page_title: Operation Cobra
section_title: Main attack and breakthrough 25–27 July
hierarchical_section_title: Operation Cobra / Allied offensive / Main attack and breakthrough 25–27 July
caption_attribution_description: English: Saint Lo and Vicinity - Operation Cobra - 25-29 July 1944.Background information: In 1938 the predecessors of what is today The Department of History at the United States Military Academy began developing a series of campaign atlases to aid in teaching cadets a course entitled, "History of the Military Art." Since then, the Department has produced over six atlases and more than one thousand maps, encompassing not only America’s wars but global conflicts as well. In keeping abreast with today's technology, the Department of History is providing these maps on the internet as part of the department's outreach program. The maps were created by the United States Military Academy’s Department of History and are the digital versions from the atlases printed by the United States Defense Printing Agency. We gratefully acknowledge the accomplishments of the department's former cartographer, Mr. Edward J. Krasnoborski, along with the works of our present cartographer, Mr. Frank Martini.
context_page_description: Operation Cobra was the codename for an offensive launched by the United States First Army under Lieutenant General Omar Bradley seven weeks after the D-Day landings, during the Normandy campaign of World War II. The intention was to take advantage of the distraction of the Germans by the British and Canadian attacks around Caen in Operation Goodwood, and thereby break through the German defenses that were penning in their forces while the Germans were unbalanced. Once a corridor had been created, the First Army would then be able to advance into Brittany, rolling up the German flanks once free of the constraints of the bocage country. After a slow start, the offensive gathered momentum and German resistance collapsed as scattered remnants of broken units fought to escape to the Seine. Lacking the resources to cope with the situation, the German response was ineffectual and the entire Normandy front soon collapsed. Operation Cobra, together with concurrent offensives by the British Second Army and the Canadian First Army, was decisive in securing an Allied victory in the Normandy campaign.
context_section_description: After the one-day postponement, Cobra got underway at 09:38 on 25 July, when around 600 Allied fighter-bombers attacked strongpoints and enemy artillery along a 270 m (300 yd)-wide strip of ground located in the St. Lô area. For the next hour, 1,800 heavy bombers of the U.S. Eighth Air Force saturated a 6,000 yd × 2,200 yd (3.4 mi × 1.3 mi; 5.5 km × 2.0 km) area on the Saint-Lô–Periers road, succeeded by a third and final wave of medium bombers. Approximately 3,000 U.S. aircraft had carpet-bombed a narrow section of the front, with the Panzer-Lehr-Division taking the brunt of the attack. However, once again not all the casualties were German; Bradley had specifically requested that the bombers approach the target from the east, out of the sun and parallel to the Saint-Lô–Periers road, in order to minimize the risk of friendly losses, but most of the airmen instead came in from the north, perpendicular to the front line. Bradley, however, had apparently misunderstood explanations from the heavy bomber commanders that a parallel approach was impossible because of the time and space constraints Bradley had set. Additionally, a parallel approach would not in any event have assured that all bombs would fall behind German lines because of deflection errors or obscured aim points due to dust and smoke. Despite efforts by U.S. units to identify their positions, inaccurate bombing by the Eighth Air Force killed 111 men and wounded 490. The dead included Bradley's friend and fellow West Pointer Lieutenant General Lesley McNair—the highest-ranking U.S. soldier to be killed in action in the European Theater of Operations.
  By 11:00, the infantry began to move forward, advancing from crater to crater beyond what had been the German outpost line. Although no serious opposition was forecast, the remnants of Fritz Bayerlein's Panzer Lehr—consisting of roughly 2,200 men and 45 armored vehicles—had regrouped and were prepared to meet the advancing U.S. troops, and to the west of Panzer Lehr the German 5th Parachute Division had escaped the bombing almost intact. Collins' VII Corps were quite disheartened to meet fierce enemy artillery fire, which they expected to have been suppressed by the bombing. Several U.S. units found themselves entangled in fights against strongpoints held by a handful of German tanks, supporting infantry and 88 mm (3.46 in) guns—VII Corps gained only 2,000 m (2,200 yd) during the rest of the day. However, if the first day's results had been disappointing, General Collins found cause for encouragement; although the Germans were fiercely holding their positions, these did not seem to form a continuous line and were susceptible to being outflanked or bypassed. Even with prior warning of the U.S. offensive, the British and Canadian actions around Caen had convinced the Germans that the real threat lay there, and tied down their available forces to such an extent that a succession of meticulously prepared defensive positions in depth, as encountered during Goodwood and Atlantic, were not created to meet Cobra.
  On the morning of 26 July, the U.S. 2nd Armored Division and the 1st Infantry Division joined the attack as planned, reaching one of Cobra's first objectives—a road junction north of Le Mesnil-Herman—the following day. Also on 26 July, VIII Corps (Major General Troy H. Middleton) entered the battle, led by the 8th U.S. Infantry Division and 90th U.S. Infantry Division. Despite clear paths of advance through the floods and swamps across their front, both divisions initially disappointed the First Army by failing to gain significant ground but first light the next morning revealed that the Germans had been compelled to retreat by their crumbling left flank, leaving only immense minefields to delay VIII Corps. By noon on 27 July, the U.S. 9th Infantry Division was also clear of any organized German resistance and was advancing rapidly.
caption: Operation Cobra, 25–29 July 1944
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