Both the British and American forces were building up steadily in strength. In spite of the interruptions and destruction due to the great storm of the nineteenth, the delays imposed were only temporary and interfered little with the execution of final plans.
The steady arrival of fresh troops made it possible to keep up the offensive, but under unfavorable conditions of terrain and weather. On the east our purpose was now to contain the maximum amount of the German forces, on the west to make sufficient progress so that the final and co-ordinated drive to break out of the restricted beachhead could be delivered.11
Late June was a difficult period for all of us. More than one of our high-ranking visitors began to express the fear that we were stalemated and that those who had prophesied a gloomy fate for Overlord were being proved correct. A grave risk that always accompanies an amphibious undertaking against a continental land mass is finding itself sealed off in a beachhead. Adequate elbow room is a prerequisite to the build-up of troops and supplies necessary to a decisive, mobile battle.
When possibilities of supply and reinforcement, as well as terrain, favor the defense, there exists the chance that in spite of successful landing the battlefield may thus easily become a draining sore in the side of the attacker rather than the opening stages of a destructive campaign against the defender’s main forces. This had been the Allied experience at Gallipoli in the first World War, an experience that was partially repeated, for some months in the early part of 1944, in the Anzio operation. Such a possibility had, of course, been thoroughly examined and planned against, long before D-day. Our greatest asset in defeating it lay in our air and sea power. With the first we were confident of disrupting enemy supply and communication, of impeding troop movements, and of beating down prepared defenses. Through sea power and the development of artificial ports we had a rugged and effective system of supply and reinforcement. We were confident, consequently, that in the build-up race we were sure to win. Beyond this, a possible countermove was the launching of a secondary amphibious and possibly airborne effort against the Brittany Peninsula.
Early planning placed a very great importance on the ports in that area, and we believed that, if the enemy should denude his defenses there in an effort to present an impregnable line in front of our Normandy landings, we could accomplish a surprise move into the Brittany region which would threaten to take him in flank and rear. In this connection we had already learned that the Germans never deliberately evacuated a port without leaving behind them a desolation and destruction that rendered rapid repair extremely difficult; therefore the particular spot we had decided upon as most useful for supply and maintenance purposes in Brittany was Quiberon Bay, a large, well-sheltered, but undeveloped harbor on the southern flank of the peninsula’s base.
As June faded into July we closely watched the situation to determine whether or not a secondary landing would prove profitable to us. More and more I turned against it. One reason was that our air forces and our deceptive threats were preventing the Germans from building up an impregnable line in front of our Normandy forces. Moreover, I knew that any attempt to stage a secondary landing would occasion delay in the direct build-up of our forces and supplies on the main front. I still believed we would have to make major use of the Brittany ports, but I believed that by continuing our attacks we would get them sooner than by lessening the weight of our blows on the main front to allow the mounting of the secondary attack.
I spent much time in France, conferring frequently with General Bradley and General Montgomery concerning timing and strength of projected battle operations.12 Such visits with Bradley were always enjoyable because he shared my liking for roaming through the forward areas to talk to the men actually bearing the burden of battle. Many of our personal conferences, throughout the war, were conducted during the trips we so often made together to the fighting troops.
A sergeant who accompanied me everywhere in France was a motorcycle policeman named Sidney Spiegel. His personal loyalty and his anxiety to protect and assist me knew no bounds. He was always particularly careful about his soldierly appearance, and no matter what the miserable conditions of road travel, he never delayed shining up his motorcycle and making of himself a model in soldierly appearance upon arrival at our destination. When finally we were separated I lost a devoted friend and a valued assistant.
During this period I kept up a written, telephonic, and radio correspondence with both Bradley and Montgomery. At the end of June the beachhead area was still too restricted to permit Supreme Headquarters to begin its move to France, but in order to be in constant touch with senior ground commanders I started my personal headquarters detachment to France during July. The battle for position and of building up reserves progressed at times with disappointing slowness and inspired the press in both Britain and America to sharp criticism. The writers could not, of course, know the facts. If everything in war were a matter of common knowledge there would be no opportunity to surprise an alert enemy.
In temporary stalemates, however, there always exists the problem of maintaining morale among fighting men while they are suffering losses and are meanwhile hearing their commanders criticized. The commentators’ voices came into every squad and platoon over the tiny radios that soldiers would never abandon.
The effect of carping becomes more serious when soldiers find it also in letters from relatives at home who have been led to expect the impossible. Among green troops the problem is much more serious than among veterans. The attitude of the latter was well expressed in a remark made to me one day by a sergeant, who with his railway unit was waiting to go farther to the front in order to start some needed construction. He said, “General, on the map this job looked easy, but now the Heinies seem to have something to say about it. But there is nothing wrong with us that a good, rousing victory won’t cure.”
Chapter 15
BREAKOUT
THE FIRST CRITICAL OBJECTIVE OF THE Normandy campaign, which was to establish a secure beachhead with adequate avenues of supply in the area between Cherbourg and the mouth of the Orne, was fully accomplished by the end of June.1
From the beginning it was the conception of Field Marshal Montgomery, Bradley, and myself that eventually the great movement out of the beachhead would be by an enormous left wheel, bringing our front onto the line of the Seine, with the whole area lying between that river and the Loire and as far eastward as Paris in our firm possession. This did not imply the adoption of a rigid scheme of grand tactics. It was merely an estimate of what we believed would happen when once we could concentrate the full power of our air-ground-naval team against the enemy we expected to meet in northwest France.
An important point in our calculations was the line from which we originally intended to execute this wheel. This part of our tactical prognostications did not work out and required adjustment. The plan, formally presented by Montgomery on May 15, stated: “Once we can get control of the main enemy lateral Granville–Vire–Argentan–Falaise–Caen, and the area enclosed in it is firmly in our possession, then we will have the lodgment area we want and can begin to expand.”
This line we had hoped to have by June 23, or D plus 17.2 In his more detailed presentation of April 7, Montgomery stated that the second great phase of the operation, estimated to begin shortly after D plus 20, would require the British Army to pivot on its left at Falaise, to “swing with its right toward Argentan–Alençon.” This meant that Falaise would be in our possession before the great wheel began. The line that we actually held when the breakout began on D plus 50 was approximately that planned for D plus 5.
This was a far different story, but one which had to be accepted. Battle is not a one-sided affair. It is a case of action and reciprocal action repeated over and over again as contestants seek to gain position and other advantage by which they may inflict the greatest possible damage upon their respective opponents.
In this case the importance of the Caen area to the enemy had caused him to
use great force in its defense. Its capture became a temporary impossibility or, if not that, at least an operation to be accomplished at such cost as to be almost prohibitive.
Naturally this development caused difficulties. Had we been successful in our first rush in gaining the open ground south of Caen, the advance of the Americans to the Avranches region might have become, instead of the dogged battle that it was, a mere push against German withdrawals. That is, greater initial success on our left should have made easier attainment, on our right, of a satisfactory jump-off line from which to initiate the great wheel.
As the days wore on after the initial landing the particular dissatisfaction of the press was directed toward the lack of progress on our left. Naturally I and all of my senior commanders and staff were greatly concerned about this static situation near Caen. Every possible means of breaking the deadlock was considered and I repeatedly urged Montgomery to speed up and intensify his efforts to the limit. He threw in attack after attack, gallantly conducted and heavily supported by artillery and air, but German resistance was not crushed.
Further, one must realize that when the enemy, by intensive action or concentration of forces, succeeds in balking a portion of our own forces, he usually does so at the expense of his ability to support adequately other portions of the field. In this instance, even though the breakout would now have to be initiated from farther back than originally planned, it was obvious that if the mass of enemy forces could be held in front of Caen there would be fewer on the western flank to oppose the American columns. This was indeed fortunate in view of the difficult type of country through which the Americans would have to advance. These developments were constantly discussed with Bradley and Montgomery; the latter was still in charge of tactical co-ordination of ground forces in the crowded beachhead.
By June 30, Montgomery had obviously become convinced, as Bradley and I already had, that the breakout would have to be launched from the more restricted line. His directive of that date clearly stated that the British Second Army on the left would continue its attacks to attract the greatest possible portion of enemy strength, while the American forces, which had captured Cherbourg four days before, would begin attacking southward with a view to final breakout on the right flank.3 From that moment onward this specific battle plan did not vary, and although the nature of the terrain and enemy resistance combined with weather to delay the final all-out attack until July 25, the interim was used in battling for position and in building up necessary reserves.
This, of course, placed upon the American forces a more onerous and irksome task than had at first been anticipated. However, Bradley thoroughly understood the situation of the moment and as early as June 20 had expressed to me the conviction that the breakout on the right would have to be initiated from positions near St. Lô, rather than from the more southerly line originally planned. He sensed the task with his usual imperturbability and set about it in workmanlike fashion. He rationed the expenditure of ammunition all along the front, rotated troops in the front lines, and constantly kept his units and logistic elements in such condition as to strike suddenly and with his full power when the opportunity should present itself.
Complicating the problem of the breakout on the American front was the prevalence of formidable hedgerows in the bocage country. In this region the fields have for centuries past been divided into very small areas, sometimes scarcely more than building-lot size, each surrounded by a dense and heavy hedge which ordinarily grows out of a bank of earth three or four feet in height. Sometimes these hedges and supporting banks are double, forming a ready-made trench between them, and of course affording almost the ultimate in battlefield protection and natural camouflage. In almost every row were hidden machine gunners or small combat teams who were in perfect position to decimate our infantry as they doggedly crawled and crept to the attack along every avenue of approach.
Our tanks could help but little. Each, attempting to penetrate a hedgerow, was forced to climb almost vertically, thus exposing the unprotected belly of the tank and rendering it easy prey to any type of armor-piercing bullet. Equally exasperating was the fact that, with the tank snout thrust skyward, it was impossible to bring guns to bear upon the enemy; crews were helpless to defend themselves or to destroy the German.
In this dilemma an American sergeant named Culin came forth with a simple invention that restored the effectiveness of the tank and gave a tremendous boost to morale throughout the Army. It consisted merely in fastening to the front of the tank two sturdy blades of steel which, acting somewhat as scythes, cut through the bank of earth and hedges. This not only allowed the tank to penetrate the obstacle on an even keel and with its guns firing, but actually allowed it to carry forward, for some distance, a natural camouflage of amputated hedge.4
As soon as Sergeant Culin had demonstrated his invention to his captain it was speedily brought to the attention of General Walter M. Robertson of the 2d Division. He, in turn, demonstrated the appliance to Bradley, who set about the task of equipping the greatest possible number of tanks in this fashion so as to be ready for the coming battle. A feature of the incident from which our soldiers derived a gleeful satisfaction was that the steel for the cutting blades was obtained from the obstacles which the German had installed so profusely over the beaches of Normandy to prevent our landing on that coast.
However, we were still without this contrivance when the First Army began its tedious southward advance to achieve a reasonable jump-off line for the big attack. It was difficult to obtain any real picture of the battle area. One day a few of us visited a forward observation tower located on a hill, which took us to a height of about a hundred feet above the surrounding hedgerows. Our vision was so limited that I called upon the air forces to take me in a fighter plane along the battle front in an effort to gain a clear impression of what we were up against. Unfortunately, even from the vantage point of an altitude of several thousand feet there was not much to see that could be classed as helpful. As would be expected under such conditions, the artillery, except for long-range harassing fire, was of little usefulness. It was dogged “doughboy” fighting at its worst. Every division that participated in it came out of that action hardened, battle-wise, and self-confident.
Tactics, logistics, and morale—to these three the higher commanders and staffs devoted every minute of their time. Tactics to gain the best possible line from which to launch the great attack against the encircling forces. Logistics to meet our daily needs and to build up the mountains of supplies and to bring in the reserve troops we would need in order to make that attack decisive. And always we were concerned in morale because troops were called upon constantly to engage in hard fighting but denied the satisfaction of the long advances that invariably fill an army with élan. By July 2, 1944, we had landed in Normandy about 1,000,000 men, including 13 American, 11 British, and 1 Canadian divisions. In the same period we put ashore 566,648 tons of supplies and 171,532 vehicles. It was all hard and exhausting work but its accomplishment paid off in big dividends when finally we were ready to go full out against the enemy. During these first three weeks we took 41,000 prisoners. Our casualties totaled 60,771, of whom 8975 were killed.5
During the battling in the beachhead a particular development was our continued progress in the employment of air forces in direct support of the land battle. Perfection in ground-air co-ordination is difficult if not impossible to achieve.
When a pilot in a fighter bomber picks up a target on the ground below it is easily possible for him to mistake its identity. He may be ten to fifteen thousand feet in the air and unless visibility is perfect he may have difficulty in identifying the exact spot on the ground over which he is flying. In his anxiety to help his infantry comrades he may suddenly decide that the gun or truck or unit he sees on the ground belongs to the enemy, and the instant he does so he starts diving on it at terrific speed. Once having made his decision, his entire concentration is given to his target; his purpose is to ach
ieve the greatest possible amount of destruction in the fleeting moment available to him. Only incessant training and indoctrination, together with every kind of appropriate mechanical aid, can minimize the danger of mistaken identification and attack on our own forces.
One method we used was to put an air liaison detachment in a tank belonging to the attacking unit. Each such detachment was given a radio capable of communicating with planes in the air, and through this means we not only helped to avoid accidents but were able to direct the airplane onto specific and valuable targets. The ground and air, between them, developed detailed techniques and mechanisms for improvement, with a noticeable degree of success.6
Accidents in the other direction were just as frequent. More than one friendly pilot attempting to co-operate with the ground troops has been greeted with a storm of small-arms fire and many returned to their bases bitterly complaining that the infantry did not seem to want friendly planes around. In the early days in Africa these accidents were almost daily occurrences; by the time we had won the Battle of the Beachhead they had practically ceased.
Within the high command a clear appreciation of the relationship between the strategic bombing effort in the German homeland and the needs of the land forces was essential if we were to work in common purpose and achieve the greatest possible result. As this appreciation developed among air as well as ground commanders, the early reluctance of such specialists as Air Chief Marshal Harris and General Doolittle, who commanded respectively the bomber forces of Great Britain and the U. S. Eighth Air Force, to employ their formations against so-called tactical targets completely disappeared. By the time the breakout was achieved, the emergency intervention of the entire bomber force in the land battle had come to be accepted almost as a matter of course.
To this general rule there was one notable exception. The U. S. 30th Division by unfortunate accident suffered considerable casualties from our own bombing effort, an incident that was repeated later in the campaign. To the end of the war the commander of this particular division insisted that when given attack missions he wanted no heavy or medium bombers to participate.7
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