D-Day snafu

[galen]

*Originally posted by DPWhite *
**Stalin desparately wanted a Western front, and without it, there is no telling how much longer the war might have continued. If Britain and the U.S. hadn’t bombed the bejezez out of Germany and destroyed the Luftwaffe and simply waited till Germany and the USSR bled each other white (as Churchill at times considered doing) the war may have lasted much longer and Stalingrad might not have been a turning point. As little credit as the Western Allies give to the Russians doing most of the awful bloody work on the Eastern front, had the Allies simply stopped after recovering North Africa and possibly Italy, the final victory was not certain. The USSR very much needed and benefited from the enormous pressure the Western Allies put on the Nazis. An unreduced Luftwaffe and German industrial base might have been able to hold off the numerical superiority of the Soviets (and their superior tanks). The Messerschmit 262 jets could have achieved air supremacy over the Soviets. So I have to disagree that Normandy was only for capitalism. It was militarily necessary.
As for surprise, Operation Bodyguard took complete advantage of Hitler’s belief in his own “military genius” and kept German reinforcements from coming for a long time. The timing of the landing was a complete surprise and Hitler withheld reinforcements because he believed the real landing would come at the Pas d’ Calais shortly. He had no clue of the scope of the Normandy invasion due to complete air supremacy and a disinformation campaign. As heavy as the Omaha casualties were, the Allies were fortunate that all the beaches didn’t have such high casualties. Amphibious operations had (and have) enormous risks, and the troops are very vulnerable while landing. The Germans knew that the Allies were coming, they just didn’t know when and where. **

The Russians had been pushing for a second front for a long time, but there was always some excuse not to . By Mid 1944, it had really become a non-issue. I realize that you will never find this assessment in any US or British publication. The line here is that the Nazi war machine was destroyed as a result of the landing in Normandy. A true absurdity to anyone remotely knowledgeable about the events on the Eastern front during 1943 and early 1944.

There is no doubt that US and British bombing of German industry had greatly hurt the Nazis, but the bulk of the German army, millions of men and hundreds of divisions, had been destroyed on the eastern front. It is not for nothing that Colonel Klink of Hogan’s Heros fame was so horrified by the threat of being sent to the Russian Front. It was essentially a death sentence.

In the year and a half or so after the battle of Stalingrad, the Nazis were pushed all the way back to the Warsaw area in heavy fighting. There was a D-Day scale battle at least every week. At Kursk in July, 1943, something like 1500 German tanks were destroyed. After that the retreat became a bit of a rout.

It is not far from Warsaw to Berlin. With or without US and British ground troops, it was clear that the Russians would soon be in Berlin and the US and Britian would not be there to save German capital.

It is even concievable, though not certain, that the Russian advance would have continued to Spain to overthrow the fascist Franco regime there.

I guess it is possible that the Germans were fooled by the Calais ruse, but I think it is a stretch. How it could work is beyond me.

[Milton_De_La_Warre]

A minor question, but one which I have often wondered about in this context:

Did the infantry landing craft sail across the channel, or were they unloaded from larger ships a few miles from the French coast?

Galen, I have to disagree with your contentions. As you yourself say: “In the year and a half or so after the battle of Stalingrad, the Nazis were pushed all the way back to the Warsaw area in heavy fighting. There was a D-Day scale battle at least every week.” If this is indeed the case, then the Soviet armies most desparately needed a second front, as without it there wouldn’t have been enough Soviets left to go the “not far” distance from Warsaw to Berlin. …Or (as they did) hold off on going this “not far” distance to take the much further detour south to “liberate” Romania, Bulgaria, etc.

This discussion (the necessity for a second front) is nmore of a Great Debate item, IMHO. Especially when pejoratives like “capitalist bacon” get thrown into the mix.

[UncleBill]

They were unloaded from larger ships near the beach.

[Sofa_King]

Galen has some good points, but it is important to note that there was a second front against the Germans in 1943: Sicily and Italy. Furthermore, the loss of France was a huge setback for the German war machine.

That front was very important for several reasons, but perhaps most importantly it forced the withdrawal of most of the Italian troops from the Eastern Front, and when Mussolini’s government collapsed it forced the Germans to occupy as much of the Italian peninsula as they could. Just as Normady did, the Italian front served as a crucial distraction and forced the redirection of large numbers of German men and materiel.

The non-Russian fronts also forced the redirection of some of the best German divisions and field commanders. Panzer Lehr, the 12th SS, and the Hermann Goering division were all otherwise occupied, as were Rommel, Kesselring, and later Model. The result was that by 1944 the initiative was stolen from the Germans and never really regained. (The Battle of the Bulge, while a temporary setback for the Allies on the Western Front, proved to be far more disastrous for the Germans.)

The loss of France also hurt the Germans far worse economically than did the loss of all of the Soviet territory. Germany had fixed the deutschmark at an artificially high exchange rate, guaranteeing a steady influx of French cash (see Len Deighton’s Blood, Tears, and Folly). French natural resources were systematically exploited for the German war machine, as was the whole of French industrial capacity and labor. 1944 was the biggest year for German production, and most of that production came in the first half of the year through the exploitation of France. (France also supplied some troops to the Germans. One of the last units protecting Hitler’s bunker in Berlin was the Charlemagne Division.)

Finally, the destruction of the equivalent of an entire German army in the Falaise Pocket was a major setback for the Germans. That it happened within a couple of months of the Destruction of Army Group Center on the Eastern Front ensured that the Germans would never fully recover from both losses.

The bottom line is this: before Normandy, the Nazis had a fighting chance to survive; after the breakout in the Cotentin, it was only a matter of time before the Nazis were destroyed.

(By the way, David Simmons is being overly modest about the German movement of reinforcements to Normandy. I suspect he personally took a good sized chunk out of the forces the Germans did try to relocate there.)

[Tranquilis]

*Originally posted by UncleBill *
**They were unloaded from larger ships near the beach. **

Not all of them. Some landing craft (the LCT) carrying tanks or other heavy equipment loaded in England and carried the loads right up onto the beaches. These were essentially very small ships with beaching capability.

As for Calais, you have to remember: Hitler was relying on:

• A totally compromised spy network,
• His own capabilities (he never really understood the industrial might facing him)
• Past amphibious assaults (no one had ever done naval assault like America (and later, Britian and Canada) did in WWII,
• His immense confidence that he was smart enough to out-guess his enemies.

This was compounded by the German General Staff’s unwillingness to argue with Hitler.

[Rayne_Man]

On the question of other fronts; I read in one book that the invasion of the south of France a month after D Day was realy bad news for the Allies. The argument put forward is that the French south coast had also tied up a lot of German troops. Once the southern invasion came the Germans realised that it was all over for them in that theatre of war and so transferred the troops from there up to Normandy , therefore providing stronger opposition to the break-out from the D Day beaches. An interesting point.