Inland, the Allied consolidation of the beachhead was progressing more or less to plan. Companies and regiments were being formed up (with some adjustment for the gaps left by the men and cargoes which had failed to make it) and moved out to join the steadily-moving front line, an ill-defined area disputed by groups of infantry and the occasional small armoured units; the bocage was not a country suited to the evolution of major formations. The Allied High Command was hopeful that Caen and Cherbourg would fall into their hands with little delay.
Lt General Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben, the commander of Fortress Cherbourg, glared down from his considerable 1.9 metre height at his subordinates, his expression grim. He let them stew for a few moments before speaking, reflecting that most of them had grown too soft on the comforts of static garrison duty in this hospitable land. He had been astonished but grateful to be hauled unceremoniously away from the Eastern Front, where he had expected to stay for some months before reassignment. His feeling of gratitude did not last long. In just four days since the Allied landing, the powerful British armoured forces, supported by the ever-present fighter-bombers, had smashed through his weak garrison divisions, leaving the remains to be mopped up by the infantry units following on behind. They were now probing his defence perimeter, less than ten kilometres from the city. Meanwhile the remote coastal batteries had been knocked out by pinpoint bombing raids using those massive, concrete-piercing guided bombs, while the immediate defences of the port were being heavily shelled by battleships. His position was hopeless, he knew, but his orders were clear: Hitler had ordered the defending troops to fight to the last bullet to give time for port facilities to be demolished. It was highly unlikely that this could be achieved.
His officers shuffled uncomfortably. Time for them to receive their orders. One thing he was sure of: they would not like them.
The clean roar of the Hercules engines was music to the ears of the ground crews tending the new Brigands. The RAF corporal studied them in satisfaction as they lined-up for takeoff. The planes were bristling with sixteen rockets, eight double-stacked under each wing, waiting their turn to be called up to the ‘cab rank’, ready to pounce on the slightest sign of resistance at the request of the Forward Air Controllers riding with the leading army units or patrolling the skies in AOP Austers. The tempo had been intense and unrelenting for four days now, the Allies desperate to keep the Germans reeling, giving them no time to organize a defence line before they were through it and hitting them again. Very much like the Blitzkrieg which led to the fall of France in 1940, their Squadron Leader had said, only this time the Germans were on the receiving end.
As the roar rose to a howl and the fighter-bombers accelerated along the makeshift runway hacked rapidly out of the ground by engineers, the corporal cursed the swirling dust for the thousandth time. It got everywhere, considerably multiplying the maintenance required for guns and engines. And into the food and drink as well, he thought glumly.
Three days later the first Allied troops stood on top of the Forte du Roule, on a steep cliff overlooking Cherbourg. The massively constructed fortress, which had proved such an obstacle to the Allies in Don’s time, had been hit by a succession of super-heavy, radio-controlled, armour-piercing bombs and now stood cratered and derelict, a straggle of traumatised survivors being led away. From this vantage point the soldiers looked down on the great port city, the view obscured by the smoke from many fires. Much of the firepower of the Allied fleet had been focused on capturing Cherbourg as quickly as possible and a new weapon was being tried; proximity-fuzed shrapnel shells which burst over the targets, showering them with high-velocity steel balls. These were flaying the German units trying to carry out their demolition orders, without significantly damaging the port facilities. Small-arms fire could be heard in the distance where infantry units were working their way into the city in a race against time to seize the port intact.
One week after the invasion, the American tank crews were still learning the foibles of their new Pershing heavy tanks and the best way of dealing with them. Their confidence had been rising steadily following some hard-fought victories against the Panther tanks, with few casualties suffered in return. The main problem was the need for constant maintenance to keep the under-developed vehicles on the road.
A smell of coffee drifted across the laager as the tankers awoke, crawling from underneath the tarpaulins stretched from the side of their vehicles, cursing at the attentions of the mosquitoes which seemed immune to the deterrent creams.
The lieutenant grinned wryly at his men, whom he had got to know very well in a week of hard fighting.
‘OK, listen up. This morning we’re moving in support of an attack to encircle Caen from the east. We expect the Krauts will be kind enough to present us with lots of targets, since there’s a Panzer Division known to be in the area. We will have Thunderbolts on immediate call, as usual.’
The Feldwebel peered through the grass stalks fringing the ditch at the line of vehicles some 300 metres away. His men to either side of him were, he knew, almost invisible under their camouflage of netting and vegetation; certainly enough to fool the observation planes which had been cruising overhead, looking for PaK guns. The Feldwebel had much experience of the Eastern Front and had chosen the ambush with care; the distant road was, for once, exposed to the side instead of being obscured by banks and hedges. The view was perfect.
He grunted in satisfaction as the lead Pershing jerked to a halt. Its commander had spotted the line of badly-filled holes which crossed the road and instantly identified them as mines. In fact, there were no mines there but the ruse was having the desired effect, as the following vehicles bunched up behind the lead tank and stopped. Perfect!
‘Los!’ He shouted, and the men beside him pressed their firing buttons. Like a covey of rocket-propelled game birds, the missiles roared into the air, wires trailing behind them. Their trajectories gradually dropped, then steadied as they were gathered into the sights and steering commenced. The Feldwebel held his breath and watched, fascinated, as the dots of fire streaked towards the unsuspecting vehicles. The road suddenly flashed into flame and smoke as the hollow-charge warheads struck home. An orderly queue of tanks was transformed in a few seconds into chaos as vehicles burned and exploded. The Feldwebel grinned in satisfaction and signalled his men to retreat rapidly along their pre-arranged route. The ditch would shortly be a very unhealthy place to be.
To the south-west of Caen a Canadian artillery battery was awaiting the order to commence firing in support of the planned envelopment of the town. Despite the usual breakfast grumbling about the boiled Compo tea, made from heavily chlorinated water, and the boring Compo rations, the men felt the tension coiling inside them as they waited to hear from their Forward Observation Officer located at an Observation Point overlooking the planned battlefield.
They had moved into their pre-planned location with some difficulty only the night before, the light of the waning moon unable to help much through the overcast sky. Now they were still, with no vehicle movement permitted; signs reading ‘dust means death!’ had been erected; their German opposite numbers would be alert for any signs of a target.
The FOO scanned the distant fields from his location within the roof of an old barn. After checking his bulky radio, he had spent much of the night positioning sandbags around his OP. Nothing was moving in the distance, but he could hear the roar of engines from just behind him as the Churchills rumbled forwards preceded by a screen of infantry, now cast much wider to counter the threat of the new guided anti-tank missiles. Dust rose from the tanks and as expected it wasn’t long before the first ‘Moaning Minnies’ came in; the wailing mortar shells causing the troops to drop flat before their detonations erupted around the area. The FOO regarded the blasts with professional interest; they were not big enough to come from the biggest of the Nebelwerfer, so were probably from the 15 cm version, which had a range of just over 7,000 yards; well within reach of his 25-pounder troop. He
scanned the horizon more intently, searching for signs of activity. In the distance, dust was rising.
The observer in the Auster looked through his binoculars and whistled through his teeth. ‘Looks like an entire Panzer Division is on the move – must be trying to stop us from surrounding Caen. He switched on his microphone to send a warning, but died even as he drew breath to speak.
The pilot of the Fw 190 led his Schwarm away from the tumbling wreckage of the observation plane, climbing back up to their station. The Army had planned a major battle around Caen, and the Luftwaffe had promised full support. The Allies were about to face their first major challenge.
The roaring of powerful engines and the clanking and squealing of tracks was a constant background din which the Standartenführer had learned to tune out of his consciousness. He peered through the dust, constantly aware of the risk of air attack. At least, he thought grimly, any plane which attacked him would have one of the new Flakpanzers to worry about; he turned to check that the vehicle was keeping station behind him, its two 3 cm MK 103 cannon mounted one on each side of the squat turret. Not that the fighter-bombers were much of a threat, he reflected – news from the battlefront had indicated that their rockets and bombs were too inaccurate to hit a tank, except by unlucky chance, while their 2 cm cannon and machine guns posed no threat to the thick armour. He looked with satisfaction at the massive barrel of the new high-velocity 8,8 cm L/71 gun which, along with thicker armour, distinguished the Ausf.B version of his Panther. The 2d SS Panzer Division ‘Das Reich’ had just finished working-up with the new vehicles and after a frustratingly slow journey towards the battlefield he was looking forwards to coming to grips with the enemy around Caen.
The bombardier in the Mosquito picked up the flare on the tail of the 2,000 pound medium-case bomb as it dropped clear of his aircraft, and nudged the joystick to ensure that it was responding to his control. The thin line of the road far below him disappeared under the long, narrow dust haze which represented the position of the armoured column, but he was only concerned with the point of the column. The other planes in this attack had been briefed to drop their bombs in a line, working back along the column. He grinned as the bomb obediently moved a fraction sideways at his command to line up precisely with the road. In a few seconds time, that Panzer division would be receiving the shock of its life.
The succession of massive detonations seemed to go on forever, the violent shock-wave from each of the instantaneously-fuzed bombs stunning the senses and tumbling vehicles too close to the explosions, while the shards of steel from the bomb casings sliced through the column. The Standartenführer’s tank wasn’t hit, but he was so stunned that he could barely hang on to the hatch ring; his ears rang like a bell and blood poured from his nose. Recovering slightly, he looked around him. Most of the armoured vehicles seemed to have survived, but the whole column had ground to a halt. He could see men wandering around outside their vehicles in shock, others slumped on the ground. He was too deafened to hear the roar of the Brigands as they dived in a steep line, releasing their rocket projectiles in rippling salvoes before following up with their cannon. The smaller RP explosions were hardly noticeable after the big bombs, but after the strafing run yet more of the lightly-armoured vehicles were hit. He clenched his teeth grimly and shook his head to clear it; it was essential that they pressed on! He never saw the Hereford IIs as they came in from behind, their 57 mm guns firing tungsten-cored ammunition which accurately punched through the rear armour of tank after tank. Some Fw 190s raced in too late, distracted by the aggressively-handled Brigands. Only disorganised remnants of ‘Das Reich’ would survive to reach the Caen battlefield.
Thirty miles away, the Canadian artillery battery was a hive of desperate activity as the gunners strove to keep up with the demands of the FOO. The day had started early with a Time-on-Target shoot at a ‘Mike’ target – all twenty-four guns of the regiment synchronizing their fire in order to land all the shells on the target at the same instant for maximum effect. Orders followed steadily throughout the morning with barely a pause, the quieter periods between more intense efforts being filled with harassing fire, with each of four guns of the troop firing in turn at prescribed intervals. Then orders for a concentrated effort would come from the radio operator linked to the FOO; ‘Hello Foxtrot, I have an Uncle target for you.’ All seventy-two guns of the Division would shift their aim to a specified grid point. ‘Fire for effect, intense fire, scale ten.’ The guns would fire ten rounds in two minutes, then stop and await the next command. Sometimes, the barrels of the 25-pounders became so hot that they started to glow, and a bucket chain was set up to the nearest stream, to pour water down the barrels. At other times, the gunners almost collapsed with exhaustion, ears ringing with the noise of their fire, arms aching from the effort of humping the twenty-five pound shells. Whenever possible, they took cover in the slit trenches by the guns; their position had been identified by some of the dreaded ‘eighty-eights’ whose supersonic-velocity time-fuzed shells gave no warning – they just exploded overhead, showering the area with fragments, instantly followed by the metallic, yowling screech of their noise catching up with them. Despite the heat generated by their efforts, the gunners all wore helmets and many had body armour; fabric-covered, moulded pieces of dense plastic, made of separate pieces dangling on shoulder straps. They knew nothing of their targets, saw no enemy except for an occasional glimpse of the intense air battle raging overhead. Their world was their guns, and they fought them until they dropped.
Over the whole of Normandy, the fighting on air, land and sea was intense. But Caen was the focus; in the skies over the old town, the Luftwaffe tussled with the RAF and USAAF, each simultaneously trying to attack the enemy’s land forces while defending their own from such attacks. Piston engines and turbines competed in a strange battle of generations; and the combats did not always go the way of the fast new jets. Offshore, battleships and cruisers loosed salvo after salvo of massive shells at the behest of their airborne observers, tormenting the German troops, while fighters circled anxiously, ready to pounce on attempts to launch the new radar-guided missiles against them. On land, the Germans had the benefit of numbers, but the effectiveness of their formations was patchy in terms of quality and equipment. The battle raged furiously, both sides locked in desperate determination. It was as if each soldier knew that the future of the war, and of the postwar world, was being decided here – and now.
CHAPTER 10 - GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG
Summer 1943
The mood in von Rundstedt’s HQ was grim. Rommel was slumped in a chair, grey with exhaustion, his clothing creased and covered with dust. He had been touring the front in his usual fashion, racing from one crisis to another in his staff car, heedless of the danger from the prowling Jabos which had almost shot him off the road twice already.
‘Cherbourg has fallen, and they have surrounded Caen.’ Von Rundstedt’s voice was bleak.
Rommel nodded wearily. ‘They have paid heavily for it, but they can afford it. We have damaged but not broken their supply lines from England, and they are receiving reinforcements faster than we can transfer them to the area.’
‘The Führer will be furious. What explanations do you have?’
Rommel shrugged. ‘Many small matters, adding up to one big defeat. Too many of our divisions were of poor quality – the best troops were always being weeded out to send East. Then we couldn’t get the good Panzer divisions there in time. First, the Allies bombed all of the bridges and rail junctions, aided by the partisans blowing up whatever they could. Then their Jabos constantly harassed the units whenever they tried to move.’
‘This was predicted, so the Luftwaffe transferred many fighter Geschwader from Germany; why could they not deal with them?’
Rommel snorted. ‘Few of them were effective. They were used to flying missions under the control of a sophisticated radar-directed home defence system. Many of them were unable to find the French airfields when they trie
d to transfer and crash-landed all over the place. Many more were hit by Jabos as they landed. Most of the rest were like fishes out of water without being told exactly where to fly and what to attack. They should have transferred units from Russia, they would have been better suited.’
‘Even so, you cannot deny that we had far larger forces.’
‘I know,’ Rommel sighed, ‘but they had the concentration of strength where they needed it, aided by that damned naval gunfire. The troops did their best, and are still holding Caen, but we have lost the initiative. We no longer stand any chance of pushing them back.’
‘What next?’
‘They seem to be content to leave Caen encircled while fresh formations are moving up to carry their advance further. When can we expect reinforcements from the East?’
Von Rundstedt grimaced. ‘That’s another problem. Russia has launched a heavy counter-attack, alongside the British forces there. Given the scale of their successive defeats it is amazing that they could pull together the necessary resources, but they seem to have a limitless supply of men and materials.’
‘And space’ agreed Rommel sourly.
‘The partisans also seem to have been coordinated and probably reinforced by air, as they have stepped up their attacks on the supply lines. Furthermore, it seems that some British heavy bombers transferred to northern Russia and carried out precision attacks on bridges and other key points of the railway network. So we can’t expect much help to reach us in the near future.’
THE FORESIGHT WAR Page 37
