 422-23 

Blotrie, la: 381 

Blumentritt, Generalleutnant Guenther: 128n, 136, 

142, 156 

Bocage country: 180, 188. 284. 365 

Boehm, Col.: 382-83 

Bois du Bretel: 381 

Bois de la Brique: 417 

Bois de Calette: 367 

Bois du Coudray: 422, 430 

Bois du Homme: 370 

Bois du Mont du Roc: 419,429 

Bois de Nerest: 419 

Bois de Roudou: 419,422,430 

BOLERO: 19,24,25-26,27,28,33,34,35,42,45,47.48, 

48n, 94,102 

attacked by Churchill: 26 

confusion in early use as a code name: 19n 

Gen. Marshall argues for: 26 

purpose of: 19 

Roosevelt's attitude toward: 23, 24 

Stimson's defense of: 25-26 

BOLERO Combined Committees: 19 
498 

Bolshevism: 145.146, 148 

Bombardons: 423-26,42~n 

Bomber Command. IX: 219-20. 222. 22~. ~Ol. 428 

Bomber losses: 212n 

Bomber offensive. See Combined Bomber Offensive. 

Bombers 

heavy: 19.86. 196.217. 219. ~OO 

medium: 19.20. 196. 215. ~Ol 

Bombing. See Air attacks; Combined Bomber Offensive; Daylight bombing; Night bombing. 

of French railroads: 217-~0 

in effectiveness in neutralizing coastal fortifications: ~Ol 

of V-boat pens and bases: 212n 

Bordeaux: 81 

Bottomley: Air Vice Marshal N. H.: 209n 

Boulogne: 15. 259 

Bourdonnerie: 422 

Bourne. Lt. Col. G. K.: 5n 

Bradley. Lt. Gen. Omar N.: 111. 158. ~05. ~20. ~29. 

~50, ~51. ~52. ~60. ~64-65. ~76-77. 40~. 416. 428. 

4~2. 44~. 447 

named commander of First V. S. Army: 114-15 

Branville: 419 

Brauchitsch. von. Generalfeldmarschall Walther: 

1~ln 

Breakwaters: 7~-74. 422-26 

Brecey: ~71 

Brecy: ~~I 

Brereton: Lt. Gen. Lewis H.; 108. 214. 214n 

Brest: ~Ol 

Bretteville I'Orgueilleuse: ~30 

Brevands: 286. ~57. ~59. ~61 

Bricquebec: 420 

Bricqueville: ~67 

Bridges 

Allied air attacks on: 228-30. 230n. 349 

captured by Germans: 416 

construction: ~60. 367 

destruction: ~57. ~60. 408 

improvised: ~67 

repair: 2~On. 357. 361. ~67 

shortage of equipment: 81 

British agents. and French Resistance: 200-01. See 

also Special Operations Executive. 

British air force. See Royal Air Force. 

British Air Ministry: 209. 210 

British airborne forces: ~48 

British Army. high command for invasion formed: 

52-53. See also British units. 

British Bomber Command: 86 

BBC: 205. 275, 276 

British Chiefs of Staff: 2. I~. 16. 18.21. 22. 2~. 25, 27. 

30.32.33.35.37.42.43.44.48. 48n. 49. 58. 58n. 

59. 65. 68. 68n. 72,79,80.90 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate, January-March 

1944: 168.169. 171. 172 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

attitude toward operations in 1942: 16-18 

and the Cairo-Tehran Conferences: 117, 122 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 213 

concept of Mediterranean operations. May 194~: 68 

differ with American Chiefs of Staff in approach 

to the problem of defeating Germany: 9-11 

favor principle of a "defensive encircling line of 

action": 32 

and French Resistance: 202 

Joint Staff Commission responsible to: 2 

and landing craft procurement program: 100. 102. 

10~ 

liaison between military and political leaders: 

90-91 

opposed to SLEDGEHAMMER: 30 

and organization of COSSAC: 48-51 

problem of air force command: 220, 222 

and questions of OVERLORD command: 107-09 

reaction to Marshall's scheme for invasion in 1943: 

18 

reject SKYSCRAPER: 58-59 

urge peripheral strategy for the defeat of Germany: 

36-~7 

British Combined Operations Headquarters: 177.197 

British Fleet. See British Navy. 

British Fleet Air Arm: 197 

British Home Forces: 5 

British Joint Planners: 5. 6. 12 

British Ministry of Economic Warfare: 210 

British Navy: 52. 53. 129. 193-94 

British Royal Air Force. See Royal Air Force. 

British units 

Army. Second: 53.114.165.174. 183n. 320. 374. 44~. 

445.447 

Army. Eighth: 86-87. 160 

Army Group. 15th: 169 

Army Group. 21: 5~, 101. 110. Ill. 114. ll5. ll6. 158. 

174.224.228 

Brigade. 8th Armoured: ~20 

Brigade. 56th Infantry: 3~9 

Brigade. 6th Special Engineer: lI15 

Commando. 47th Royal Marine: lI20. ~lI9 

Corps. I: 189.320 

Corps. 8: 444 

Corps. 30: 320.37~.~75.444 

Division. 3d: lI~2 

Division. 30th: 376 

Division. 50th: 221. 222. ~32. 3~8. 339. 375 

Division. 6th Airborne: 185. ~32 

Division. 7th Armoured: 374.375.445 

Division. 79th Armoured: 320 

British shipbuilding industry: 102 

British War Cabinet: 90-91 

Brittany: 57.78. 188.259 

Bri tteville-sur-Laize: 444 

Brixham: 272 

BTonay: 348 
INDEX 499 

Brooke, Gen. Sir Alan: 4, 17, 17n, 25, 38-40, 43-45, 

48,68,96n, 113-71-72,221 

argues for Mediterranean operations: 40-41 

attitude toward Ovmoan: 96,97,98,99 

Browning, Lt. Gen. F. A. M.: 207 

Brownjohn, Maj. Gen. N. C. D.: 52 

Brucheville: 260 

BUCCANEER: 126 

Buelowius, Generalleutnant Alfred: 266-67 

Buhot: 321 

Build-up schedules: lEEn, 351 

Bulldozers: 317 

“Bunker paralysis,“: 430 

Bureau Central de Renseignements et d’Action 

(BCRA) : 198-99,200,205 

Burma Road: 126 

Buteaux, les: 382 

Buttlar-Brandenfels, von, Generalmajor Horst Freiherr Treusch: 264 

Cabourg: 165 

Caen: 67n, 74, 75, 76, 78, 182, 183, 184, 188, 257, 278, 

300, 332, 333, 339, 348-49, 350,371, 373, 374, 375, 

408,428,443,444,445,446-48 

as assault area: 56,57,71, 72,73 

decision to make main assault in vicinity of: 72-73 

terrain: 180-81 

Cahagnes: 375,380 

Cairo Conference: 112, 113, 113n, 126-27,166,213 

attitude of British toward OVERLORD prior to: 122 

preliminary policy discussions: 120-122 

Calais: 8, 12 

Cambe, la: 187n, 352-53,367 

Cambrai: 137 

Camouflage: 261n, 270,322,380 

Canada: 55,58-59,78,84 

Canadian Army, First: 53, 114 

Canadian Chief of Naval Staff: 84 

Canadian Division, 3d: 332, 339, 348n, 444 

Canchy: 367 

Canham, Col. Charles D. W.: 318, 324, 324n, 326-27, 

340-4L381-82 

Cap de Carteret: 260 

Cap Gris Nez: 23, 259 

Cap de la Hague: 260, 301,419,420,434,438,440 

Cap Levy: 438 

Carentan: 103, 187, 188, 278, 279, 280, 286, 288, 290, 

291, 293, 298, 347, 352, 371, 376, 377, 378n, 408, 

415 

Carentan causeway: 356.. 357-59 

Carillon, le: 383 

Carmick: 322n 

“Carpet” bombing: 428 

Carpiquet: 349 

Carrefour, le: 367 

Carrier pigeon: 319n 

Carriers: 84 

Carteret: 387 

Casablanca Conference: 38-45,46,47-49,63,83,107n, 

109, 112-13, 116, 120, 164,207-08, 211 

Casemating of coastal batteries: 262 

Cassidy, Lt. Col. Patrick J.: 281-82 

Casualties, Allied: 283, 290, 304, 324, 329, 359, 368, 

376, 378, 383, 388, 398, 401 

artillery: 388, 398, 402, 430, 432 

D-Day: 284, 284n, 288, 300, 300n, 313, 325n 330, 

330n 

Dieppe raid: 55 

drowning: 313 

exercise TIGER: 270, 270n 

friendly fire: 400 

glider landings: 329 

landing operations: 313, 315-17, 318-19 

machine gun fire: 313,315,324,380, 387,432 

mines: 324, 395 

mortar fire: 345, 387, 398,402,432 

officer: 287,319 

82d Airborne Division: 300, 300n, 329 

101st Airborne Division: 284n. 286,288 

1st Division: 330n, 376 

2d Division: 376 

4th Division: 329, 336 

29th Division: 330n, 376 

Casualties, German: 142-43, 142n. 281, 282, 283, 289, 

330,331,334,339n, 344,347,348,365,367,373-74, 

378,396,416,431,434,436 

Caumont: 370, 371, 373, 374, 377, 380, 446 

Caumont Gap: 366-77 

Cauquigny: 291,292,398 

Cavalry Group, 4th: 416,438,440 

Cavalry Squadrons 

4th: 304,416,417,421 

24th: 304,416,418,438 

102d: 374,380 

Chaney, Maj. Gen. James E.: 1, 2, 22 

Channel Islands: 23, 79, 131, 137, 242n 

Chartres: 78 

Chateau de Fontenay: 392 

Chsteaudun: 78 

“Chattanooga Day”: 230 

Chef-du-Pont: 289,291,292,398,400,401 

Chemical Battalion, Elst: 317 

Chemical mortars: 233n, 392 

Cherbourg: 21,23, 56,57, 73, 78, 81, 181, 182, 187-88, 

187n. 259,260,263,279,289-90,291,297,301,345, 

349, 350, 374, 376, 377, 421n, 426n. 447n 

capture: 386-449 

destruction: 441-42,442n 

field fortifications: 420 

port capacity increased: 442n 

reconstruction of port begun: 441-42 

Rommel’s plans for defense of: 413 

Cherbourg Landfront: 388, 420-21 

Chevres, les: 429 

Chiang Kai-shek. Generalissimo: 43 

INDEX 

Brooke. Gen. Sir Alan: 4. 17. 17n. 25. 38-40. 43-45. 

48. 68. 96n. 113. 171-72.221 

argues for Mediterranean operations: 40--41 

attitude toward OVERLORD: 96. 97. 98. 99 

Browning. Lt. Gen. F. A. M.: 207 

Brownjohn. Maj. Gen. N. C. D.: 52 

Brucheville: 260 

BUCCANEER: 126 

Buelowius. Generalleutnant Alfred: 266-U7 

Buhot: 321 

Build-up schedules: 188n. 351 

Bulldozers: 317 

"Bunker paralysis.": 430 

Bureau Central de Renseignements et d'Action 

(BCRA) : 198-99.200.205 

Burma Road: 126 

Buteaux.les: 382 

Buttlar-Brandenfels. von. Generalmajor Horst Freiherr Treusch: 264 

Cabourg: 165 

Caen: 67n. 74. 75. 76. 78. 182. 183. 184. 188.257.278. 

300. 332. 333. 339. 348-49. 350. 371. 373. 374. 375. 

408.428.443.444.445.446-48 

as assault area: 56.57.71.72.73 

decision to make main assault in vicinity of: 72-73 

terrain: 180--81 

Cahagnes: 375.380 

Cairo Conference: 112.113. 113n. 126-27. 166.213 

attitude of British toward OVERLORD prior to: 122 

preliminary policy discussions: 120-122 

Calais: 8. 12 

Cam be. la: 187n. 352-53. 367 

CambTai: 137 

Camouflage: 261n. 270.322. 380 

Canada: 55.58-59.78.84 

Canadian Army. First: 53. 114 

Canadian Chief of Naval Staff: 84 

Canadian Division. 3d: 332. 339. 348n. 444 

Canchy: 367 

Canham. Col. Charles D. W.: 318.324. 324n. 326-27. 

340--41.381--82 

Cap de Carteret: 260 

Cap Gris Nez: 23. 259 

Cap de la Hague: 260. 301.419.420.434.438.440 

Cap Levy: 438 

Carentan: 103. 187. 188. 278. 279. 280. 286. 288. 290, 

291.293. 298. 347. 352. 371. 376. 377. 378n. 408, 

415 

Carentan causeway: 356,.357-59 

Carillon, Ie: 383 

Carmick: 322n 

"Carpet" bombing: 428 

Carpiquet: 349 

Carrefour.le: 367 

Carrier pigeon: 319n 

Carriers: 84 

Carteret: 387 

499 

Casablanca Conference: 38-45.46.47-49.63.83. 107n. 

109. 112-13. 116. 120. 164.207-08.211 

Casemating of coastal batteries: 262 

Cassidy. Lt. Col. Patrick J.: 281-82 

Casualties. Allied: 283. 290. 304. 324. 329. 359. 368. 

376. 378. 383. 388. 398. 401 

artillery: 388. 398. 402. 430. 432 

D-Day: 284. 284n. 28il. 300. 300n. 313. 325n. 330. 

330n 

Dieppe raid: 55 

drowning: 313 

exercise TIGER: 270. 270n 

friendly fire: 400 

glider landings: 329 

landing operations: 313.315-17.318-19 

machine gun fire: 313.315.324.380.387.432 

mines: 324. 395 

mortar fire: 345. 387. 398. 402. 432 

officer: 287.319 

82d Airborne Division: 300. 300n. 329 

IOlst Airborne Division: 284n. 286. 288 

1st Division: 330n. 376 

2d Division: 376 

4th Division: 329. 336 

29th Division: 330n. 376 

Casualties. German: 142-43. 142n. 281. 282. 283. 289. 

330. 331. 334. 339n. 344. 347. 348. 365. 367. 373-74. 

378.396.416.431.434.436 

Caumont: 370. 371. 373. 374. 377. 380. 446 

Caumont Gap: 366-77 

Cauquigny: 291.292.398 

Cavalry Group. 4th: 416.438.440 

Cavalry Squadrons 

4th: 304.416.417.421 

24th: 304.416.418.438 

102d: 374.380 

Chaney. Maj. Gen. James E.: 1.2.22 

Channel Islands: 23.79. 131. 137. 242n 

Chartres: 78 

Chateau de Fontenay: 392 

Chateaudun: 78 

"Chattanooga Day": 230 

Chef-du-Pont: 289.291.292.398.400.401 

Chemical Battalion. 81st: 317 

Chemical mortars: 233n.392 

Cherbourg: 21.23.56.57.73.78.81. 181. 182, 187-88. 

187n. 259. 260. 263. 279. 289-90. 291.297. 301.345. 

349.350.374.376.377. 421n. 426n.447n 

capture: 386-449 

destruction: 441-42. 442n 

field fortifications: 420 

port capacity increased: 442n 

reconstruction of port begun: 441-42 

Rommel's plans for defense of: 413 

Cherbourg Land/ront: 388. 420-21 

Chevres. les: 429 

Chiang Kai-shek, Generalissimo: 43 
500 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander. See 

COSSAC. 

China: 3G, 43 

Churchill, Winston: 4, G, 11, 12, lG, 18-19, 18n, 21-22, 

23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 31, 31n, 35, 38, 40, 41, 44, 

45, 48, Gl, 64, G8, 69, 91n, 95, 9Gn, 119, 160, 173n 

ANVIL-OVERLORD debate, January-March 1944: 168, 

172 

and bombing of French railroads: 223 

on choice of a supreme commander: 44 

concept of ROUNDUP: 23 

favors GYMNAST at London conference of 20 July 

1942: 28-29 

and French Resistance: 203 

interest in eastern Mediterranean: 119-20 

and landing craft requirements: Gl, 64 

on need of guiding and controlling subordinate 

commanders: 109 

pleads for “elasticity” in OVERLORD in order to expedite Mediterranean operations: 122 

and problem of air force command: 219-20 

proposed attack on the “underbelly” or Axis: 35 

questions feasibility of SLEDGEHAMMER: 28-29 

role as military leader: 90-92 

suggests appointment of Marshall to command 

OVERLORD: 113 

suggests that OVERLORD plan !)c enlarged: 99 

suggests planning for operation in Norway: 98 

suggests supplying French guerillas by air: 99 

suggests use of floating piers: 22 

at Tehran Conference: 122-26 

upset by Dodecanese defeat: 122 

urges GYMNAST: 26,27,28-29 

urges Mediterranean operations at the Casablanca 

Conference: 40, 41-42 

wants assault increased to four divisions: 102 

Civilians: 156, 202, 222-23, 228,410 

Clark, Gen. Mark: 111 

Close-support craft: 67. See also Support craft. 

Coastal batteries: 131, 176-77, 194, 2Gln 

Allied air force assigned mission of neutralizing: 

19496 

casemating of: 262 

estimated force required to silence: 193 

neutralization plan: 193-97, 308 

Coastal current: 313, 317 

Coastal defense, German theory of: 326 

Coastal defense works, German, four classes of: 309n 

Coastal position, typical: 324 

COCKADE: 51,70,71 

Code messages: 205-06 

Cole, Lt. Col. Robert G.: 280-81, 359, 359n 

Colleville: ISOn, 182, 309, 313, 315, 318, 324, 325, 326, 

328, 329, 330, 334, 337 

Colleville-sur-Mer: 72 

Collins, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton: 301,344, 344n, 392,401, 

403, 404, 406, 415, 416, 417, 426-28, 433, 443. See 

also Corps, VII. 

Colombieres: 367 

Combat efficiency, German troops: 420-21,448 

Combat fatigue: 383 

Combat planes, short range of: 208n 

Combined Bomber Offensive: 180, 207-30, 265. See 

also Allied Expeditionary Air Force; Air Offensive, Allied. 

Combined Chiefs of Staff: 2, 25, 33, 35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 

42, 44-45, 47-49, 64, 67, 69, 70, 71, 74, 75, 80, 83, 

84, lG5n, l88,209n, 274 

and the ANVIL-OWRLORD debate, January-March 

1944: 164-65, 166, 167, 169 

British Joint Planners and Combined Staff Planners responsible to: 5 

and the Cairo-Tehran Conferences: 117, 119,125 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 207,209,212 

and landing craft procurement program: 101,104 

operations in Mediterranean to be subject to approval by: 70 

and organization of COSSAC: 47-49 

organization and duties: 2,6 

and Outline OVERLORD: 74 

and problem of control of strategic air forces: 219- 

20 

and proposed operations against Italy: 87, 93, 98 

at the Quebec Conference: 94-95,98-99, 100 

and questions of OVERLON) command: 106, 107-09, 

111,112,113-14 

Combined Commanders: 22,23, 31,47,48, 57, 58, 59 

development of new planning staff in accordance 

with decisions at Casablanca Conference: 47-51 

directed to study SLEDGEHAMMER: 12 

estimate of size of assault: 59 

formation of: 6 

Gen. Morgan chief staff officer to: 48 

and organization of COSSAC: 47-51 

point out difficulties inherent in SLEDGEHAMMER. 

12-13 

produce SKYSCRAPER plan: 57 

report on possibility of invasion of the Pas-deCalais, April 1942: 13 

Combined Operations Headquarters: 5,162 

Combined Planning Staff: 5n, 19, 33, 126 

Command 

American versus British views of: 108-10 

principle of unity of: 10Gn 

problems caused by officer casualties: 319 

questions of: 105-17, 218-21 

Commando, defined: 57n 

Commandos: 54, 56, 73, 135, 136, 171, 320, 322n, 339 

Committee of Operations Analysts: 208-09 

Commune, la: 366 

Communette, la: 366 

Communication 

destruction of equipment during landings on 

OMAHA Beach; 319,319n 

letter by courier: 365 

Communications bunker, behind American lines: 429 
INDEX 

Communications. German: 297-98. 368 

"Composite Group Headquarters": 54 

Concentric attacks: 293-97. 360--64 

Concrete emplacements. ineffectiveness of naval fire 

against: 193 

Congress. Marshall's relationship with: ]]3 

Coningham. Air Marshal Sir Arthur: 54n 

Conseil National de la Resistance, Ie: 199 

Convoy system. reorganized: 84 

Cooke, Rear Adm. Charles M .• Jr.: 65. 169 

Corlett. Maj. Gen. Charles H.: 377. 377n. 379. 381. 

See also Corps. XIX. 

Cormolain: 377 

"Corncobs" (Blockships): 272n 

Corps. II: 114 

Corps. V: 19. 53, 70. 187-88, 196. 286, 305-08. 320. 

See also Gerow. Maj. Gen. Leonard T. 

junction with VII Corps: 351--65 

lodgment. 7-18 June: 336--84 

Corps. VI: 169 

Corps. VII: 66. 158. 182, 187-88. 188n. 269. 302, 336. 

336n, 341. 342, 347. 350. 365, 366. 376. See also 

Collins. Maj. Gen. J. Lawton 

airborne assault: 278-300 

and capture of Cherbourg: 386-449 

and D·Day beachhead: 328-30 

junction with V corps: 351-65 

landing on UTAH Beach: 302-04.328 

Corps. VIII: 415.416,440 

Corps. XV: 447 

Corps. XIX: 188. 366. 376, 377. 379. See also Corlett. 

Maj. Gen. Charles H. 

Corps, British. See British units. 

Corps. German. See German units. 

COSSAC (Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander): 51-54. 52n. 57.58. 58n. 63. 66. 69. 72n. 

107n 

Gen. Morgan's ap'pointment as: 48-51 

increasing responsibilities: 52 

and landing craft requirements: 66--67 

organization and powers: 51-52 

plans: 70-82 

Cota. Brig. Gen. Norman D.: 318.324. 324n. 337. 364 

Coteaux du Perche: 78 

Cotentin Peninsula: 103. 165. 166. 177. 182. 185. 186. 

187.259.260.264 

assault on ruled out: 72 

cutting of: 396-408 

terrain: 180 

Cottot: 403 

Coulombs: 331 

Counterattack 

expected by Americans on D-plus-3: 372 

German doctrine of: 153-54 

measures taken as insurance against: 367 

Courseulles: 72. I80n. 332. 348 

Coutances: 334. 338. 349-50 

Couvains: 376. 381 

COlI ville: 417 

Creek. Capt. Roy E.: 292-93 

Crepon: 321. 330 

Cresserons: 332 

Crisbecq: 341.342.386.390-92 

Crocker. Lt. Gen. J. T.: 189 

Croix Rouge. la: 380 

CROSSBOW: 215-17. 215n 

Crossroads 114: 429 

Crossroads 177: 429 

Culoville: 282. 283. 347 

501 

Cunningham. Admiral Sir Andrew B.: 4n, 168, 168n 

D Day 

forecasting weather for: 73 

selection of: 188-90 

Daladier, Edouard: 137 

Dangueville: 392 

Dartmouth: 272 

Davison, Capt. R. E.: 5n 

Daylight bombing, controversy over: 208. 209 

DD tanks: 192n, 304, 309, 315 

De Guingand, Maj. Gen. Sir Francis: 160 

Deane, Maj. Gen. John Russell: 121-22, 121n 

Deauville: 8, 12 

Defense, coastal, initial effectiveness: 326 

Defense, German: 383-84 

aided by hedgerows: 326 

disagreement over doctrine of defense in depth: 

151-56 

effect of air borne drops: 396 

effectiveness of scattered resistance by small 

groups: 326 

field fortifications: 386, 420 

lack of freedom of maneuver: 351 

policy of maintaining intact defense: 351 

positions prepared in depth: 375-76 

unable to concentrate forces against airborne land· 

ings: 282, 298-300 

DeFranzo, S/Sgt. Arthur F.: 368n 

De Gaulle, Gen. Charles: 198-200 

Delestrain, Gen.: 200 

Demolitions: 304,315-17,390,436, 442n 

Denmark: 231, 246n, 412 

De Rohan, Col. Frederick J.: 403,404.419 

Destroyer escorts: 62, 104 

Destroyer Flotilla, 8th: 301 

Destroyers, Allied: 261n 

Destroyers, German: 261n 

Devers, Lt. Gen. Jacob L.: 53. 53n. 101. 106. 109. 1I4, 

1I5 

Deville: 364 

Dewing, Maj. Gen. R. H.: 4n 

Dieppe raid: 53.54-55,136,137,152,183,190-91,193, 

262,327n 

Digosville: 430, 432 

Dijon: 79 

Dill, Field Marshal Sir John: 4, 4n. 25. 31n, 48n 
502 

Directive No. 40: 133-35,459-63 

Directive No. 51: 148, 151, 152, 154,231,233,234,257, 

464-67 

Distinguished Service Cross: 281n, 290n, 293n, 317, 

318n, 320n, 322n, 324n, 347n, 369n, 473-76 

Dive·bombing attack: 432 

Diversionary attacks: 76 

Dives River: 78 

Divisions, British. See British units. 

Divisions, German. See also Infantry division, Ger· 

man; Panzer Division; Panzer Grenadier Divi· 

sion 

characteristics: 175-76 

four categories of: 254n 

Dodecanese Islands: 119, 122 

Dodigny: 368 

Doenitz, Grossadmiral Karl: 83,84,232,275 

Dollmann, Generaloberst Friedrich: 230, 261n, 275, 

293,297,334,335,350,351,371,379,395,411,445 

Domfront: 188 

Doolittle, Lt. Gen. James H.: 213,219 

Dorchester: 269 

Douet: 367 

Douglas, Air Marshal Sholto: 6 

Douve River: 181-82, 186, 187, 187n, 280, 282, 286, 

287,288,289,290,293,298,321,347,357,359,361, 

401,402,404,406,40B 

Douvres: 330 

Doyle: 322n 

DRAGOON: 173n 

D'reux: 78, 186 

Drome corridor: 353 

Dr6me River: 337, 338, 339, 443, 444 

Droueries, les: 288, 348 

DUKW'S: 309, 320, 426, 442 

Dunes de Varreville: les, 165, 302 

Dunkerque: 12,57, 91, 259 

Eaker, Brig. Gen. Ira C.: 19, 47, 108, 208, 209, 212n, 

213,214 

Eastern Defense Command: 1I4 

Eastern Naval Task Force: 190 

East-West troop exchanges: 141-43,146-47,175 

Eberbach, General der Panzertruppen Heinrich: 447 

Ecausseville: 386, 3B7-.gB 

Ecqueneauville: 342 

Eddy, Maj. Gen. Manton: 403, 403n, 406, 417, 419, 

420, 438. 440. See also Infantry Division. 9th 

Eden. Anthony: IB, 121n 

Edwards. Col.: 113n 

Egypt: 25, 26, 29 

Eighth Air Force: 21,47, B6, 108, 1I 1, 196, 211n, 212n, 

269n,300 

attack on French railroads: 219, 223-24 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 208-10, 208n. 

211,212.213-14,215 

Eisenhower, Gen. Dwight D.: 1I-12, 15n, 26-27, 26n, 

28, 29-32, 46, 70, 87n, 105, 1I1, 113n, 160, 164. 

CROSS·CHANNEL ATTACK 

165n, 166n, 173n. 174,212,274,276,351.352,403. 

448, 449. See also Supreme Allied Commander; 

Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary 

Force 

and airborne planning: 18~6 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate. January-March 

1944: 165,167,168.169,170-.73 

appointed commander of OVERLORD: 112.114 

appointed commander of TORCH: 31-32 

appointed Commanding General. ETOUSA: 26 

appoints Gen. Hartle executive deputy theater 

commander: 46 

attitude toward GYMNAST: 29-30 

attitude toward SLEDGEHAMMER: 29 

complains against British tendency to freeze or· 

ganization: 108-09 

and controversy over bombing of French railroads: 

219--23 

directive to: 457-58 

disagrees with Churchill on GYMNAST: 27 

favors mainland operations against Italy: 87 

on method of assisting Soviet Union: 11-12 

opposed to Aegean offensive: 119 

opposes invasion of Southern France: 125 

ordered to draw plans for invasion of Southern 

France: 99 

outlines situation in Italy, 24 October 1943: 117, 

119 

and problem of command of strategic air forces: 

219--21 

and problem of selection of D Day: 269. 272-74 

and shortage of landing craft: 270 

takes over direction of strategic air forces in sup· 

port of OVERLORD: 223 

takes up duties as SAC: 158, 164 

on vertical envelopment: 185 

Ekman, Col. William E.: 290, 388 

EI Alamein: 25 

Eleventh Amphibious Force: 160 

Elle River: 366. 368, 369. 373, 375, 3B2 

Elliott, Col. Walter A.: 369 

Embarkation, organization for: 269-70 

Emmons: 322n 

Emondeville: 302, 3BB 

Engineer Battalion, 2d: 3BI 

Engineer Combat Battalions 

37th: 325 

146th: 325 

Engineer Port Construction and Repair Group, 

1056th: 442 

Engineers: 304, 315-17, 336, 360. See also Engineer 

units. 

casualties suffered in removing beach obstacles: 

315, 317 

demolition teams: 192-93 

used as infantry: 381 

Engranville: 337, 338 

Entrenchments: 418 
INDEX 

Envelopment: 185. 357. 361-64 

Equeurdreville: 432. 434 

Equipment. See Shortages: Supply. 

Escures: 339 

Esquay-sur·Seulles: 331. 444 

Etreham: 339 

Etretat: 16 

ETOUSA: 31. 46. 53. 54. 64 

Eure River: 78. 180 

Evill. Air Marshal D. C. S.: 4n 

Evreux: 78 

Ewell. Lt. Col. Julian: 283. 356 

FABIUS: 270 

Fahrmbacher. General der Artillerie Wilhelm: 404. 

404n. 413-14 

Falaise: 181 

Falkenhorst. von. General der Infanterie Nikolaus: 

135n 

Falley. Generalleutnant Wilhelm: 297.396 

Falmouth: 269.272 

Fauville: 329. 342 

Felber. General der Infanterie Hans·Gustav: 143-44 

Fermanville: 176 

Ferry Command: 62 

Ferrying craft: 423 

Feuchtinger. Generalleutnant Edgar: 332-33 

Fieffes Dancel. les: 393 

Field Artillery Battalions. See also Armored Field 

Artillery Battalions; Parachute Field Artillery 

Battalion. 

7th: 313 

38th: 369 

44th: 440 

60th: 415. 416 

l11th: 309 

311th: 434 

Field orders: 187. 187n. 350. 417 

Fields of fire: 390 

Fiere. la: 289. 291-93. 345. 396-401 

Fifteenth Air Force: 212. 213. 218 

Fifth Army: 169 

Fighter aircraft. effort to destroy in Combined 

Bomber Offensive: 209-10 

Fighter bombers: 373. 376. 428 

Fire and maneuver. doctrine of: 402 

Fire power. U. S. and German infantry divisions: 

470 

Fire support. See Artillery; Naval Fire Support. 

Fire support plan: 193-94. 197 

First Canadian Army: 53. 114 

First U. S. Army: 110. 114. 165. 182. 183. 183n. 185. 

187. 188. 320. 321. 336. 361. 365. 372. 372n. 374. 

376. 377. 378. 386. 423. 428. 438. 447 

counterbattery plan: 196 

established in England: 53 

naval fire support for: 193-94 

and the NEPTUNE plans: 174 

503 

takes over operational control of American ground 

forces in the United Kingdom: 158 

First U. S. Army Group (FUSAG). activated: 115 

Flame throwers: 192.390 

Flank security: 393. 395. 403. 406. 417 

Flares. use of: 189 

Fleche. la: 371 

Flint. Col. Harry A.: 392. 393. 419 

Floating piers: 22. 73-74 

Floating reserve: 103. 182. 191. 327. 327n 

Floods: 286-87. 353. 367 

Flottemanville-Hague: 419.420.421. 429. 431 

Flying bombs: 215-17 

Focke-Wulf 190: 265 

"Follow·up" divisions. defined: 69n 

Fontenay-sur-Mer: 302.387.392 

Force B. See Task Force B. 

Force O. See Task Force O. 

Force U. See Task Force U. 

FFi (Forces Franfaises de l'[nterieur): 206-07 

Foret de Cerisy: 264. 321. 366. 368. 369. 371. 372. 

372n. 373, 375. 376 

Forges. les: 302. 328. 342. 345 

Formigny: 328.337. 337n. 338. 339 

Fort des F1amands: 433 

Fort du Roule. 429. 432. 434-36 

Fort St. Marcouf: 392. 395 

Forti fica tions 

attacks at Crisbecq and Azeville: 390-92 

in Cherbourg area: 420. 434 

Ozeville: 392 

permanent coastal artillery positions at Crisbecq 

and Azeville: 341-42 

plan for assaulting: 308 

use of demolitions against: 436 

FORTITUDE: 76n 

Fossardiere: 381 

Fosse Soucy: 339 

Fotelaie. la: 367 

Foucarville: 281. 304 

Fournel. Ie: 281-82 

France. Southern. 93. 173n. See also ANVIL. 

German occupation of: 143 

historic invasion route through: 144-45 

invasion discussed at Quebec Conference: 99-100 

railroad targets: 218 

Resistance: 198. 202-03 

Stalin urges assault on: 123-26 

Franco. Francisco: 97 

Francs Tireurs et Partisans: 198 

Frankford: 322n 

Freiwilligen: 145 

French civilians: 156. 202. 222-23. 228. 410 

French guerilla forces. See French- Resistance_ 

French Labor Service: 252. 263 

French Resistance: 52. 52n. 224. 236. 275-76, 297. 408 

and national unification: 198-99 

plans for direct military action hv: 206-07 
504 CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

French Resistance: (Continued) 

sabotage by: 203-04, 408-10 

SHAEF considers mass uprisings unlikely: 202 

supplies sent to: 201-02, 201n, 203, 203n, 207 

Front National: 198 

Fuesilier battalion, organization: 237 

Funck, von, General der Panzertruppen Hans Freiherr: 235, 373 

Gare Maritime: 441 

Gasoline: Germans short of, 3G0, 410, 411 

Gavin, Brig. Gen. James A.: 291, 29ln, 398, 400 

George, Lt. Col. Alexander: 382, 382n 

Gerhardt, Maj. Gen. Charles H.: 327, 327n, 337, 352, 

382, 383. See also Infantry Division, 29th. 

German Admiralty: 83 

German Air Force. See Luftwaffe. 

German Armed Forces of the Netherlands: 246 

German Army. See also German units: Reserves, 

German. 

average age of troops: 147 

command and tactics: 242-58 

lack of replacements: 147 

organization for combat: 236-42 

physical standards relaxed: 146-47 

racial composition: 145 

strength in December 1943: 147 

strength on 6 June 1944: 471 

German combat troops 

characteristics of: 282 

used as construction workers: 252 

German defense. See Defense, German. 

German industries, and Combined Bomber Offensive: 207-10, 223 

German Navy: 129, 130, 131, 137, 243, 259, 301 

German units. See also German Army. 

Army, First: 130, 143. 233, 242, 247, 248, 258, 412 

Army, First Panzer: 235 

Army, First Parachute: 238n 

Army, Sixth: 234 

Army, Seventh: 130, 138, 141, 146, 225, 227, 239n, 

242, 242n, 246, 252, 254, 258, 260, 263, 275, 278, 

293, 293n. 305, 332, 334, 338, 348-51, 370, 374, 

378, 379, 386, 396n 404, 408-11, 413, 413-14, 

414n, 415, 421, 438, 442n. 443, 444, 446 

Army, Eighth: 234 

Army, Fifteenth: 130, 138, 138n. 141, 154, 242, 250, 

252, 257, 257n, 258, 275, 278, 351, 411, 412, 446 

Army, Nineteenth: 144, 232, 242, 247, 248, 258, 412 

Army Felber: 143 

Army Group A: 130 

Army Group B: 87, 130, 149, 246, 248, 249, 275, 

332, 414, 446 

Army Group C: 130, 149n 

Army Group D: 130 

Army Group G: 248 

Army Group Center: 141 

Army Group North: 141, 233 

Army Group South: 132 

Army Group for Special Employment: 149, 243-46 

Batlalion, lst, 6th Parachute Regiment: 298, 347 

Battalion, 2d, 6th Parachute Regiment: 298, 356- 

57 

Battalion, 3d, 6th Parachute Regiment: 298, 358 

Battalion, Seventh Army Sturm: 260, 297, 342- 

44, 387, 418 

Battalion, 17th Machine Gun: 260, 420 

Battalion, 2d, 191st Artillery Regiment: 283 

Battalion, 100th Panzer Replacement: 260, 260n, 

292n, 293, 402 

Battalion, 206th Panzer: 260 

Battalion, 3d, 243d Artilley Regiment: 342, 416, 

416n 

Battalion, 275th Fuesilier: 379n 

Battalion, 352d Antitank: 330n 

Battalion, 352d Fuesilier: 257, 330n, 338 

Battalion, 439th Ost: 353 

Battalion, 441st Ost: 321 

Battalion, 456th Artillery: 297, 342, 387 

Battalion, 457th Artillery: 297, 387 

Battalion, 513th, 30th Mobile Brigade: 338 

Battalion, 642d Ost: 254 

Battalion, 709th Antitank: 297, 342 

Battalion, 3d, 726th Regiment: 319n 

Battalion, 795th Georgian: 254, 2G0, 297, 342 

Battalion, lst, 914th Regiment: 322 

Battalion, Ist, 915th Regiment: 330n 

Battalion, 2d, 915th Regiment: 330, 338 

Battalion, lst, 916th Regiment: 321 

Battalion, 2d, 916th Regiment: 338 

Battalion, Ist, 919th Regiment: 297 

Battalion, 3d, 919th Regiment: 147n, 278, 393 

Battalion, 2d, 921st Regiment: 395n 

Battalion, Engineer, 922d Regiment: 297n 

Battalion, lst, 922d Regiment: 395n 

Battalion, lst, 984th Regiment: 379n 

Battalion, 2d, 984th Regiment: 379n 

Battalion, 2d, 1058th Regiment: 357 

Battalion, 3d, 1058th Regiment: 288, 298, 356 

Battalion, 3d, 1261st Artillery Regiment: 387 

Battalion, 3d, 1352d Artillery Regiment: 338 

Battalion, 3d, 1716th Artillery Regiment: 319n, 

353 

Brigade, 7th Werfer: 444 

Brigade, 30th Mobile: 334, 338, 339, 339n, 353 

Corps, I SS t anzer: 334,348,349,371,374,408,443, 

444 

Corps, II Parachute: 252, 349, 371, 373, 377, 443, 

444 

Corps, II SS Panzer: 235, 411, 443, 444, 445 

Corps, XXI: 135n 

Corps, XXV: 334, 404n 

Corps, XLVII Panzer: 235, 373, 443 

Corps, LXXIV: 260, 379 

Corps, LXXXIV: 138, l55,242n, 252,254, 260, 263, 

278, 280n. 297-98, 305, 330, 334, 360, 369, 371, 

377, 404, 404n, 408, 413, 414, 414n. 417, 443, 446 
INDEX 

German units: (Continued) 

Corps, LXXXVI: 412,443 

Division, 1st 55 Panzer: 235, 24Q, 248, 372, 412, 

442, 444 

Division, 2d Panzer: 240, 373, 374-75, 377, 412 

Division, 2d Parachute: 238, 238n 

Division, 2d 55 Panzer: 206, 248, 412, 442, 442n, 

444, 445, 446 

Division, 3d Parachute: 238-39, 238n, 239n, 252, 

349, 350n, 371, 373, 375, 380, 382 

Division, 5th Parachute: 238, 252, 253 

Division, 6th Panzer: 141 

Division, 9th 55 Panzer: 233, 234, 235, 240, 248, 

411,412,442,445 

Division, 10th 55 Panzer: 235, 411, 412, 442, 445 

Division, 11 th Panzer: 248, 372 

Division, 12th 55 Panzer: 248, 333-34, 348, 349, 

373,412,442, 444 

Division, 16th Luftwaffe Field: 446 

Division, 17th 55 Panzer Grenadier: 239-40, 248, 

349, 350n, 360, 364, 364n, 365, 371-73, 372n, 374, 

376, 378n, 379 

Division, 19th Luftwaffe Field: 235 

Division, 21st Panzer: 235, 242, 248, 257, 257n, 

319n, 332, 334, 348, 349, 373, 444 

Division, 60th Panzer Grenadier: 148 

Division, 77th: 238, 238n, 257n, 334, 349, 350n, 

371, 387, 395, 404, 413-15, 414n, 416, 417, 430 

Division, 89th: 233n 

Division, 91st: 186, 238, 260, 278, 288, 289, 293, 

293n, 297, 336, 387, 393, 396, 404, 408, 413, 417 

Division, 116th Panzer: 248 

Division, 243d: 254, 254n, 258, 387, 395, 413, 417, 

420, 430 

Division, 265th: 254, 379 

Division, 266th: 254, 334 

Division, 275th: 254, 257, 257n, 364 

Division, 276th: 442 

Division, 277th: 442 

Division, 319th: 131, 242n 

Division, 326th: 235 

Division, 331st: 235 

Division, 346th: 235, 257n 

Division, 348th: 235 

Division, 349th: 235 

Division, 352d: 238n, 254-57, 254n, 264, 286, 319, 

319n, 320, 321, 322n, 330, 331n, 334-35, 337-39, 

337n, 339n, 340, 348, 353, 367, 368, 369, 369n, 

372, 373, 375, 379n, 380, 382, 383 

Division, 353d: 254, 257, 257n, 371-72, 382 

Division, 361st: 235 

Division, 709th: 147, 238, 252, 254, 258, 260. 263. 

278. 283. 286. 288. 293. 293n. 297. 298. 330. 387. 

413. 417 

Division, 711 th: 278 

Division, 715th: 234 

Division, 716th: 238.254,257.264. 264n. 278. 319n. 

321, 332, 334, 338, 370, 372 

505 

Division, Panzer Lehr: 234.235. 248, 333. 334. 348. 

349, 370, 372-75. 412. 442. 444 

Gruppe XXI: 135n 

Kampfgruppe Boehm: 382 

KamPfgruppe Heintz: 371, 378-79 

Kampfgruppe Hellmich: 395. 413 

Kampfgruppe Hoffman: 387n. 395 

KamPfgruppe Keil: 387n 

KamPfgruppe Meyer: 330-31. 338 

KamPfgruppe Mueller: 387n 

Regiment, 6th Parachute: 238. 238n. 239. 260. 286. 

288, 293. 297-300. 356 

Regiment. 15th Parachute: 430 

Regiment, 37th 55 Panzer Grenadier: 371 

Regiment, 38th 55 Panzer Grenadier: 371 

Regiment, 101st 5tellungswerfer: 260. 260n 

Regiment, 191st Artillery: 328 

Regiment, 243d Artillery: 387 

Regiment, 352d Artillery: 254. 257n. 353 

Regiment, 726th: 257, 319n. 331. 338. 339. 340. 353 

Regiment, 729th: 345.418.420 

Regiment, 739th: 420 

Regiment, 9I4th: 341,350.353.367 

Regiment, 915th: 257n. 321. 330 

Regiment, 916th: 320.324.330.334.337.338. 369n 

Regiment, 919th: 345. 420 

Regiment, 920th: 297n 

Regiment, 922d: 297n, 345. 420 

Regiment, 943d: 382 

Regiment, 984th: 378 

Regiment, 1049th: 402 

Regiment, 1050th Grenadier: 416 

Regiment, 1057th: 293. 345.401 

Regiment, 1058th: 283. 293. 293n. 297. 342, 344. 

357 

Germany. 5ee also German units; Hitler. 

collapse of: 79-82. 120 

and combined Bomber Offensive: 207-17 

planning the defeat of: 8-11 

Gerow, Brig. Gen. Leonard T.: 5n, 187. 305. 308n. 

320. 327. 361. 365. 375. 444. See also Corps V. 

Gestapo: 200 

Geyr von Schweppenburg, General der Panzertrup· 

pen Leo Freiherr: 153. 156n, 247. 248. 248n, 348. 

349,373-74. 373n.443.444. 445n. 446. 447 

Ghormley, Rear Adm. Robert L.: 1.2 

Gibraltar: 97, 129n 

Ginder. Col. Philip H.: 401. 402 

Glacerie. la: 430, 432 

Glider Infantry Battalion: 356n 

Glider Infantry Battalions. 5ee also Battalions. 

1st. 325th Glider Infantry: 396-98. 400 

2d, 325th Glider Infantry: 388 

3d. 325th Glider Infantry: 398 

1st. 327th Glider Infantry: 364 

2d. 327th Glider Infantry: 364 

3d. 327th Glider Infantry: 356. 356n 
506 

Glider Infantry Battalions: (Continued) 

1st, 40lst Glider Infantry: 356n 

2d, 40lst Glider Infantry: 356n 

Glider Infantry Regiments 

325th: 300, 329, 345, 398, 401, 402, 403, 404, 406 

327th: 356n, 357, 359, 361---u4, 365 

401st: 356n 

Glider landings: 186, 283, 298, 300, 329 

Glider regiments, organization: 356n 

Gliders: 184n, 250, 279, 345 

Goebbels, Josef Paul: 140n 

Goering, Reichsmarschall Hermann: 130, 133, 133n, 

136,238,253,265 

Golleville: 417 

Gonneville: 421, 430, 438 

Goode, Col. Paul R.: 341,364, 382n 

Gouesmerie, la: 372n 

Gourbesville: 402, 404, 420 

Grand Hameau, Ie: 328 

Grandcamp-Ies-Bains: 75, 78, 353, 423 

Grande Huanville: 415 

Greece: 35,41, 122 

Grenades: 359, 436 

Greville: 441 

Gronde River: 331 

Group von Schlieben: 413, 414 

Gruchy: 341,438,440,441 

Gruenther, Brig. Gen. Alfred W.: 32 

Guderian, Generaloberst Heinz: 241,242 

Guerrillas, French. See French Resistance. 

Gun-support craft. See Support craft. 

Guns. See Artillery; Howitzers; Mortars; Self-propelled guns; Weapons. 

Guns, German: 176, 240n, 241, 368, 383, 420, 441 

20-mm.: 383, 420 

75-mm.: 240, 240n, 330 

76.2-mm.: 240 

88-mm.: 239,240,241,368,383,387,420,436 

122-mm.: 297 

150-mm.: 297 

155-mm.: 177n, 196,308,322 

I70-mm.: 177 

21O-mm.: 341 

240-mm.: 176 

Gustav Line: 169 

GYMNAST: 10-11, 15,26,27,29,30,31 

H Hour: 188-90 

Haig, Field Marshal Sir Douglas: 4n 

Halder, Generaloberst Franz: 128n 

Haley: 340 

Hall, Rear Adm. John L.: 160, 160n, 301, 322n, 327, 

426 

Ham, Ie: 386,387, 387n, 388, 415 

Hameau Gringer: 432, 436 

Hamel, Ie: 331 

Hamel de Cruttes: 329 

Handy, Maj. Gen. Thomas T.: 35-36,60 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Harcourt: 349 

Harding: 322n 

Hardinvast: 429, 432 

HARLEQUIN: 70 

Harper, Col. Joseph H.: 361, 365 

Harriman, W. Averell: 121n 

Harris, Air Marshal A_ T.: 4n, 5 

Hartle, Maj. Gen. Russell P.: 46 

Haskell, Col. Joseph P.: 203 

Hausser, Generaloberst der Waffen-SS Paul: 445, 446 

Haut Gueutteville: 293 

Haute-Littee: 369 

Hautteville-Bocage: 406, 415 

Haye du Puits, la: 260,413,414,415 

Heavy bombers: 196,217, 219. 300 

Hedgehogs: 250. See also Beach obstacles. 

Hedgerow cutters: 384 

Hedgerows: 284, 348, 356, 359, 361, 364. 368, 369. 376, 

380,386,400,402-03,406,422,449 

difficulties of fighting in: 297, 402-03 

tactics in: 381-82 

typical action in: 348, 380 

Helleville: 417, 429 

Hellmich, Generalleutnant Heinz: 395 

Hennecke, Konteradmiral Walther: 278, 438, 441-42 

Henneville: 440 

Heydte, von der, Major Friedrich-August Freiherr: 

293n, 297-98, 347, 347n, 348, 356, 357. 360. 364. 

364n 

Hiesville: 282, 283 

Higgins, Andrew J.: 60 

Hilfswillige: 145 

Hill 30: 293. 357, 361. 400 

Hill 35: 353 

Hill 64: 331 

Hill 90: 380 

Hill 97: 380 

Hill 102: 383 

Hill 108: 383 

Hill 115: 381 

Hill 133: 415 

Hill 145: 415. 

Hill 147: 381 

Hill 150: 380. 381 

Hill 158: 421 

Hill 170: 419 

Hill 171: 429, 431 

Hill 192: 375,376.380-81 

Hilpert, Generalleutnant Karl: 135 

Hitler: 133n. 152n. 232, 234, 237. 238. 241, 242n. 246. 

247, 248n, 248-49. 257, 258. 262, 275. 333. 350. 

414. 414n. See also Germany_ 

admonishes Schlieben on defense of Cherbourg: 

430 

Allied invasion of North Africa a complete surprise to: 143 

analysis of Dieppe raid: 137 

basic order for defense of the West: 133. 135 
INDEX 

Hitler: (Continued) 

Conference of 29 September 1942: 136-37 

Conference of 17 June 1944: 412-13.414 

Conference of 30 June 1944: 445-46 

decides to attack Soviet Union: 129-30 

and decline of Luftwaffe: 265 

and defeat of German submarine: 83-84 

effort to rebuild western defenses: 148-57 

estimates of Allied intentions: 138. 259. 259n 

intervention in the battle: 411-12. 414. 443. 445-46 

issues Directive 40: 133 

issues Directive 51: 148.231 

orders halt in shift of troops from Western to 

Eastern Front: 148.231.233 

policy of rigid defense: 152 

and projected invasion of England: 129 

regards Channel Islands important for political 

reasons: 131 

Rundstedt's visit to: 140 

takes direct command of Army: 131n 

Hobbs. Maj. Gen. Leland: 377. See also Infantry Division.30th. 

Hoffmann. Oberstleutnant: 147n. 278 

Holdy: 284 

Home Defense Command: 53 

Hommet d·Arthenay. Ie: 377 

Hopkins. Harry: 16. 18.21.27.28.30-31 

"Hornets." self-propelled 88-mm. antitank guns 

(German) : 241 

Horse-drawn artillery: 254 

Houdienville: 282. 283 

House-to-house fighting: 281.283 

Houesville: 357 

Howell. Brig. Gen. G_ P.: 402.402n 

Howitzers. 105-mm.: 197.284.309.341.356.383 

Huebner. Maj. Gen. Clarence R.: 305. 308n. 319. 

374. See also Infantry Division. 1st. 

Hughes-Hallett. Commodore J.: 53. 53n. 54n. 60 

Hull. Cordell: 121n 

Hull. Maj. Gen. John E.: 169 

Hungary: 234. 235. 246n 

Hupfer. Lt. Col. C. G.: 344 

Huppain: 337 

Hurst. S/Sgt. Paul A.: 436 

HUSKY: 70. 83. 86-87 

Iceland: 17. 19 

India: 17 

Infantry. American 

assault troop weapons: 192 

battle charge: 359. 387. 398. 441 

German estimate of: 337n 

Infantry. German. See German units. 

Infantry. German. organization: 236-42 

Infantry battalions. See also Antitank Battalions; 

Armored Field Artillery Battalions; Armored 

Infantry Battalions; Engineer Battalions; Engi· 

neer Combat Battalions; Field Artillery Battal507 

ions; Glider Infantry Battalions; Parachute 

Field Artillery Battalion; Parachute Infantry 

Battalions; Ranger Battalions; Tank Battalions_ 

1st. 8th Infantry: 304. 328. 312. 387-88. 422. 432 

2d. 8th Infantry: 283. 304. 328. 342. 344. 387. 422 

3d. 8th Infantry: 304. 329. 342. 422. 431 

2d. 9th Infantry: 368 

3d. 9th Infantry: 368-69 

1st. 12th Infantry: 432. 433 

3d. 12th Infantry: 388-90 

1st. 16th Infantry: 318. 324. 337 

2d. 16th Infantry: 315. 318. 324. 328. 337 

3d. 16th Infantry: 318. 325. 328. 337 

I st. 18th Infantry: 328 

2d. 18th Infantry: 325. 328. 337 

3d. 18th Infantry: 328. 337 

1st. 22d Infantry: 390. 421 

2d. 22d Infantry: 390 

3d. 22d Infantry: 302. 304. 341-42. 390. 418. 421 

1st. 26th Infantry: 337. 339 

2d. 26th Infantry: 337. 339 

3d. 26th Infantry: 337-38. 339 

1st. 38th Infantry: 369 

2d. 38th Infantry: 369 

3d. 38th Infantry: 369. 380 

1st. 39th Infantry: 392.395.416 

2d. 39th Infantry: 392 

3d. 39th Infantry: 392. 393 

1st. 47th Infantry: 419 

2d. 47th Infantry: 419-20. 441 

1st. 60th Infantry: 420. 440 

2d. 60th Infantry: 406. 420. 441 

3d. 60th Infantry: 408. 420. 440 

1st. 115th Infantry: 327.367.376.381.382 

2d. 115th Infantry: 327. 367. 368. 382 

3d. 115th Infantry: 327-28.367.368.376.380.381. 

382 

1st. 116th Infantry: 317. 326. 381 

2d. 116th Infantry: 315. 317. 318. 326. 327. 381 

3d. 116th Infantry: 317. 318. 324. 325. 327. 381 

1st. 175th Infantry: 382. 383 

3d. 175th Infantry: 382. 383 

1st. 313th Infantry: 429 

3d. 313th Infantry: 429 

2d. 314th Infantry: 434-36 

3d. 314th Infantry: 434-36 

1st. 357th Infantry: 401 

2d. 357th Infantry: 401 

1st. 358th Infantry: 402 

3d. 358th Infantry: 402 

Infantry Division. 1st: 158n. 187.352.380 

assault on beach: 305-19 

assault plans: 190. 197 

assault training: 162-64. 270 

casualties: 330n. 376 

in drive on Caumont: 366. 368. 369. 371-77 

effort to secure beachhead: 337. 339. 340 
508 

Infantry Division, 2d: 158n 

attack toward St. Lb: 380-81 

casualties: 376 

in drive on Caumont: 366, 369, 370, 372n, 374, 375, 

376, 377 

Infantry Division, 4th: 284, 300, 329, 336, 344, 345. 

401, 402, 440” 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416,418,419, 

421 

assault on beaches: 302, 302-04 

assault plans: 187, 190, 197 

assault training: 162 

capture of Cherbourg: 403n, 423, 428, 430, 433 

casualties: 329, 336 

drive to the Quineville ridge: 386-96 

Infantry Division: 5th, 158n 

Infantry Division, 8th: 158” 

Infantry Division, 9th: 158n 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416-17, 418, 

419-20, 421 

assault plans: 187, 269 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 403, 406-08, 415-16 

capture of Cherbourg: 403n, 428, 429, 431, 433, 

434, 436, 440 

Infantry Division, 29th: 158n, 365, 366, 367, 369n.

375, 376 

assault on beaches: 327 

assault plans: 187, 190, 197, 197n 

assault training: 162, 270 

attack toward St. LB: 377, 379-80, 381, 382-83 

captures Isigny: 352-53 

casualties: 330n, 376 

in drive on Caumont: 374 

effort to secure beachhead: 336, 337, 340-41 

Infantry Division, 30th: 377, 379 

Infantry Division, 34th: 19 

Infantry Division, 79th: 188n, 403, 415, 440 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416, 417-18, 

419, 421 

capture of Cherbourg: 428, 429, 431, 432, 434-36 

Infantry Division, 83d: 447 

Infantry Division, 90th: 417 

assault plans: 187 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 401-04, 406, 415, 

416 

Infantry Regiments. See also Glider Infantry Regiments; Parachute Infantry Regiments. 

8th: 281, 283, 284n 298, 302, 328, 329, 342, 344, 

345, 386, 387-88, 393, 396, 418, 421-22, 430, 431, 

432 

9th: 368-69, 375, 380 

12th: 302, 329, 341, 386, 388-90, 392, 392-93, 418, 

421, 422, 430, 431, 432-33 

16th: 162, 308, 309, 315, 318-19, 319n, 324, 325, 

328, 336 

18th: 308, 325, 327-28, 337-38, 368, 374 

22d: 302, 329, 341. 386, 390, 392, 393, 418, 421, 

430. 431. 432. 438-40 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

23d: 375, 376, 380, 381 

26th: 308, 337n, 340, 368, 374 

38th: 368, 369, 376, 380 

39th: 392, 393, 403n, 406, 415, 417, 419, 420, 421, 

429, 431, 432, 434, 438 

47th: 404, 406, 415, 416, 419, 420, 429, 431, 432, 

433-34 436, 440, 441 

60th: 403, 404, 415, 416, 417, 419, 420, 421, 429, 

431, 438, 440-41 

115th: 187, 308, 327, 328, 337, 339, 340, 352, 353, 

367, 376, 381, 382-83 

116th: 162, 187n, 305-08, 313-15, 317, 318, 319, 

324, 326-27, 329, 340, 352, 353, 356, 365, 367n. 

376, 380, 381, 382, 383 

119th: 382, 383 

120th: 377 

175th: 337, 340, 341, 352-53, 359-60, 361, 364, 365, 

367, 376, 380, 382, 383 

313th: 417, 419, 429, 432, 436 

314th: 418, 419, 429, 431, 432, 436 

315th: 417-18, 419, 421, 429, 432 

357th: 401, 402, 404, 416 

358th: 401, 402, 403, 406 

359th: 302, 388, 401, 402, 403-404, 406 

Infantry-tank teams: 383-84 

Infiltration: 430, 431 

Initial Joint Plan. See NEFTUNE Initial Joint Plan. 

Intelligence, Allied: 174-80, 175n, 186, 210-11, 215, 

217, 221, 224, 319n, 372, 372n, 417 

Intelligence, German: 138, 258-59, 275-76, 350 

Interdiction 

by Allied air force: 360, 410 

artillery: 361, 406 

Inundations. See Floods. 

Invasion fleet 

German command unaware of: 275-76 

organization for embarkation: 269-70 

size of: 274 

Invasion front: 26, 56, 57, 72, 99, 165-66, 181 

Iran: 17 

Iraq: 17 

Isigny: 180, 181, 187, 187n, 308, 327, 351-53, 357, 359, 

360, 361, 365, 367, 376, 381, 423 

Ismay, Lt. Gen. Sir Hastings: 90, 91n, 98, 121, 121n 

Isolationism: 92 

Italy: 29, 35, 36, 68, 69, 83, 171-72, 173, 173n. See 

also Anzio: HUSKY; Mediterranean operations; 

Salerno; Sicily. 

Allied attacks on railroads: 217, 228 

capitulation: 87, 143-44 

invasion of: 87-90, 93 

strategy of defeating: 36, 37, 41, 42-43, 68, 93, 96, 

97, 117-19, 121, 122, 169 

Italian Fourth Army: 143-44 

Italian 5th Alpini Division: 144 

Jacob, General der Pioniere Alfred: 136 

Jaeger divisions: 231, 231n 

508 

Infantry Division, 2d: 158n 

attack toward St. La: 380--81 

casualties: 376 

in drive on Caumont: 366, 369, 370, 372n, 374, 375, 

376,377 

Infantry Division, 4th: 284, 300, 329, 336, 344, 345, 

401,402,440n 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416, 418, 419, 

421 

assault on beaches: 302, 302-04 

assault plans: 187, 190, 197 

assault training: 162 

capture of Cherbourg: 403n, 423, 428, 430, 433 

casualties: 329, 336 

drive to the Quineville ridge: 386-96 

Infantry Division: 5th, 158n 

Infantry Division, 8th: 158n 

Infantry Division, 9th: 158n 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416-17, 418, 

419-20, 421 

assault plans: 187, 269 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 403,406-08,415-16 

capture of Cherbourg: 403n, 428, 429, 431, 433, 

434, 436, 440 

Infantry Division, 29th: 158n, 365, 366, 367, 36Yn, 

375, 376 

assault on beaches: 327 

assault plans: 187, 190, 197, 197n 

assault training: 162, 270 

attack toward St. La: 377, 379-80, 381, 382-83 

captures Isigny: 352-53 

casualties: 330n, 376 

in drive on Caumont: 374 

effort to secure beachhead: 336, 337, 340-41 

Infantry Division, 30th: 377, 379 

Infantry Division, 34th: 19 

Infantry Division, 79th: 188n, 403, 415, 440 

advance to the Cherbourg Landfront: 416, 417-18, 

419, 421 

capture of Cherbourg: 428, 429. 431, 432, 434-36 

Infantry Division, 83d: 447 

Infantry Division, 90th: 417 

assault plans: 187 

in attack to cut the Peninsula: 401-04, 406, 415, 

416 

Infantry Regiments. See also Glider Infantry Regiments; Parachute Infantry Regiments. 

8th: 281, 283, 284n, 298, 302, 328, 329, 342, 344, 

345, 386, 387-88, 393, 396, 418, 421-22, 430, 431, 

432 

9th: 368-69, 375, 380 

12th: 302, 329, 341, 386, 388-90, 392, 392-93, 418, 

421, 422, 430, 431, 432-33 

16th: 162, 308, 309, 315, 318-19, 319n, 324, 325. 

328, 336 

18th: 308, 325, 327-28, 337-38, 368. 374 

22d: 302, 329, 341. 386, 390. 392, 393. 418, 421. 

430, 431, 432. 438-40 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

23d: 375, 376. 380, 381 

26th: 308, 337n. 340. 368, 374 

38th: 368, 369. 376, 380 

39th: 392, 393, 403n, 406, 415, 417, 419, 420. 421, 

429, 431, 432, 434, 438 . 

47th: 404, 406, 415. 416, 419. 420. 429. 431. 432, 

433-34. 436, 440. 441 

60th: 403. 404, 415, 416. 417. 419. 420, 421. 429. 

431,438, 440-41 

115th: 187, 308, 327. 328, 337, 339. 340. 352. 353. 

367, 376, 381, 382--83 

116th: 162, 187n, 305-08, 313-15, 317, 318, 319, 

324, 326-27, 329, 340, 352. 353. 356. 365, 367n, 

376. 380, 381, 382, 383 

119th: 382, 383 

120th: 377 

175th: 337.340,341,352-53,359--60,361.364. 365, 

367, 376, 380, 382, 383 

313th: 417, 419, 429, 432, 436 

314th: 418,419,429.431.432. 436 

315th: 417-18,419,421,429,432 

357th: 401, 402. 404. 416 

358th: 401. 402, 403. 406 

359th: 302, 388, 401, 402, 403-404, 406 

Infantry-tank teams: 383--84 

Infiltration: 430, 431 

Initial Joint Plan. See NEPTUNE Initial Joint Plan. 

Intelligence, Allied: 174--80, 175n, 186, 210-11, 215, 

217,221,224, 319n, 372. 372n, 417 

Intelligence, German: 138. 258-59, 275-76. 350 

Interdiction 

by Allied air force: 360, 410 

artillery: 361, 406 

Inundations. See Floods. 

Invasion fleet 

German command unaware of: 275-76 

organization for embarkation: 269-70 

size of: 274 

Invasion front: 26,56.57.72,99, 165-66. 181 

Iran: 17 

Iraq: 17 

Isigny: 180, 181. 187. 187n, 308, 327. 351-53. 357. 359. 

360, 361. 365, 367, 376. 381. 423 

Ismay, Lt. Gen. Sir Hastings: 90. 91n. 98. 121. 121n 

Isolationism: 92 

Italy: 29, 35, 36, 68. 69. 83. 171-72. 173. 173n. See 

also Anzio; HUSKY; Mediterranean operations; 

Salerno; Sicily. 

Allied attacks on railroads: 217. 228 

capitulation: 87, 143-44 

invasion of: 87-90, 93 

strategy of defeating: 36. 37. 41. 42-43, 68, 93. 96, 

97. 117-19, 121. 122, 169 

Italian Fourth Army: 143-44 

Italian 5th Alpini Division: 144 

Jacob, General der Pioniere Alfred: 136 

Jaeger divisions: 231. 231n 
INDEX 

Japan: 8. II. 18. 23-24. 25. 27. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 

38. 43-44. 129. See also Pacific theater. 

Stalin promises to join in war on: 123 

strategic defensive against: 8; 35. 36. 43-44 

Jedburghs: 206-07 

Jodi. General der Artillerie Alfred: 135. 155. 232. 

234. 257. 333. 411-12. 445 

Joganville: 388 

Johnson. Col. Howard R.: 286. 287. 287---S8n. 288. 

347. 347n 

Johnston. Lt. Col. James D.: 420 

Joint Board. 1942 membership: 3n 

Joint Chiefs of Staff: 3. 4n. 15.27. 31. 32. 33. 34-35. 

36. 37. 38. 42. 43. 48. 49. 63. 64. 65. 68. 69. 70. 

77. 165n. 173n 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate. January-March 

1944: 168...69 

and the Cairo-Tehran Conference: 117-19. 120. 

121. 122-23. 126 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 209-10. 213 

concept of Mediterranean operations. May 1943: 

68...69 

and decision on target date for invasion: 69-70 

favor concentration on BOLERO in preparation for 

ROUNDUP in 1943: 32 

and French Resistance: 203 

and landing craft requirements: 63. 64. 65. 101-02 

and organization of COSSAC: 48-51 

organization and duties: 3-4 

problem of air force command: 220 

at the Quebec Conference: 83.87.88.90.92.93-94. 

96.97.98 

and questions of OVERLORD command: 108. 111-12 

relative independence: 92 

seek overriding priority for OVERLORD in debate 

at Quebec Conference: 97-100 

Joint Intelligence Committee: 222 

Joint Planning Staff: 6. 23. 34. 104. 184 

Joint Staff Mission: 2. 4. 4n. 27. 90n 

JSSC (Joint Strategic Survey Committee): 36-37. 

83. 86. 90n 

Joint War Plans Committee: 90n. 93 

Junkers 88: 265 

JUPITER: 27 

Kampfgruppen. mobile: 254 

Kanalkueste: 138--40. 149.262.351.411.446 

Kauffman. Lt. Col. Michael B.: 406 

Keil. Oberstleutnant Guenther: 420. 441 

Keitel. Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm: 133. 136. 227. 

411. 445 

Kelly. Cpl. John D.: 436. 436n 

Kesselring. Generalfeldmarschall Albert: 149 

King. Admiral Ernest J: 3. 3-4n. 23-24. 27-28. 51. 

31n. 34. 43. 60. 63. 65. 70. 94n 

attitude toward OVERLORD: 65. 93. 94 

organizes U. S. naval forces in Europe: 160 

and shortage of landing craft: 102. 104 

509 

Kirk. Rear Adm. Alan G.: 53. 160. 160n. 190. 194. 

273 

KMA (coastal mine) : 262 

Kluge. von. Generalfeldmarschall Guenther: 447 

Knocke: 56 

Knudsen. William S.: 26n 

Koehn. Oberst Walter: 420 

Koenig. Gen. Joseph Pierre: 206 

Kraemer. Generalmajor der Waffen-SS Fritz: 147n 

Kraiss. Generalleutnant Dietrich: 321. 330. 334. 338-

39. 340. 353. 369. 369n. 383 

Krancke. Admiral Theodor: 243. 259. 260--63. 276. 

278, 301 

Krause. Lt. Col. Edward C.: 289. 290. 290n 

Labor troops: 144. 145. 202. 228. 430 

Lambe. Capt. C. E.: 5n 

Landes. les: 387n. 402 

Lande-sur-Drome. la: 380 

Landfront. See Cherbourg Landfront. 

Landing. errors in: 304, 313 

Landing craft: 12. 100-05. 122. 191, 321n. 330n 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate of JanuaryMarch 1944: 165, 166...68. 169-73 

British development of: 61...62 

congestion offshore: 320. 325 

effort to make most of existing supply: 105 

estimate of requirements: 59--60. 63...65. 100-03 

experiments in firing artillery from: 197 

priority in construction: 62...63. 104 

reallocation of at Cairo Conference: 126--27 

serviceability rate: 170--71 

shortage of: 63n. 74-75. 75n. 100--02. 103 

sought by Eisenhower for Italian campaign: 117-

19 

U. S. production: 61n. 62...63 

used to ram beach obstacles: 325 

vehicle capacity: 66.66n 

Landing Craft and Bases. Europe: 160 

Landing exercises, British: 264n 

Landrum. Maj. Gen. Eugene M.: 403. 403n. 404. See 

also Infantry Division. 90th. 

Laval: 371 

LCA: 61. 67n, 171. 190 

LCG: 101 

LCI (L): 101. 127. 167. 170. 172 

LCM (I): 61 

LCT: 54. 61. 62. 63. 64. 66. 67. 100. 101. 103. 104. 

127. 167. 172. 192 

LCT (4): 61. 61n. 63n 

LCT (5): 197 

LCT (R): 101, 197 

LCVP's: 67n. 190. 192. 309. 313. 341 

LSI: 171 

LSI (H): 170 

LSI (L): 127 

LSI (S): 67n 

L'Armee, Secrete: 199-200 
510 

L'Eclin: 375 

Le Havre: 8. 15. 16.21.57.72.81, 103.259,301 

Leahy, Admiral William D.: 4, 4n, 31n, 93 

Leigh-Mallory, Air Marshal Sir Trafford: 21,52. 52n, 

54n, 107-08, 112, 162, 214 

and airborne planning: 186 

and controversy over bombing of French railroads: 

217,218,222 

on German Air Force: 180 

and the NEPTUNE plans: 173 

and selection of D-day: 273 

Lessay: 188, 260, 349, 361 

Lestre: 387 

Lettau. Major Heinz: 276n 

Lewis, Col.: 398 

Liege: 8 

Lieusant: 418 

Limited-objective attack: 348, 373, 377, 379-83 

Limited withdrawal: 416 

Landwirt submarines: 301 

Lindquist, Col. Ray: 291 

Linear defense; German theories: 151-56 

Lion-sur-Mer: 72, 180. 180n 

Lisieux: 333 

Lison: 360, 367 

Litteau: 375 

Little, Admiral Sir Charles: 4, 4n, 53, 54, 160-62 

Livry: 375 

Lock. la Barquette: 280, 286-87. 287-88n 

Lockwood. Pvt. John A.: 293 

Lodgment, development of: 187-88 

Loire River: 79,180,230,349,371,408-10 

Londe, la: 372 

London, effect of flying bombs on: 215-17 

London Conference 

April 1942: 16-18 

July 1942: 28-32,33-34 

Longraye: 370 

Longueville: 308, 327, 352 

Losses_ See also Casualties. 

Losses, Allied aircraft: 210. 211. 212, 214 

Losses, Allied shipping: 38-40, 63-64, 83, 84-86, 270, 

313, 423-26, 426n 

Louvieres: 340 

LST's: 61-62,63,64,103,127,167,170,171,172,173, 

270, 302n, 423, 426 

Luckett, Col. James S.: 293n, 422, 433 

Luettwitz, von, Generalleutnant Heinrich Freiherr: 

373 

Luftflotte Reich: 267 

Luftgaukommando Westfrankreich: 243n 

Luftwaffe: 75, 130, 133n, 212, 223, 227, 237n, 249. 

252-53, 267n, 332, 335, 411, 429, 431 

Allied estimates of before D Day: 179-80 

Allied offensive against: 209-10, 211, 212, 214, 215, 

218-19, 221 

causes of decline before D Day: 265 

never able to intervene in Cotentin battles: 395 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

ordered to strengthen defenses: 148 

raid on camp near Falmouth: 270-72 

use of in defense: 153-54 

Luftwaffe units. See also Third Air Force. 

Corps, II Air: 266-67, 335 

Corps, II Fighter: 266, 267n 

Corps, III Flak: 243, 243n 

Division, 4th Fighter: 266 

Division, 5th Fighter: 266 

German Home Air Command (Luftflotte Reich) : 

267 

Luzerne, la: 381 

McAuliffe, Brig. Gen. Anthony: 361 

McCook: 322n 

Machille guns: 380, 386-87, 434-36, 440 

MacKeivie, Brig. Gen. Jay W.: 401, 403. See also 

Infantry Division, 90th. 

McLaren, Capt. M.: 56n 

McLean, Brig. Gen. Kenneth: 165, 165n, 166 

McNabb, Brig. Colin: 22 

McNair, Lt. Gen. Lesley J.: 26n, 184 

McNarney, Maj. Gen. Joseph T.: 26n 

MacNeely. Lt. Col. Carlton 0.: 283, 344 

Macready, Lt. Gen. G. N.: 4n 

Madeleine. la: 353 

MAGNET: 19 

Magneville: 386, 387 

Maisy: 356 

Mandeville: 337, 368 

Maneuver, fire and: 402-03 

Mans, Ie: 78, 225 

Mantes-Gassicourt: 228. 408 

Maquis: 99, 202-03, 203n, 206, 442n 

Marcks. General der Artillerie Erich: 155, 298, 334, 

340, 369, 395, 404, 408 

Marcouf. See Fort St. Marcouf. 

Mare it Canards, La: 429,431,432 

Maritime Commission: 104 

Marnitz, Generalmajor Viktor: 152. 152n, 153 

Marshaling areas: 269, 270 

Marshall, Gen. George C.: I, 3, 8, 19, 21n, 23, 24, 25, 

26, 26n, 27-28, 29, 30, 30n, 31, 33, 34, 38, 40, 41, 

42,43-44, 48n, 65, 87n, 1l0. 111, 113n, 122n, 127, 

272 

and airborne planning: 183-84, 185 

ANVIL-OVERLORD debate, January-March 1944: 

168-69, 172, 173 

appointment as SAC discussed: 108, Ill, 113, 113n, 

114 

attitude toward GYMNAST: 27-28, 30 

biographical sketch: 94n 

defense of BOLERO: 28 

favors enlarging OVERLORD plan: 99 

on Gen. Morgan: 115 

on invasion in 1942: 16-17 

at London Conference, April 1942: 16-18 

at London Conference, July 1942: 29-30 
INDEX 

Marshall, Gen. George C.: (Continued) 

Navy challenges European strategy of: 93-95 

on Mediterranean operations: 40, 42, 43-44, 97 

opposes British opportunism: 94-95 

on OVERLORD command: 111, 112, 114-15 

on priority of European theater: 8 

proposes offensive in Pacific rather than in Eu· 

rope: 27-28, 33-34, 98 

relations with Congress: 113 

relations with Joint Chiefs of Staff: 94-95 

Marshall Memorandum: 13-19,22,33,34,37,62 

Marshes, movement through: 329, 367 

Martinvast: 429 

Martinville ridge: 380, 381 

Maupertus: 421, 438, 440 

Meauffe: 383 

Medal of Honor: 304n, 319n, 368n, 436n 

Mediterranean air bases: 212-13,218 

Mediterranean operations. See also ANVIL; Anzio; 

GYMNAST; HUSKY; Naples; TORCH. 

British and American concept of, May 1943: 68-70 

British arguments for at the Casablanca Conference: 40-42 

debated at Quebec Conference: 88-100 

and differences between British and U. S. strategic 

concepts: 94-97 

Mediterranean theater, drains German troops from 

Western front: 143-45 

Medium bombers: 196, 215, 301 

Meindl, General der Fallschirmtruppen: 349-50, 360, 

371, 373 

Melbreak: 322n 

Merderet River: 186,286,287,289,290,291,293,297, 

302, 336, 345, 357, 364, 386, 388, 393, 396, 400, 

401,413,417 

Merrill, Lt. Col. John W.: 432 

Merville: 332 

Mesieres, 281 

Mesnil au Val: 420 

Message "B": 205-06 

Messerschmitt 109: 265 

Meuse River: 8, 228 

Mell\'aines ridge: 321, 330 

Meyer, Col.: 331 

Michaelis, Lt. Col. John H.: 281 

Microwave radar: 84. See also Radar. 

Middleton, Maj. Gen. Troy H.: 415. See also Vln 

Corps. 

Midget submarines, German: 179,261 

Milford Haven Command: 54 

Military observers. See Observers. 

Miller, 2d Ll. Kermit C.: 367 

Millett, Col. George V.: 396-98 

Mine fields: 390 

Mines, German: 179, 262n 

antipersonnel: 264 

coastal: 262, 264 

detonated by Allied naval fire: 302 

511 

improvised from artillery shells: 264n, 322n 

mine-laying fleet depleted by Allied attacks: 262 

Rommel's mine-laying program: 250-52 

teller: 264 

Mobile operations, German theories of: 151-57 

Moitiers, les: 402 

Molotov, Vyacheslav: 24-25, 41, 121 

Montebourg: 297,344, 350n, 371, 386,387, 387n, 388, 

390, 393, 395, 396, 408, 413, 418, 420 

Montgomery, Gen. Sir Bernard L.: 86, 116-17, 164, 

165n, 166n, 167n, 274, 351, 443-44, 445, 447. See 

also British units, 21 Army Group. 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate, January-March 

1944: 165-u7,171 

biographical sketch: 158n 

and ground command problems: 117n 

"Montgomery plan": 167, 167n, 181 

seeks broader assault front: 165-66 

and selection of D Day: 272, 274 

succeeds Gen. Paget: 15S-60 

Montigny: 340 

Montmartin-en-Graignes: 361, 364, 365, 377, 377n 

Montrabot: 380 

Moon, Rear Adm. Don P.: 301 

Moon-sur-Elle: 372n 

Morale 

Allied: 273, 428 

German: 75, 79, 120, 146, 209, 210, 337 

Morgan, Ll. Gen. Frederick E.: 48, 49-51, 52, 59, 64, 

66,70,71,72,73,74,75, 75n, 76, 77, 79, 80, 91n, 

94, 107n, 165n, 167n 

and airborne planning: 183 

and the ANVIL-OVERLORD debate of JanuaryMarch 1944: I 64-u5 , 166, 167 

appointed COSSAC: 48-51 

and choice of assault area: 71-72 

concept of COCKADE: 70-71 

concept of OVERLORD: 58-59 

estimate of enemy capabilities: 76-77 

and expansion of the assault front: 99, 103 

favors floating reserve: 191 

and MULBERRIES: 74 

and organization of COSSAC: 51-52 

quasi command conferred on: 105-06, 164 

and questions of OVERLORD command: 105-17 

and struggle for landing craft: 64, 66, 74, 100-05 

Morsalines: 387 

Mortars: 416 

chemical: 392 

4.2-inch: 382 

Moscow Conference, October 1943: 121, 128 

Mosles: 337, 339 

~,fotey, Ie: 398, 400, 401 

Motor transport, German: 224, 227-28 

Moulin, Jean: 199, 200 

Moulins, les: 309n, 313, 315, 318, 324, 325, 327 

Mountbatten, Commodore Lord Louis: 5, 5n, 6, 18, 

25, 54 
512 

Mount Cauvin: 337 

Mount Cenis: 144 

MS·Flotilla, 6th (mine layers): 262 

Mueller, Oberstleutnant Franz: 420 

MULBERRIES: 73, 74 

Mussolini, Benito: 87. 144 

Mustangs: 428 

Naiden. CoL E. L: 5n 

Naples: 87.88 

National Committee (Ie Conseil National de la Re· 

sistance): 199 

Naval action: 270 

Naval Beach Battalion. 7th: 320n 

Naval branch of COSSAC: 51 

Naval Commander Normandy: 278. 301 

Naval fire support: 152. 153-54, 189, 190. 193-94. 

196-97.273.287. 301-02. 313. 322, 325, 326, 339, 

341. 342. 353. 361. 373n. 387, 390. 392. 432. 434. 

445. 446. 448 

Naval gunfire spotting teams: 197 

Naval Staff (X): 53 

Navy 

disagrees with Army on strategy: 92-94 

and landing craft requirements: 62. 63 

organization for the assault. January 1944: 160. 162 

permanent observer established in London: I 

planning in early 1942: 5 

resists development of landing craft: 60-61 

shipbuilding program. 1944: 104 

size of invasion fleet: 274 

:\Tavy. German: 133n. 276. 276n. See also Mines. Ger· 

man. 

Admiral Krancke's report on weakness of: 261-62 

estimate of strength: 179 

ordered to strengthen defenses: 148 

torpedo boats: 301 

views on imminence of invasion: 259. 260-61 

NaliV Group West: 243. 259. 442n 

Nazi party: 145 

Nazis. categories of: 145n 

Nebelwerfer: 223n. 233. 239. 239n. 438 

Nehou: 406. 415 

Nelson, Donald: 103 

NEPTUNE Initial Joint Plan: 173-74. 182. 183, 189. 

See also NEPTUNE plans. 

NEPTUNE plans: 173-97 

airborne planning: 183-86 

development of the lodgment: 187-88 

estimate of the enemy: 174-80 

fire support: 193-97 

objectives and terrain: 180-83 

organization and tactics of the assault forces: 190-

93 

selection of D·day: 188-90 

Netherlands: 12. 26, 56. 59 

:\Teuville·au·Plain: 289.290.297, 342, 344. 345 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Nevada: 197n 

Nicolle: 440 

Night attack: 73. 188-89. 416. 418 

Night bombing. controversy over: 208. 209, 215, 222 

Ninth Air Force: 54, 108. 112. 214. 218, 335. 428. 432. 

448 

IX Bomber Command: 219-20. 222. 223. 301. 428 

IX Tactical Air Command: 428 

Noble. Admiral Sir Percy: 4n 

Norfolk House: 170 

Normandy battle, typical: 348. See also Hedgerows. 

North Africa. 21. 36. See also GYMNAST; Mediterranean operations; TORCH. 

effect of Allied invasion on Germans: 143 

Rommel's experience in: 249 

Northern Ireland: 17. 19 

Norway: 27. 35. 70. 98. 137. 146.231.412 

Nouvelle Plage: 442 

Oberbefehlshaber West (OB WEST) : 128n. 130. 131. 

141. 142. 143. 144. 146. 148. 150. 156. 258. 260. 

275.276.332.349.350.360.410.446.447 

and attacks on French railroads: 225. 227 

and OKW policy in 1944: 231-36 

Oberkommando des Heeres (OKH): 131. 131n. 133. 

141.243.252 

Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW): 128n. 

131n. 143. 144. 149. 150. 151-52. 153. 154. 155-56. 

248. 333. 333n. 350. 408. 411. 412. 442. 446 

cancels comprehensive defense plans: 233 

defense policy in 1944: 231-36 

lack of co·ordination with OKH: 133-35 

Observation: 197. 284. 292. 375. 376. 380. 382 

Observers. U. S .• in London: 1-2 

Obstacles. underwater: 304. 321. 325. See also Beach 

obstacles. 

Octeville: 419.428.429.431-32.433-34.436.438.440 

Odon River: 445 

Officer casualties: 319 

Ogden. 1st Lt. Carlos C.: 436. 436n 

"Oil Plan." for bombing Germany: 219. 222 

Oil plants. bombing of: 208. 209. 212. 223-24 

Oise River: 12. 228 

Oisel: 230n 

OKH. See Oberkommando des Heeres. 

OKL: 243 

OKM: 243 

OKW. See Oberkommando der Wehrmacht. 

Ollande River: 416 

OMAHA beach: 72n. 182. 189-90. 196. 302. 319. 319n. 

329. 330. 336. 448 

compared with Cherbourg as a port of entry: 226n 

D·day bombing: 301 

enemy coastal defenses: 302 

landings on: 305-21 

storm damage: 426 

terrain: 189-90.308-09. 321-22 
INDEX 

OPD: 5,6 

on appointment of a ground commander: 116 

plan for invasion, 1943: 15-21 

Operational Groups: 207 

Operational Training Unit: 184-85n 

Ore!: 88 

Organization 

of the assault: 158-60, 190-93, 269-72 

for combat, German: 236-42 

of German forces in the West: 128-40 

Organization Todt: 131, 136, 137,228,252,417 

Orglandes: 404, 406 

Orleans: 78, 410 

Orne River: 78, 184, 185,257,264,332,333,334,348, 

349, 411, 442, 443, 444, 446 

OSS (Office of Strategic Services): 202, 203 

Ost battalions: 146 

Ostendorll, Generalmajor der Wallen-SS Werner: 

360, 365, 371, 372n 

Ostruppen: 146-47 

Ouistreham: 75, 180 

OVERLORD 

airborne planning: 183-93 

allotment of resources, May 1943: 63-70 

ANVIL-OVERLORD debate: 164-73 

Cairo-Tehran Conferences: 117-27 

COSSAC plans: 70-82 

digest of: 450-56 

fire support: 193-97 

landing craft requirements: 59-63, 100-05 

NEPTUNE plans: 173-83 

organization for planning: 46-54 

Quebec Conference: 83-100 

questions of command: 105-17 

size and shape of the attack: 54-59 

U. S. organization and training for the assault, 

January 1944: 158-64 

Owens, Sgt. William D.: 345 

Ozeville: 386, 392 

P-38: 213 

P-4Ts: 432, 434 

Pacific theater. See also Japan. 

controversy over allotment of aircraft for: 34-35 

definition of strategy: 35, 36 

Navy's primary interest in: 92-93 

Paget, Gen. Sir Bernard: 5-6, 5-6n, 26-27, 53, 5811, 

158 

Panther (Mark V tank): 241 

Panzer division: 14211, 154n, 24811 

equipment: 148 

tank armament: 240-41 

Panzer grenadier division: 142n 

equipment: 148 

organization: 239-42 

weapons: 240n 

Panzer Group West: 247, 248n, 348, 373, 443, 445, 

446, 447 

513 

Parachute divisions, German: 238-39, 239n 

Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, 377th: 280 

Parachute Infantry Battalions. See also Battalions. 

1st, 501st Parachute Infantry: 287 

2d, 501st Parachute Infantry: 288, 348 

3d, 501st Parachute Infantry: 283, 356 

1st, 502d Parachute Infantry: 281-83, 359 

2d, 502d Parachute Infantry: 280, 282, 359 

3d, 502d Parachute Infantry: 280-81, 359 

1st, 505th Parachute Infantry: 290, 388 

2d, 505th Parachute Infantry: 290, 344, 388 

3d, 505th Parachute Infantry: 289, 290 

1st, 506th Parachute Infantry: 282-83, 284, 287, 

347, 356 

2d, 506th Parachute Infantry: 282, 284, 348, 356, 

361 

3d, 506th Parachute Infantry: 282, 286, 287, 288, 

347 

2d, 507th Parachute Infantry: 291, 292 

1st, 508th Parachute Infantry: 401 

2d, 508th Parachute Infantry: 293, 400 

Parachute Infantry Regiments 

501st: 286,287, 347, 357, 361, 364, 365 

502d: 280, 282, 286, 289, 329, 357, 361, 365 

505th: 289, 291, 291n, 328-29, 345, 386, 388, 403n, 

404, 406 

506th: 280, 282, 283, 288, 328, 347, 348, 356, 357, 

359, 361, 364, 365 

507th: 289, 290, 396, 398, 400, 402n, 403, 404, 406 

508th: 289, 290, 291, 293, 396,402, 402n, 403n, 406 

Parfouru: 375 

Paris: 12, 181, 185,223, 350, 373,410,442 

Pas-de-Calais: 12-13, 13n, 21, 22, 57, 58, 67n, 70, 71-72, 

76, 76n, 259, 261 

Passive resistance: 225 

Pathfinder planes: 279, 289, 290-91 

Patrols: 374n, 377, 380, 382 

Pattern bombing: 428 

Patton, Lt. Gen. George S.: 86, 351 

Paulus, Generaloberst Friedrich: 38 

Pemsel, Ceneralleutnant, Max: 278, 414 

Periers: 260, 297, 360, 364, 365, 378 

Perimeter defense: 290 

Phoenix: 74 

Photographic reconnaissance: 177, 215, 259 

Physical standards, German: 147 

Picauville: 293, 401 

Piers, floating: 73-74 

Pieux, les: 417,420 

Pillboxes: 192, 436 

Pilotless aircraft: 138-40,215-17,412,413 

Pilots, German, shortage of: 265-66 

Pinder, T/5 John j., Jr.: 319n 

Plan Tortue: 205 

Plan Vert: 205 

Planning papers, chronology of: 468-69 

Platoon, organization for assault: 191-192 

Plymouth: 269, 272 
514 

Plymouth Command: 54 

POINTBLANK: Ill, 220. See also Combined Bomber 

Offensive. 

Pointe du Hoe: 176, 196, 308, 318, 322-24, 326, 340, 

353 

Pointe et Raz de la Percee: 308, 309, 319 

Poland: 145 

Pole charges: 390, 436 

Political considerations affecting strategy: 90-91, 92, 

92n, 96n, 106-107, 203, 234 

Pont I'Abbe: 289,293,401, 402, 403, 406, 415 

Pont Hebert: 377 

Poole: 272 

Port, Ie: 282,286,347, 357 

Port Brehay, Ie: 302 

Portal, Air Chief Sir Charles: 4, 17, 17n, 20, 43, 54, 

86, 126, 168, 209, 209n 

and controversy over bombing of French railroads: 

219, 221, 222 

and problem of air force command: 220 

proposed as commander of whole bomber offensive 

against Germany: 213 

Portbail: 443 

Port·en·Bessin: 181, 301, 337, 339, 423 

Portland: 272 

Ports 

as factor in choice of assault area: 56 

prefabricated: 73, 166, 272n, 422-23, 423-26, 426n 

Portugal: 232, 258 

Pound, Admiral Sir Dudley: 4, 168n 

Pouppeville: 280, 282, 283, 304 

Prairies Marecageuses: 357, 402, 413, 443 

Prefabricated ports. See Artificial ports. 

Preloading: 69n, 369n 

Pretot: 404 

Prime movers, German: 241 

Prisoners 

of Allies: 280, 282, 283, 289, 298, 325n, 342, 344, 

347,367,371,387,390,416-21,422,431,433,434, 

436-38, 440, 441 

of Germans: 293n, 298, 396 

interrogation of: 372, 372n, 428-29 

taken into German Army: 145-46 

Propaganda, German: 137,140, 140n, 176 

Psychological warfare: 75-76, 436 

Quebec Conference: 68n, 83-100, 102, 104, 108, 113, 

117, 121, 126, 164, 183 

Querqueville: 438 

Quesada, Gen. Elwood R.: 428 

Quincy: 197n, 287 

Quineville: 182,302,386,387, 387n, 390-95, 408, 418, 

423 

"Racial Germans." See Volksdeutsche. 

"Racial purity": 145 

Radar: 262 

in antisubmarine warfare: 84 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

German: 188, 261, 301 

Radio: 319n 

Rae, Capt. R. D.: 398 

Raeder, Grossadmiral Erich: 129, 133, 136 

Raff, Col. Edson D.: 329 

Raiding operations: 15-16. See also Dieppe raid; 

St. N azaire. 

Raids: 360 

Railroads 

bombing of: 217-30, 408 

repair: 228 

sabotage: 204-05, 204n, 207, 224, 225 

Ramsay, Admiral Sir Bertram H.: 6, 21, 162, 162n, 

173, 193-94, 272, 273, 352 

Ranger Battalions: 191 

2d: 196, 197n, 308, 313-15, 318, 322, 367n 

5th: 197n, 318, 324, 326, 367n 

Rangers: 54, 171, 308, 322n, 329, 340, 353. See also 

Ranger battalions. 

RANKIN: 51, 79-82, 120 

Rauville-la Bigot: 417 

Reconnaissance: 197, 258, 367 

Reconnaissance in force: 347 

Reconnaissance Troop, 29th; 359 

Reeder, Col. Russell P.: 302, 388, 393n 

Regensburg, air raid on: 210 

Region Nord: 230 

Region Ouest: 230, 410 

Reigneville: 404, 406 

Rennes: 257, 297 

Replacement Army (German): 233, 234, 235, 236. 

258 

Replacements: 368 

Reserve panzer corps: 154n 

Reserves. German. See also Defense, German. 

disagreement over use of in defense of west: 154-

57, 154n 

estimated amount available to Rundstedt: 176 

Germans unable to mass in accordance with plan: 

351 

lack of: 147-48 

use of: 74, 147, 321, 330, 332-33, 334, 338, 348-49, 

351, 360, 365, 371, 373, 374, 380, 383, 444, 446 

Resistance. See French Resistance. 

Reuville: 344 

Review of Strategy: 9 

Rhodes: 119, 122, 125 

Rhone Valley: 144-45 

Richter, Generalleutnant Wilhelm: 264n 

Ridgway. Maj. Gen. Matthew B.: 184,289, 289n, 291, 

344, 345, 398, 403, 406. See also Airborne Divi· 

sion, 82nd. 

Rifle company, organization for assault: 192, 237 

Riley, Pvt. Ralph G.: 390 

River crossing: 367, 382, 406 

Riviere, la: 321 

Road blocks: 281, 282 

Road sabotage: 205, 206 
INDEX 

Roberts, Cpl. Ernest T.: 293 

Roberts, Maj. Gen. J. H.: 54n 

Robertson, Maj. Gen. Walter M.: 366, 366n, 369. See 

also Infantry Division, 2d. 

Robinson, Col. Warren A.: 418 

Rocheville: 417 

Rocket craft: 197 

Rockets: 215, 302n. See also V-weapons. 

Rohrbach, Colonel Helmuth: 345,420 

Romania: 122n 

Rome: 1l7, 169 

Rommel, Generalfeldmarschall Erwin: 25, 87, 149n, 

230, 246n, 260, 275, 278, 319, 334, 349, 350, 360, 

373, 412-13, 414, 430, 434, 444, 445, 447 

asks for extension of authority: 247 

at Berchtesgaden: 445, 446 

command and powers: 243-49 

and effort to strengthen the western defenses: 149-

51, 154, 157, 264-65 

mine defenses: 263-64 

theory of defense: 249-58 

Roosevelt, Franklin D.: 2,4, 6, II, 16,23-25, 27-28, 

28n, 29, 30-31, 31n, 32, 32n, 33, 35, 44, 45, 54, 

69, 92n, 94-95, 126, 1l3n, 122n, 172 

appoints Eisenhower to OVERLORD command: 114 

decides to go ahead with GYMNAST: 31-32 

disapproves of proposal to press Pacific rather 

than European offensive: 27 

interested in exploiting success in the Mediterranean: 35-36 

and landing craft requirements: 64 

opposes committing large armies in Italy, May 

1943: 69 

promises Stalin a second fron t: 24-25 

proposes a British supreme commander: 44 

role as military leader: 92 

seeks advice on future offensive operations, March 

1942: 15 

at Tehran Conference: 123-26 

urges active operations in 1942: 24-25 

visited by Molotov: 24 

Roosevelt, Brig. Gen. Theodore: lI04n 

Rouen: 57,78,81,228 

ROUNDHAMMER: 66n 

ROUNDUP: 9, 21, 22, 23, 27, 28n, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 

36, 37-38, 40,41, 42, 44, 46, 47, 54. 55-56. 55n, 

57, 58, 65, 68, 79 

concept of. 1941: 6-8 

contingent on collapse of Germany: 79 

fear of competition with TORCH: 32 

Gen. Brooke's view of, May 1943: 68 

idea of dispersed attacks abandoned as a result of 

Dieppe experience: 55-56 

indefinite postponement of: 32 

new plan for. June 1942: 22-23 

resources drawn off by TORCH: 46-47 

Roosevelt's attitude toward: 23 

515 

Royal Air Force: 12, 13, 17, 21, 130, 196, 197, 208, 

209n. See also Allied Expeditionary Air Force. 

Bomber Command: Ill, 213,214,215 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 207-10 

high command for invasion formed: 52, 53, 54 

problem of establishing an over-all tactical air 

command: 107-08 

Tactical Air Force: 54. 112 

Tactical Air Force, 2d: 428 

Rubercy: 367 

Rudder. Lt. Col. James E.: 322, 322n 

Rufosses: 422 

Ruguet River: 309n 

Ruhr: 58 

Rundstedt. von. Generalfeldmarschall Gerd: 130. 

132n, 136. 142, 143. 144, 144n, 150, 154n. 156n, 

175, 176, 235. 236, 237. 239, 242. 248n, 260. 263. 

276, 278, 333, 333n, 348, 350. 375. 411. 412-13, 

442.443,445,447 

alarmed by rail sabotage: 204-05 

and Allied air attacks on French railroads: 224-25, 

228 

appointed Commander in Chief West: 130. 132 

at Berchtesgaden: 140. 445, 446 

and disagreement over defense tactics: 151, 152. 

153-55. 156-57 

power limited: 243-49 

proposes formation of a central reserve: 154 

relieved of command: 447 

report on state of defenses. October 1943: 128. 

140-41. 148 

theories of defense conflict with Rommel's: 253-58 

Russia. See Soviet Union. 

Ryes: 321 

S-Boote: 261 

Sabotage: 203-07,275, 360, 408, 410, 448 

SAC. See Supreme Allied Commander. 

St. Andre-de-I'Epine: 380, 381. 382 

St. Clair-sur-Elle: 376. 381 

St. Christophe-du-Foc: 417 

St. Come-du-Mont: 286, 287-88. 298. 347, 34&, 356. 

357 

St. Contest: 332 

St. Croix-Hague: 420, 440 

St. Floxel: 278, 393 

St. Gabriel: 331 

St. Georges de Bohon: 377 

St. Georges-d'Elle: 373 

St. Germain-d'Elle: 373, 380 

St. Germain-Ie-Gaillard: 417 

St. Germain-de-Varreville: 281, 329 

St. Jacques-de-Nehou: 416 

St. Jean-de-Daye: 371 

St. Laurent: 181, 309. 309n, 315. 324. 325, 326, 327, 

328, 329, 330. 337, 340 

St. Leger: 338 
516 

St. La: 182. 183n. 185. 188.297. 319n. 350. 351. 351n. 

366. 368. 371. 373. 374. 375. 376. 377-84. 386. 428. 

443. 444 

St. La-d'Ourville: 182. 185. 415. 416 

St. Marcouf: 392 

St. Marcouf Islands: 304 

St. Martin-de-Blagny: 334 

St. Martin-Ie Greard: 417. 419. 421 

St. Martin-de-Varreville: 280. 280n. 281. 302 

St. Mauvieu: 444 

St. Nazaire. raid on: 54. 135 

St. Paul-de· Verney: 371 

St. Pierre·Eglise: 421 

St. Pierre·du·Mont: 341 

St. Sauveur de Pierre Pont: 182 

St. Sauveur-Ie Vicomte: 185. 187. 286, 289. 401. 403. 

404. 406. 413. 414. 415. 438 

St. Sulpice: 321 

St. Vaast·la Hougue: 187. 414 

Ste. Anne: 339 

Ste. Colombe: 403. 406. 415 

Ste. Marguerite·d·Elle: 376 

Ste. Marie·du-Mont: 282. 283. 298. 302. 328. 347 

Ste. Mhe-Eglise: 182. 279. 280. 289. 290. 290n. 291. 

m.m.~.m.m.M~M~lli.m 

Saire River: 422 

Salcombe: 272 

Salerno: 107. 1l0. 117. 152. 153 

Salmuth. von. Generaloberst Hans: 154-55. 156n 

Sanford. Maj. Teddy H.: 396. 400 

Sardinia: 87 

Satterlee: 322 

Sattler. Generalmajor Robert: 436. 438 

Saumur: 371 

Scapa Flow. 101. 102 

Schimpf. Generalleutnant Richard: 373 

Schlieben. von. Generalleutnant Karl-Wilhelm: 

147n. 297. 293n. 342. 344. 387. 393. 408. 414. 417. 

418. 418n. 420. 421. 428. 429. 430. 431. 432. 434. 

438. 443 

Schmetzer. Generalleutnant Rudolf: 136 

Schreiber. Lt. Gen. Edmond: 21 

Schwarzwalder. Capt. F. V.: 292 

Schweinfurt. air raid on: 210. 211 

Schweppenburg. von. See Geyr. 

SEA LION. See SEELOEWE. 

Second front. demanded by Soviet Union: 24. 41. 

120-21 

Second landing. German speculation regarding: 

350-51. 35In.411-12 

SEELOEWE: 129. 130. 131 

Seine: 8. 12. 16.57.72.78.81. 180. 185. 188.228.230, 

408. 443, 444 

Seine Bay: 276 

Self-propelled guns: 197 

Service troops. build-up reduced: 447-48 

Seulles River: 331 

Seventh Army Engineer School: 378n 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

SHAEF. See Supreme Headquarters Allied Expedi· 

tionary Force. 

Shanley. Lt. Col. Thomas J. B.: 293. 400 

Shettk Capt. Charles G.: 286, 347 

Shingle. on OMAHA Beach: 308-09 

Shipbuilding. See also Landing craft. 

British: 102 

Navy's 1944 program: 103-04 

Shipping losses: 38-40,63-64, 83, 84-86, 270, 309-13, 

423-26, 426n 

Shore obstacles. See Beach obstacles; Underwater obstacles. 

Shortages, Allied: 336 

ammunition: 336 

landing craft: 63n, 75n, 101, 103 

shipping: 15n, 21 

spare parts for landing craft: 170-71 

supplies: 336 

Shortages. German 

ammunition: 360, 387, 442-43 

cement: 263 

gasoline: 360, 411 

pilots: 265 

prime movers: 241 

spare parts: 242 

lransport space: 410-11 

trucks: 411 

weapons: 368 

Sicily: 29. 83. 86-87. 152, 153, 182, 183 

Sigeville: 344 

Silver Star: 390 

Simmons. Lt. Col. Conrad: 432 

Sinclair. Maj. Gen. J. A.: 55, 56 

Sink, Col. Robert F.: 282-84, 348. 356. 357, 361 

SKYSCRAPER: 57-59, 59n 

Slappey, Col. Eugene N.: 340 

Slapton Sands: 270 

SLEDGEHAMMER: 16, 17, 18n, 21, 22, 24. 26. 27, 28-29, 

30,31,35,41,65,79 

Combined Commanders directed to study: 12 

difficulties posed by: 21-22 

disadvantages: 12-13 

found unfeasible: 27-30 

opposed by Churchill: 22, 27 

Smith, Maj. Gen. Walter Bedell: 165, 165n, 166-67, 

203n, 273 

Smoke, use of: 191, 318, 324, 388. 395, 398 

Smythe, Col. George W.: 404, 436 

Snipers: 367, 422. 438 

SNCF (Societe National des Chemins de Fer) : 204n, 

205n.225,228 

Sodenstern, von, General der Infanterie Georg: 144, 

153, 155, 253 

Soissons: 12 

Somervell. Gen. Brehon B.: 26n 

Somme: 12, 16 

Sommervieu: 321,338 

Southern Base Section: 269 
INDEX 

Southern France. See France, Southern. 

Southhampton: 269 

Southwick House: 272,274 

Soviet Union: 9, 11, 12, 16, 17,23,24,25,26,28,29, 

30,35,36,37,38,42,68,69,77,83,88,93, 121n, 

122n, 125, 144n, 168. See also Stalin. 

co-ordination of OVERLORD with: 69-70, 168 

demand for "second front": 24-25, 41, 120--22 

draws German troops from Western front: 141-43, 

145, 146-47 

estimates of capabilities: ll-12, 24-25, 30 

German invasion of: 129-30 

offensive operations: 38, 88, 120, 233-35 

nationals conscripted by German Army: 145, 146 

participation in Tehran Conference: 123-26 

views on Mediterranean operations: 120-26 

Spaatz, Lt. Gen. Carl: 20, 20n, 47, 213, 218, 219, 221, 

222, 224 

Spain: 97, 97n, 129n 

Spalding, 2d Lt. John M.: 324 

Special Air Service: 207 

Special Army Observer: I 

Special Force Headquarters: 205n 

Special Naval Observer: I 

Special Operations branch of OSS: 203, 205 

Special Operations Executive: 200-02, 203, 205, 276 

Speer, Reich Minister Albert: 136, 228, 265 

Speidel, Generalleutnant Hans: 278, 413n 

Sperrle, Generalfeldmarschall Hugo: 243, 278 

Spotter planes: 434 

Sprindis, Capt. Stephen W.: 441 

SS divisions: 240 

SS panzer· type divisions: 240 

Stagg, Group Captain J. M.: 272, 276 

Stalin, Joseph: 24,43,77. See also Soviet Union. 

at Tehran Conference: 123-26 

urges assault on Southern France: 123-25, 168 

Stark, Admiral Harold R.: 2, 3, 53, 102, 160 

STARKEY: 70 

State Department: 203 

Static defense, German theories of: 151-57 

Static divisions, German: 175,237 

Stegmann, Generalmajor Rudolf: 414n, 416 

Stimson, Henry L.: 15, 25, 31 

Stopka, Lt. Col. John P.: 359 

Storm, 19-23 June: 422, 423-26, 426n 

Strafford, Group Capt. S. C., 5n 

Strafing attacks: 338,410, 428, 429 

Strategic air forces. See U.S. Strategic Air Forces. 

Strayer, Lt. Col. Robert L.: 282 

Sturm Battalion, organization: 260n 

Sub chasers: 104 

Submarines, German: 29, 38-40, 45, 63-64, 421 

bases: 136 

construction of pens: 131, 137 

construction yards as target: 208, 209, 211-12, 

212n 

defea ted by Allies: 83-86 

517 

midget: 179,261 

Supreme Allied Commander. See also Eisenhower. 

controversy over powers of: 108-12 

directive to: 457-58 

Eisenhower's appointment as: 158, 164 

Sully: 339, 340 

Summers, S/Sgt. Harrison: 281, 281n 

Supply: 336, 447-48, 442n, 351. See also Artificial 

ports; Shortages. 

delayed build-up: 351 

establishment of supply points urged: 340 

of French Resistance: 201-03, 201n, 203n, 207 

hampered by storm: 422, 423-26 

for invasion, transport of: 269-70 

by LCVP: 341 

by LST: 423 

total build· up, 18 June 1944: 423 

Support craft, shortage of: 101 

Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force. 

See also Eisenhower. 

and the ANVIL·OVERLORD debate, January-March 

1944: 170--73 

and bombing of French railroads: 217-18, 223-24 

and French Resistance: 202, 205, 206 

and the NEPTUNE Plans: 173-83 

U. S. organization: 114-17, 158-62 

Surles, Maj. Gen. Alexander D., 26n 

Surprise, tactical: 73, 74, 76, 188-89, 191,275-76 

Surprise attack: 289 

Surrain: 328 

Sweden: 121 

Switch lines, German: 153, 156 

Switzerland: 258 

Table of Organization: 184 

Tactical Air Command, IX. See Ninth Air Force. 

Tactical Air Force, RAF: 54, 112 

Tactical Air Force, 2d: 428 

Tactical air forces, U. S. See Ninth Air Force; 

Twelfth Air Force. 

Tactical loading: 75, 103, 170, 171 

Tactics of the assault forces: 190-93 

Talley, Col. Benjamin B.: 320, 320n 

Talybont: 322, 322n 

Tanatside: 322n 

Tank Battalions 

70th: 304, 344 

741st: 309, 337 

746th: 329, 344, 348, 392n, 406 

747th: 352, 376, 383 

899th: 392n 

Tank fire: 340 

Tank obstacles: 250 

Tankdozers: 193 

Tank-infantry attack: 340, 344, 348, 383-84, 387-88. 

422 

Tanks, DO': 192n. 304. 309, 315 

Tanks. German: 239-42, 393 
518 

Tanks, German: (Continued) 

losses: 242 

Mark III: 242 

Mark IV: 148, 240, 241, 242 

Mark V: 240 

production: 240-42 

Russian: 241n, 260n, 292n 

Tanks, use of: 197, 329, 340-41, 344, 347-48, 352-53, 

381, 392, 406-08, 422, 431, 433, 441 

as close support artillery: 192 

difficulty of coordinating with infantry in hedgerow country: 383--84 

fire fight with enemy assault guns: 344 

in invasion: 92-93 

Tarawa operation: 193 

Taret de Ravenoville: 342, 392 

Task Force B: 190,270 

Task Force Barber: 392 

Task Force 0: 187, 190, 194,269,270,272, 301, 322n 

Task Force U: 190, 269, 270, 272, 301 

Task Force 122: 160 

Taute Canal. See Vire-Taute Canal. 

Taylor, Col. George A.: 319, 324-25 

Taylor, Maj. Gen. Maxwell: 283, 283n, 347, 364. See 

also Airborne Division, lOlst. 

Tedder, Air Marshal Sir Arthur W.: 203, 220, 220n, 

221, 273 

Tehran Conference: 121,123, 123n, 128, 168, 169 

Teller mines: 264 

Terre-de-Beauval: 401, 403, 415 

Tetrahedra, 250. See also Beach obstacles. 

Theil, Ie: 419 

Third Air Force: 243, 252, 266, 395 

Third U.S. Army: 188, 188n, 447 

Thompson: 322, 322n 

Thompson, Col. James V.: 401 

Thompson, Lt. Col. Paul W.: 162 

Thury: 349 

Tidal conditions: 189-90,317, 317n 

Tiger (Mark VI) tank: 241,270 

Tilly-sur-Seulles: 338, 348, 374, 375, 377, 444 

Timmes, Lt. Col. Charles J.: 291, 292, 396, 398, 400 

TINDALL: 70 

Tobruk: 25 

Todt. See Organization Todt. 

Tollevast: 429 

Tor Bay: 269, 272 

TORCH: 31-35, 31n, 32n, 44, 165n 

attitude of British Chiefs of Staff: 32 

attitude of U.S. Chiefs of Staff: 32 

chosen as code name for North African operation: 31 

competes with OVERLORD for consideration as main 

effort: 90 

drain on European theater: 46-47 

formation of planning staff for: 31-32 

Torigni-sur-Vire: 442n 

Torpedo Boat Flotilla, 5th: 301 

CROSS-CHANNEL ATTACK 

Torpedo Boat Flotilla, 9th: 301 

Torpedo planes: 153-54 

Torpedoes, human: 179 

Torpedoes, remote-controlled: 261 

Torquay: 272 

Toulon: 442n 

Touques River: 181 

Tour-en-Bessin: 339 

Tourlaville: 428, 430, 432, 433 

Training, 274-75 

for airborne operations: 184, 184-85n 

assault exercises: 160-62, 269, 270 

Assault Training Center set up in England: 162-64 

defects in: 402-03 

tank-infantry tactics: 383-84 

Training, German: 147n, 253n 

hampered by construction program: 252-53, 253n 

parachute jumping: 239n 

pilots: 265-67 

Transport planes: 279 

Transport space, defined: 410n 

Tree burst: 430 

Treipel, Generalmajor Gerhard: 280n 

Trenches, German: 341,390 

Trevieres: 181, 337, 353. 366. 368. 36g. 370n 

Tribolet, Col. Harvey A.: 302, 390. 393 

Troop quality, German: 142. 146-47, 239. 420-21, 

448 

Troop strength, Allied: 47n 

German estimate of: 351-52 

U.S. troops in England, January 1944: 158n 

Troop strength, German. See also German Army. 

in defense of Cherbourg: 417 

divisions available on 6 June 1944: 471 

estimate of: 174-76 

in France 1944: 235 

Trotebec: 430 

Turkey: 9. 35, 41-42. 120, 121, 122, 125 

Turnbull, Lt. Turner B.: 290 

Turner, Rear Adm. R. K.: 5n 

Turner. Lt. Col. William L.: 282-83 

Turqueville: 297. 302, 328, 342 

Twelfth Fleet: 53. 160 

Twelfth Air Force: 47.208.212, 212n 

V-boats. See Submarines, Germall. 

Underground. French. See French Resistance. 

Underwater obstacles: 177n, 250, 250n, 304. See also 

Beach obstacles. 

Vnited Nations: 92, 92n 

Urville: 417, 418 

U.S. Army Forces in the British Isles (USAFBI): 22 

U.S. Atlantic Fleet: 84 

U.S. bases: 19 

U.S. Strategic Air Forces (VSSTAF). See also Eighth 

Air Force; Fifteenth Air Force. 

and bombing of French railroads: 217-20 

and Combined Bomber Offensive: 207-17 
INDEX 519 

U.S. Strategic Air Forces (USSTAF) : (Continued) 

Eisenhower takes over direction of: 223 

establishment and organization: 212-13, 213n 

U.S. tactical air forces. See Ninth Air Force; Twelfth 

Air Force. 

UTAH BLACH: 182, 183, 185, 186, 190, 196, 284, 297, 

301, 313, 329, 448 

landings on: 302-04, 328, 329 

storm damage: 426 

terrain: 181, 182, 284 

V-weapons: 138-40, I40n, 150, 215-17, 252, 412, 

412n, 413, 422. See also Rockets. 

Valdecie, le: 415 

Valognes: 187, 187n, 328, 395, 403, 413, 414, 415, 

417, 418, 418n, 419,429 

Van Fleet, Col. James A.: 302, 393 

Vandervoort, Lt. Col. Benjamin H.: 290, 290n, 344 

Vast, le: 260 

Vasteville: 419 

Vaubadon: 366 

Vauville: 414, 420, 438, 440 

Vaux-sur-Aure: 338, 339 

Vaux-sur-Orne: 332 

Vaux-sur-Seulles: 332 

Vertical envelopment: 185-86 

Vian, Rear Adm. Philip: 190 

Vichy France, occupation of: 143 

“Victory Program”: 96 

Vidal, Gen. See Delestrain. 

Videcosville: 387 

Vidouville: 380 

Vierville-sur-Mer: 72, 180n, 181, 182. 286, 308, 309, 

309n, 313, 326, 329, 347, 350, 357 

Villers-Bocage: 373, 374, 375, 444, 445, 446 

Villiers-Fossard: 381, 382, 383, 384n. 444 

Villiers-le-Set: 330 

Viney, Col. Alvin G.: 441 

Vire River: 73, 180, 181, 182, 187n, 264, 321, 333, 

350, 356, 357, 360, 361, 364, 365, 371, 372, 374, 

376, 377, 378n, 380, 382, 411, 443, 444 

Vire-Taute Canal: 361. 377 

Volksdeutsche: 145-46, 147 

Volksliste drei: 145-46 

Volkswagen: 371 

Volunteers, German. See Freiwilligen. 

Voroshilov, Marshal K. E.: 121 

WADHAM: 70 

Walsh, Air Marshal Sir William: 4n 

Wannsee: 298, 298n 

War Cabinet: 222-23 

War Production Board: 103 

Warfield, Lt. Col. William E.: 368 

Warlimont, General der Artillerie Walter: 143, 143n, 

412 

Washington Conference, May 1943: 64-70, 83, 87, 

88,90n, 99, 100-01,209 

Weapons. See entries for various types of weapons. 

‘12ieather: 86n, 130, 210, 276n, 313, 317, 319 

D-day forecast: 272-74 

forecasting: 73 

German meteorologists: 276 

hampers air operations: 300-01 

storm over Channel, 19-23 June: 422, 423-26 

Weathers, Capt. Ornery C.: 369, 370n 

Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab, WFSt: 135 

Welborn, Lt. Col. John C.: 344, 344n 

Wemyss, Lt. Gen. Sir Colville: 4, 4n 

Werfer regiments: 231n 

West, Maj. Gen. Charles A.: 166 

West Wall: 131, 137,447 

Westem Defense Forces: 301 

Western defenses, German efforts to rebuild: 148-57 

Western Naval Task Force: 190, 194, 197n 

Weymouth: 272 

Whitefoord, Maj. Gen. P. G.: 217-18 

Wiggins, Col. Porter B.: 417 

Wilkes, Rear Adm. John: 160, 160n 

Williams, Brigadier E. T.: 319n 

Wilson, Charles E.: 103-04 

Wilson, Gen. Sir Henry Maitland: 170, 172 

Winant, John G.: 122 

Wisner, Lt. John H.: 291 

Witzleben, von, Generalfeldmarschall Erwin: 130. 

131-32, 132n 

Wood, Col. Sterling A.: 417, 418 

Woolacombe: 162 

Wyche, Maj. Gen. Ira T.: 417, 417n, 418. See also 

Infantry Division, 79th. 

Wyman, Brig. Gen. Willard G.: 328 

XAP: 127 

Yarmouth: 272 

Yugoslavia: 92n, 122 

Zeebrugge: 57 

Zeitzler, Generaloberst Kurt: 135, 136, 135n 

ZITADELLE: 144 

Zuckerman, Professor S.: 217, 219 

Zweite Stellung: 263, 264 

Zwingman, Pvt. Otto K.: 293, 293n 

f2 U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1993 33C-517 
OVERLORD AREA 

--- R.'L_.~ , ; WO "" -.: nAC", --- Moo," "IO &Y' 

"" •• "010, .. , Jll( UOS 

• 

" 

, 

CIIANN£L 

n ISLANDS 

c::J '00 lOO .~ D .. av • 

N G 5 

.. 

H C H A N N , 

MAP! 
\ 

rp 

12SJ29H 

I 

H'I 

fiRST 

US. 

SECOND 

B,. 

THE 

• 

FINAL OVERLORD PLAN , , '---~'" 

-:-:-:-:-:-:-

o 

0/10. lO"ES 

DO. • ..... SE U N[ 

IHlJfjOATEO ... t A 

• 

MAP II 
DEVELOPMENT OF THE LODGMENT 

21 Army Group Forecast of Operations 

os of 26 February 19 44 

o " MILES 

Plo(irmei 

SlMuoire 

FIRST 

U.S. 

Oomfronf 

·ChQleoubrionl 

Argtl,!/on 

~mitJns 

. Cllor/flls 

• Chu'ealKiun 

MAP [II 
SEALING OFF THE BATTLEFIELD 

THE INTERDICTION PLAN 

o 8RIOGE SITE 

o '" "'IUS 

0 

~f L8 eoen 

o 

s~ 

Argenfon 

• Rennss 

0 

fa Mons 

'", 

S 'E. c. -c; \ 

0" 

-~ 

" SIC 

0)-

/ 

0 

1-

--

~ 

" " " " " "-

, , LI NE 

"t0 

>-

u 

<u 

'" 

CluJ'eoudun 

Am/ens • 

, 

Reims 

o. 

i;/ ... rroyes 

suo - EST 

suo - OUEST 

MAPIV 
ORDER OF BATTLE OB WEST 

6 June 1944 

0 STATIC ANO RHl:RVE DIVISIONS 

rill ATTAC~ INfANTRY OlY lSIO NS 

D3I "AtIZ£~ GRENAD IER DIVISIONS 

I§] PANZER DIVISIONS 

Divisio"s il> ",OC~SS of fo,mo"O/! '" ,tlhot>ililoli",,, 

,UII it>dic,U"d by mi""s si9" {-} . o ,~ 

, ' , N 

M' LES 

MAP V 
G 

£ N 

IIfrocomb4 

Woolocombl 

, 

5 

R E A T 

• 

F 

R 

-

• 

. -. 8 8 

T 

> 

" 

• • 

, 

• 

< 

• 

CCln 

• 

A 

Oo~'r 

• 

ALLIED ASSAULT ROUTES 

6 June 194 4 

" MAIN EWURKATIOM ARU.S 

- S .. ROUTES 

"" ROUTES 

~~.~O • ." " ~ " " 'LES 

MAP VI 
.. .: .' 

: .. 

.... 

....... ~ 

. . 

\\ 

• 

THE AIRBORNE ASSAULT 

6 June 1944 

o --

"-o.v-' o...IttTM LUll 

_-.-.-.-_- _'[0 .11[ • 

==:> AlIII Of GvIIuJo COUH'IlJI,O,n.ogc 

" _ 'M 

~ DUVO$(I ' 

R[M'.OICI: ~UT 

B.t.TI[~~, ~ 152 _ _ ITUM 

UHOCC<.O'O[O "'T1U~ _ITIQH 

c-_ "".,"'" 10 mtllM'S 

~ , ;;;0.- -- • "",n 

, ... 

@ 

I 

r 

MAP VIl 
~~ / " 

"'~~ ">o-

..... Y" 

" ;> c· ,./ .J L, 

~ .. ;' . ~ ><Jrl'_ 

I c J 

L w 

... 

.. 

10lST AIRBORNE DIVISION 

DROP PATTERN 

6 June 1944 

"'CTUAL LANOI NGS 

ORO~ l ONE "(;" UNI1$ "" 8n 5o,,, P«hI ,.,. 

,., OM .d 8n, !>OSlO I'<<t" '.'. 0,. Hq 

0_ ZONE '0' UNITS. '" ono 2d Bn, "" .. ".o'" "". 3d 6n "-<l'''" Pro'" In •• Co C 326,. AOn [n~' 8n 

__ U NI)IHG eUOHO 1 H[ lO OP lIM" 

(: ::J 820 . ,AaORN E DIYISIO N D"OP ZONE 

E ... ~ ,It" ,.", •• M" _ .,1&' 1_ ""'_ """II 

, 

MAP VIII 
( -. 

~-

B20 AIRBORNE DIVISION 

DROP PATTERN 

6 June 1944 

~ORQP lOHl 

IICTUAL LANDINGS 

D" OP IOtl E "t" UHI1$: 507", P<oht 'n' ORO. lO NE '0' ".'n: 505'" "'eM "". I>i • .. ~ ond 6 or,o" 0' ", " eoll.",ou' hcoO' 

D.O. ZONE ' N' UNITS. 508," ProM '.' 

.".,0 '5 ""e', 01 ""00*"00."'" "00:» 

__ LAND'No BEYOND TNE " .' w", 

c: :)10'" "'"BO"" [ O' VIS'O" DROP ZONE 

MAP IX 
" CordtJlwil'- : .. :.,:, .. '.' 

• 51 a..-. , ;. dII·"'" ' ... 

" 

.. 

V CORPS D-DAY OBJECTIVES 

Ot.Ilctlvn. £S~r IAfTAllOOO5 

o...:cnvn. roUOW-UI' lUG/Kiln 

G RUrSTAlOtl NUT 

o Suo .. ; I'OIIiT 

~ ,,,.,.,.. 10 """,. 

MAP X 
~~~" ~ 

LEGEND 

,-'-'---'--1 I'I.UNU ~ ... O"" ncrOltl 

121 

."'N 'N"'U I>I: N[T"'''ONS 

----- ..... , 0' OY ~I. A$UII~l "U "H"l"I 

o 0 P'OIl1ION'. I NO 01' 0 0 " 

r---J GU"U co..l1u K H UU 

,........,,........,........, G .... U .Ullr U H, I NO 00' 0 0 .. 

CHARLIE DOG GREEN 

.. 

OMAHA BEACH ASSAULT 

(INFANTRY) 

6 JUNO 1944 

.~ 

--

DOG WHITE 

K '~' "' ._, 

DOG RED EASY GREEN 

• 

bJ_1I _· ·_·_··············· 

2 SIC 

EASY RED 

. '~'_, " .---.•.. -...... ... ---, 

FOX GREEN 

.r8i • r:::~ 16 K -·1 r ···········-·-·-. lr-··------"-Y-"C-----.. -.-, I 

~~j ' r [;JI6 

r··········· ............. -.. ----} ---·-··-··-----··-·--·~ I r----'-' ~"-··-.., _ .----,-,"".'----, I 

U6 16 

,"".,,"'. 

FOX REO 

1C!$J16-

MAP Xl 
FlFIST· ~ SECOND 

u. B,. 50Br ) ,., 

1-----------------------------GO" .,,"" ---------- - j ~-------- ------+------t----'"'O .,,"< -----------1 

THE SECOND BRITISH ARMY 

ON D DAY LANDING Aflr. 

K, N, v, W, x, y. GLIDER LA tl OING AN D DROP lONES 

S MA LL GLIDER FORCE TO CflASH lllNO 

ON M EflYILLE BA1HR f 

BRIDGE DE MOLISHED BY AIRBOR NE TROOPS 

FRONT LI NE. 2. 4 00, 6 ~U E 

GE IIIU N OH EN$ES 

o RESISTA NCE NEST (§).. STRONG POI N T 

o o 

E LE V.TlO ;~,-"",-, ,.,." , .. am '0 ~O 

, 

.. 'us 

' OO Ctl(! 01>0 .. 

, . • 

o 

MAP XII 
GERMAN COUNTERMEASURES 

6 June 1944 

LEGEND 

® STATIC DIVISION 

® CORPS RESER¥( 

@ ARMY RESERVE 

@l ARNY GROUP B RESERVE " (;,'J", KG al rled 

@) QK W RESER¥( 

DIRECTION OF NO¥( NENT 

" K"NPFGRUPPE 

- MAIN RAILROADS 

HIG~ "' ''' YS 

Ollimp~r 

MAP XIII 
) 

,. 

.~- : / " 

.' 

sr to '. 

V CORPS 7-8 JUNE 1944 

_ Foor_ I'OSITIOIf$, (Y(HlNi5 6 ...... E 

f'I'TnTTTT ~ _l'ON', ('I(Jf<NG 1 ___ 

_ AOVAIoIU 8 JUIj[ 

G£_ UfII'TS AI Of 8 JuH( 

COt'IIOW _"'" I() ""IllS 

000 0 

;;-- ""~~~~~- _---: .. ':i 

MAP XIV 
/ 

VA~ 

• 

I 

------ ------ • 

" 

VII CORPS ON D + I 

o.GOV _GTIV( ..... ( 

8uotHu.D Uot. {)If 0 g,lY 

I'O&o<tf {)If Gu! ... " II($ISTOJOe(. 

_051<" 611 JuHl 

Ax .. {)If .n .... 1.k/N[ 

PosI,_ U,-"S>II£D [\'(HIIOC, 7 Jufc 

"'XII {)If (i(Ifowo ~TT"'. 1 Jufc 

~ _ _ ooc-______ "-____ -.~ 

YAIR.I -- "'Ll' 

MAP XV 
- -- ----- -- - - --------

.0 

- ~ . 1'7th 55 

u 

/ 

/' 

,~ 

Hlesvdle 

.. 

" 

/~ 

s~ G60r9;r· 

de·8""on 

.: ..... 

'. 

BATTLE FOR CARENTAN 

AND JUNCTION OF THE BEACHHEADS 

9'12 June 1944 

1111

-11111111111 

AXIS o~ ~TT4C"'. 8 JUNE 

FO RWARO POsmONS. EVENING 9 JUNE 

AXIS or ATTAC~, 10 JUNE 

FORWARO POSITIONS, EVENING II JUNE 

AXIS Of ATTACK, 12 JUNE 

iiill' llIl l lIlI FORWARD POSITIONS, EVEN'NG 12 JUNE 

GER'-AN UN,TS AS OF 12 JUNE 

Conloor rnftrvol fO ~!ers 

~ 0 

---

, vARDS " 'cES 

-) 

~ t'" 

\ ,0 

, .0 

I 

" 

MAP XVI 
c 

1 

W 

( 

VII V 

V CORPS ADVANCE 

9-13 June 1944 

ZI///##//& fOOtW.o.lID II'OSIflOHS, (VU"''''' 8 JUN[ 

W/////////I/, PosITIONS IIUCIO(O EV£ G 9 JVf<[ 

Po$!HONS "UCHEO (V[ I~ 10 JUNE 

4/##/////4 PoSITIONS II[&(;H(O [VtHIH(; 12 Jo,I,.[ 

"'¥i",ii"", PosITlOOlS II[.&CIIlD [V(N'I'IG " JUNE 

Gcl!IoU.N _'noNS, £V(HIH(; 13 JUNE 

MAP XVII 
KAMPFGRUPPE HEINTZ 

... "

" . 

6- 11 June 1944 

RAILROAD. TWO OR OR~ TRACKS 

R.,LROAD. SINGLE TRACI( 

RR CUT IT IOMIIN6 OR ' .. OUGE, 

o OAT TO 12 JUNE * flloOP U AIN 

o 

WILES " " 

MAP XVIII 
v 

\ 

TOWARD ST. LO 18 June 19 44 

ViI/lummI»- FORWUD P(lSITlQNS, ~VENIN~ 14 JUNE 

• - ,. POSITIONS R(AGNED [VENI NG 16 JVNE 

GERM" ! UNITS AS or [VENI NG 18 JU NE 

ContOll' Interval 10 m#ters 

MAP XIX 
8-14 June 1944 

____ Fo~WA RO POSITIONS, NIG>tT 118 JUNE 

• ••• _ F()RWA RO POSITIONS, E~ENING 10 .klNE 

PoSITIONS ~UC~EO EVENING 12 J~NE 

PoSiTIONS ~£AC~ED EII[NING 14JUNE 

80undrJriu in 91~~n as of 2330, 12 JUM 

COn/Oil' inf rll(}l 10 m~"rs 

"'LES 

MAP XX 
ATTACK TO CUT THE PENINSULA 

o 

o 

\ 

\ 

\ 

\ 

10 -18 June 1944 

FORWA RD POS'TIO S. EV[N,"G 9 JU NE 

FOR WARD POSITIONS, EVEN ING 13 JUNE 

FOR WA RD POSI TIONS. [VENING 16 JUNE 

POSIT IONS REACHED N""T 11/ 18 AND 

EU lY "'ORNING 18 JUNE 

GER MAN UNITS AS Of Ie JUNE 

HEVAHDNS IN .. n u s 

~~-I~~;;;t. 

\ 

\ 

, 

" 

\ 

\~ 

- SI Moreou! Is 

MAP XXI 
SI Morco~t IS t;J 

c:? 

THE ADVANCE NORTH 

19 - 21 June 1944 

111111111\\ F~OHT LtH(. HIGHT 18/19 JUNE 

"""""'" PoSI TIONS R(lCHEO 19 JUNE 

••••• PosITIQN ' REACHED 20 JUNE 

tmmmImt FRONT LINE. EV(HIH~ 21 JUNE 

~ GERNlH DE~EHSE P[AlioIETER 

~RDIII CAPTURED DDel/VEN TI 

.I/AP XXII 
'U '""",,, 

THE ATTACK ON CHERBOURG 

22 - 26 June 19 44 

N'GHT POS,TlONS ~EACMEO " fO~w~~O £Uu,NfS 

- 21 JUNE ___ 22 JUNE " JUNE 

--- " JUNE _ 25 U~E 

GU .... N DEfE NSE: PER' ''ETER rpo .. CAPTu~EO ... O~TEO " M' ~CM 

C:.3 Sl~ONG PO'NT 

Arliliery emplcctmenlS wtr8 forM/td for oll-oround dtfeMe 

(j) ARSENA C <ll GAR[ ~,~",." Gl C,n ~"'-c 

® U NDERGROUNO SM[cH~ IVQN SCMC1U"·S CI') 

£/I!VO/!(MS In m~lerS 

'000 0 

1944 

.. 

.. " 

Cop Levy 

c> 

.... 

AA 4A 

/ 

MAP XXIII 
, -.- • 

-- THE 

• 

ADVANCE INLAND - I July 1944 

6 JUfI. 6 .AI~( ~ tv("'''" I'onMO _. • MH''''' ! JULY 

• 

• • 

JIAP XXIV