Hans Von Luck - Panzer Commander

by Unknown

  First reports indicated that British paratroops had dropped over Troarn. The commander of No.11 Battalion had already started a counterattack with uninvolved elements and had succeeded in penetrating as far as Troam, to which elements of the 5th Company had already withdrawn under their own steam.

  We telephoned the company commander, who was in a cellar.

  “Brandenburg, hold on. The battalion is already attacking and is bound to reach you in a few moments.”

  “Okay,” he replied, “I have the first prisoner here, a British medical officer of the 6th Airborne Division.”

  “Send him along as soon as the position is clear.” In the meantime, my adjutant telephoned the division. General Feuchtinger and his general-staff officer had not come back yet.

  We gave the orderly officer, Lieutenant Messmer, a brief situation rcport and asked him to obtain clearance for us for a concentrated night attack the moment the divisional commander returned.

  By now, we had a slightly better idea of and grip on the situation. Prisoners who had misjudged their jumps and fallen into our hands in the course of our limited counterattack were brought in to me. Before I had them escorted away to division, in accordance with orders, we learned during our “small talk” that the 6t)i Airborne Division was supposed to jump during the night in order to take the bridges over the Orne at Ranville intact and form a bridge The Start of the Invasion, 6 June 1944 173 head east of the Orne for the landing by sea planned for the morning of 6 June.

  Gradually we were becoming filled with anger. The clearance for an immediate night attack, so as to take advantage of the initial confusion among our opponents, had still not come, although our reports via division to the corps and to Army Group B (Rommel) must have long since been on hand. We made a thorough calculation of our chances of successfully pushing through to the coast and preventing the formation of a bridgehead, or at least making it more difficult.

  I remember the British medical officer who was brought to me as the first prisoner. In his parachute equipment he looked like any other soldier. As a good Briton, he kept his composure, but seemed deeply disappointed, and unnerved, at being taken prisoner immediately on his first mission. Since he too would only give his name and number, I began, as always with a British prisoner, to make small talk. I spoke about my last visit to London in March 1939, about Picadilly Circus and my British friends. At that he thawed, and I learned more about British intentions and the task of the 6th Airborne Division.

  The hours passed. We had set up a defensive front where we had been condemned to inactivity. The rest of the division, with the panzer regiment and Panzer Grenadier Regiment 192, was equally immobilized, though in the highest state of alert. My adjutant telephoned once more to division. Major Forster, IC and responsible for the reception of prisoners, came to the phone. He too was unable to alter the established orders. Army Group B merely informed us that it was a matter of a diversionary maneuver: the British had tlii-own out straw dummies on parachutes. At daybreak, I sent y id.jutarit to ask divisional command post to secure us immediate clearance for a counterattack. On his arrival, Liebeskind witnessed a heated telephone conversation which Feuchtinger was evidently having with the army: “General, I have just come back from Paris and I've seen a gigantic armada off the west coast of Cabourg, warships, supply ships, and landing craft. I want to attack at once with the entire division east of the Ome in ordr to push through to the coast.” But clearance was strictly denied.

  Hitler, who used to work far into the night, was still asleep that early morning.

  At the command post, I paced up and down and clenched my fists at the indecision of the Supreme Command in the face of the obvious facts. If Rommel had been with us instead of in Germany, he would have disregarded all orders and taken actionf that we were convinced.

  We felt completely fit physically and able to cope with the situation. I concealed my anger and remained calm and matter-of-fact. My experience in previous theaters of war had taught me that the more critical a situation, or the more alarming the reports, the more calmly every experienced leader should react.

  The best way to calm an excited orderly officer, or a dispatch rider coming straight from an apparently desperate situation, is to sit him down, give him a cigarette and say, “Now tell me what has actually happened.” So the tragedy took its course. After only a few hours, the brave fighting units in the coastal fortifications could no longer withstand the enemy pressure, or else they were smashed by the Allied naval guns; while a German panzer division, ready to engage, lay motionless behind the front and powerful Allied bomber formations, thanks to complete air superiority, covered the coastal divisions and Caen with concentrated attacks. In the early hours of the morning, fkom the hills east of Caen, we saw the gigantic Allied armada, the fields littered with transport gliders and the numerous observation ballons over the landing fleet, with the help of which the heavy naval guns subjected us to precision fire.

  The situation forced us to regroup. Strong, combat units were formed on either side of the Ome, east and west. We continued to wait for clearance for a counterattack. In view of this superiority, I thought, on seeing the landing fleet, there was no longer much chance of throwing the Allies back into the sea.

  Bringing up reserves was even now extremely difficult for us.

  The “second front” had been established. The enemy in the east pressing with superior strength, the ceaseless bombing of our most important industrial centers and railway communicationsven the bravest and most experienced troops could no longer win this war. A successful invasion, I thought, was the beginning of the end.

  What we didn't know at the time was some information which came into my hands at the beginning of May 1987. Werner Kortenhaus, a former tank commander in our division and the author of Geschichte der 21. Panzer-Division (“History of the 21st Panzer Division”), made available to me two letters that had been sent to him at the end of 1979 by General Speidel, formerly chief of staff of Army Group B (Rommel).

  The Start of the Invasion, 6 June 1944 175 Extract from letter of 26 October 1979: I called Feuchtinger between 1.00 h. and 2.00 h. on 6.6.44, but couldn't get him. It was not until the morning of 6 June that my first general-staff officer got through to him Feuchtinger had a general directive to attack at once in the event of an airborne landing.

  Extract from letter of 15 November 1979: The 21st Panzer Division had orders to go into action at once if the enemy made an airborne landing, and with the whole Division, in fact.

  This general order, to attack at once in full strength, hence with my whole combat group during that very night of 5-6 June, in the event of an airborne landing, was known neither to me nor to my adjutant at the time, the later General Liebeskind of the Bundeswehr. Neither, apparently-, did the other units in the division know of this order. Instead, we all adhered to the strict order not to carry out even the smallest operation until it had been cleared by Army Group B. The divisional staff must have known of the other order, as is clear from General Speidel's letters.

  The question arises: If I had known of the order to take action in the event of airborne landings, I would on my own responsibility have launched an attack with the whole regiment, reinforced by the Becker assault-gun battalion, against the airborne landings east of the Ome. It is my firm opinion, and that of my adjutantat the time, that by exploiting the initial confusion among the enemy after their descent, we would have succeeded in pushing through to the coast and probably also in regaining possession of the two bridges over the Orne at B6nouville. Parallel operations would then have been started also by Regiment 192 and the panzer regiment.

  This would not have been enough to prevent the invasion as a whole, but there would probably have been a delay in the seabome landing, with great losses for the British.

  An example of how imprecise issuing of orders can have an adverse effect on a large operation.

  Further, highly interesting information came into my hands at the beginning of J
une 1987 through a former captain on the general staff, later General Wagemann of the Bundeswehr, who had given qt 176 PANZER COMMANDER to Lieutenant-Colonel H D. Bechtold of the Bundeswehr, a student of the invasion, at the beginning of May 1987.

  From May to July 1944, Wagemann had been posted to the divisional staff for training and during the night of 5-6 June, he was deputizing for the'first general-staff officer, who was in Paris with Feuchtinger. Wagemann reported that late in the evening of 5 June 1944, the division's radio company had picked up a British cleartext radio message that indicated the loading of transport gliders. This report had been passed on. After the first reports of airborne landings, he had at once alerted the whole division and informed Feuchtinger in Paris between two and three o'clock in the morning of 6 June. Feuchtinger had then arrived at the command post with his general-staff officer between six and seven o'clock.

  We were all surprised that Speidel in his call at two o'clock in the morning of 6 June, knowing of the “general directive,” had not given the order “to attack airborne enemy forces at once with all available elements in my sector east of the Ome.” The fact that in the critical hours it was left to incompletely informed divisional commanders to cope with the situation seems to me, in retrospect, inexcusable.

  On the night of 5/6 June, 1944, Lance-Corporal Hammel had been assigned to guard duty. He belonged to Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion 21 of our division, which was lying in reserve in positions near a village south of Caen.

  As Hammel was later to relate: "The inactivity upset us greatly.

  We had always been in action as scouts and as the spearhead of the Division. Now we had been stationed there for weeks, waiting for something that might not affect us at all, the landing. On orders from Rommel we had to carry out exercises by night almost every day, so that in the event of airborne landings we would be familiar with the terrain as far as the coast. To occupy ourselves we had to set up"Rommel's asparagus' as a defense against gliders, and also prepare fortifications in the area behind the Atlantic Wall.

  “Suddenly at midnight on 5 to 6 June all hell broke loose: from my post I could see flares in the sky, followed by a concentrated air raid on nearby Caen. ”Now the fun begins' was my first thought.“ Lieutenant (as he then was) Rupprecht Grzimek -of the reconnaissance battalion remembers it clearly. ”During that same night of 5 to 6 June we were alerted that paratroops and gliders had landed in the sector of Panzer Grenadier Regiment 125 under Major von Luck. Together with the bombing of Caen this suggested The Start of the Invasion, 6 June 1944 177 more than a commando operation. We knew the order 'to attack only on orders from the highest authority." In spite of that, within a very short time the battalion was ready for action. Our commander, Major Waldow, was on leave. He was due back on 8 June. At dawn a liaison officer whom we had sent to von Luck reported that not only had an airborne division landed east of the Ome, but the enemy had brought up a vast armada off the coast and was preparing a landing from the sea.

  “Heavy naval guns now joined in the landing operations. The weak units on the coast were apparently already involved in fierce fighting. Soon after came the order:”The Battalion is attached to von Luck's combat group and will move off at once in the direction of Troam, about 12 kilometers east of Caen.“ By making full use of cover we reached the area just west of Troam in the early afternoon more or less without interference.” Lance-Corporal Hammel, later: As we moved forward to the northeast we saw toward midday on 6 June two Messerschmidt fighters flying north low over the Orne, the only German aircraft that day.

  "East of Caen lay the first British paratroops to be killed.

  From their parachute-silk we cut ourselves scarves as protection against the dust. Our commander's deputy gave us the order to attack. We went into the attack practically from the march.

  Further west we could hear the sounds of battle. That, we heard, was where our armored group was supposed to attack. The enemy was apparently concentrating his naval fire against this, for him, dangerous thrust. His air force was also in action there. So we made good progress as far as the outskirts of Fscoville, hence only a few kilometers from Ranville and the two bridges over the Orne.“ In the early morning of 6 June the situation and issuing of orders in face of the airborne landings, the armada of warships, merchantmen and landing craft, and the incipient landing from the sea were more than confusing: Despite the supposed ”general directive, we had not received permission to attack during the night.

  Feuchtinger, even in the early morning, did not receive clearance for his division to counterattack.

  The Commander in Chief West (von Rundstedt) was of the opinion, as was Hitler's High Command, that this was a diversionary maneuver. The real landing was expected in the Pas de Calais.

  Our corps commander, on the other hand, General Marcks, thought the landing was “genuine.” Rommel, we heard, was enroute to his HQ, without having met Hitler.

  So the night and first hours of 6 June went by. Too late, much too late! was how it seemed to us. We were dismayed and angry that we had not been believed by the highest authority.

  Finally General Marcks, whether authorized to do so or not, ordered our division to attack at once, with the whole division, east of the Orne and smash the units of the 6th Airborne Division that had landed there and cut their communications with the west. While the necessary orders were being issued and the division was forming itself for attack, the extent of the sea landings became evident. In the middle of our movements, which were constantly harassed by British planes, came a new order, this time from the 7th Army.

  "The bulk of the 21st Panzer Division will attack the enemy forces that have landed west of the Ome; only elements of von Luck's combat group will attack the bridgehead east of the Orne.11 This involved time and further losses from air attacks.

  The re rouping of the division took hours. Most of the units, from the area east of Caen and the Orne, had to squeeze through the eye of the needle at Caen and over the only bridges available in this sector. Caen was under virtually constant bombardment from the navy and the fighter-bombers of the RAF.

  Feuchtinger informed me that an armored group, including my I Battalion in SPWS (Schfitzenpanzerwagen, armored personnel carri'ers), was to push through to the coast west of the Orne.

  His orders to me: “You will attack with your II Battalion, reinforced by Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion 21 and Assault-gun Battalion 200 (Major Becker) and a platoon of 8.8cm antitank guns, east of the Orne. Your task is to crush the 6th Airbome's bridgehead, recapture the two Orne bridges at B6nouville and establish contact with the coastal units. Elements of artillery will support you. Start of the attac-,k: as soon as all elements have reached you.” The Start of the Invasion, 6 June 1944 179 The employment of the reconnaissance battalion worried me greatly. I had after all seen action in all the theaters of war as an “armored scout,” always as the “spearhead” of the division. We were not equipped for direct attacking operations.

  No.4 Company of the panzer regiment arrived toward 1700 hours on 6 June, Major Becker's batteries not until the night of 7 June. So I had to start without them.

  My II Battalion was engaged in heavy defensive fighting against the paratroops that had landed, who were obviously trying to extend their as yet very small bridgehead. I could free only limited elements of the battalion for the attack.

  In the late afternoon, almost at the same time as the armored group west of the Orne, we set off. Our goal: to push through via Escoville-H6rouvillette to Ranville and the two Ome bridges.

  The reconnaissance battalion went straight into the attack from its march and, supported by the panzer company, penetrated to Escoville against their surprised opponents.

  Hans Von Luck - Panzer Commander

  Then all hell broke loose. The heaviest naval guns, up to 38cm in calibre, artillery, and fighter-bombers plastered us without pause. Radio contacts were lost, wounded came back, and the men of the reconnaissance battalion were forced to take cover.


  I had gone up with the attack and saw the disaster. I managed to run forward to the commander of the battalion and gave him fresh orders.

  To avoid further heavy losses, break off the attack at once and take up defensive positions on the southern edge of Escoville.

  Set up a line of defense there and prevent any further enemy advance. No.4 Company of the panzer regiment, as well as Major Becker's assault-guns, when they get here, will support you. See that your men, and also the crews of the armored cars, dig themselves in." I ran back to my regiment's radio station. My adjutant, Liebeskind, had to report the breaking-off of the attack to division. At the same time Feuchtinger sent word that the armored group had reached the coast through the gap between the landed elements of the British 3rd Infantry Division and the 3ro Canadian Infantry Division. Heavy fire from the navy, relays of attacks by fighterbombers and, in the rear of the armored group, newly landed paratroops had forced them to withdraw, to avoid being encircled. My sister regiment, 192, had taken up a defensive position at about the same level as us.

  Now the very thing Rommel had feared had happened: the en 180 PANZER COMMANDER emy had not been attacked by our whole division and thrown back into the sea in the first hours of the landing.

  The other two panzer divisions were lying in areas far to the rear. Of the “1,000 fighters” that Goering had promised nothing was to be seen.