Eisenhower in War and Peace

by Jean Edward Smith

  “Yes,” I said, “after you have lunch with me in about an hour.”81

  Eisenhower continued to juggle his affection for Kay with his love for Mamie. “I never forget that 28 years ago I brought out the West Point Class Ring to 1216 McCullough [in San Antonio], proud as a peacock,” he wrote his wife on Valentine’s Day.82 Ike wrote superb letters, and he continued almost weekly to tell Mamie how much he missed her. From his letters it is apparent that Mamie often chided him. “I know that people at home always think of an army in the field as living a life of night clubs, gayety and loose morals,” Eisenhower replied shortly before D-Day.

  So far as I can see the American forces here are living cleaner and more nearly normal lives than they did in Louisiana—California—etc. In the larger cities, such as London, there are undoubtedly numbers of officers and men that are living loosely; but it is also true that the pictures painted by gossips are grossly exaggerated. So far as the group around me is concerned, I know that the principal concern is work—and that their habits are above reproach.83

  As D-Day approached, Eisenhower smoked more and slept less. He moved from Mayfair to Telegraph Cottage, and then in April to an advance headquarters in the woods outside Portsmouth, on Britain’s south coast—the principal embarkation point for OVERLORD. From February 1 to June 1, Ike visited twenty-six divisions, twenty-four airfields, and countless depots, hospitals, and other installations, his grin always at the ready. “Soldiers like to see the men who are directing operations,” wrote Eisenhower. “Diffidence or modesty must never blind the commander to his duty of showing himself to his men, of speaking to them, of mingling with them to the extent of physical limitations.”84

  Montgomery knew this even better than Ike. “Even Eisenhower with all his engaging ease could never stir American troops to the rapture with which Monty was welcomed by his,” Omar Bradley remembered.85 Montgomery visited every unit going ashore on D-Day, American as well as British and Canadian, encouraging the men to break ranks and gather around while he told them what an honor it was to command them. “General Eisenhower is the captain of the team, and I am proud to serve under him,” said Monty. By his own reckoning, Montgomery estimated that he had inspected, “and been inspected by,” well over one million men.86 Bedell Smith reported afterward that the confidence of the troops in the high command was without parallel, thanks to Monty. “They thought he was a friendly, genuine person without any traces of pomposity.”87 l

  Whatever their later quarrels, Eisenhower and Montgomery were on good terms as D-Day approached. Ike had given Montgomery free rein to plan, prepare, and rehearse the invasion without hindrance, and Monty, for his part, believed Eisenhower had grown in stature during the lead-up. “Eisenhower is just the right man for the job,” Monty confided to his diary after dining with Ike on June 2, 1944. “He is really a big man and is in every way an Allied commander. I like him immensely; he has a generous and lovable character and I would trust him to the last gasp.”88

  On May 15, Eisenhower gathered his OVERLORD commanders for a final review at St. Paul’s School in London—the headquarters of Montgomery’s Twenty-first Army Group.m Formal invitations were extended to the King, Churchill, the war cabinet, and the British chiefs of staff, as well as some four dozen senior commanders and staff officers. “Eisenhower was quite excellent,” Montgomery noted in his diary. “He spoke very little, but what he said was good and high level.”89 But it was Monty who stole the show. “I have no clear recollection of his actual words,” wrote General Sir Hastings Ismay, Churchill’s chief of staff, “but the impression left on my mind is still vivid.”

  Plans and preparations are now complete in every detail. All difficulties have been foreseen and provided against. Nothing has been left to chance. Every man knew exactly what he had to do. Their equipment left nothing to be desired. If there was anyone who had doubts, he would prefer his room to his company. It reminded me of King Henry’s speech before Agincourt in Shakespeare’s Henry V:

  …he that has no stomach to this fight,

  Let him depart; his passport should be made,

  And crowns for every convoy put into his purse.90

  After Montgomery spoke, Churchill addressed the audience. “Gentlemen, I am hardening toward this enterprise. I repeat, I am now hardening toward this enterprise. Let us not expect all to go according to plan. Flexibility of mind will be one of the deciding factors. We must not have another Anzio. Risks must be taken.”91 King George VI spoke last, a brief hortatory speech, much like Nelson’s message to the fleet at Trafalgar. Eisenhower recalled many years later that “the smell of victory was in the air.”92

  Despite what appeared to be a White House go-ahead to deal with de Gaulle, Roosevelt began to hedge his commitment. On May 11, Eisenhower advised the Combined Chiefs that it was increasingly urgent to resolve a host of issues pertaining to the upcoming situation in liberated France. “The most effective means of doing so,” he said, “would be for General de Gaulle himself to come to London. I would then be able to deal with him direct on the most immediate and pressing problem of the initial approach to the French people and their organized resistance groups.”93 Churchill agreed, but Roosevelt vetoed any discussion of political issues. “We must always remember,” said the president, “that the French population is quite naturally shell shocked. It will take some time for them quietly and normally to think through the matters pertaining to their political future. We as liberators have no ‘right’ to color their views or give any group the sole right to impose one side of a case on them.”94

  Eisenhower, who was taken aback by FDR’s resistance, recharted his course. On May 16 he assured Roosevelt that he would “carefully avoid anything that could be interpreted as an effort to influence the character of the future government of France. However, I think I should tell you that so far as I am able to determine from information given to me through agents and through escaped prisoners of war, there exists in France today only two major groups, of which one is the Vichy gang, and the other seems almost idolatrous in its worship of de Gaulle.” Eisenhower told FDR that once ashore he expected to find “a universal desire to adhere to the de Gaullist group.”

  Ike was counting on Roosevelt’s ultimate willingness to defer to the commander in the field. But to build a backstop against presidential caprice, he reminded FDR that SHAEF was an Allied command. “I hope that your desires on this subject of which I am already aware, can eventually come to me as a joint directive of the two governments.”95 By suggesting that Roosevelt needed Churchill’s concurrence, Eisenhower hoped to find the wiggle room he needed to deal with de Gaulle.

  And deal with de Gaulle he must. “We were depending on considerable assistance from the Resistance in France, and an open clash with de Gaulle would hurt us immeasurably,” wrote Eisenhower in his memoirs. Roosevelt’s objections were “academic.” As Ike saw it, in the initial stages of OVERLORD “de Gaulle would represent the only authority that could produce any kind of French co-ordination and unification, and no harm would result from giving him the kind of recognition he sought. He would merely be placed on notice that once the country was liberated the freely expressed will of the French people would determine their own government.”96

  Eisenhower thought it essential to retain de Gaulle’s goodwill. On May 23, 1944, he wrote the French leader (who was still in Algiers) to congratulate him on the performance of French troops fighting in Italy. De Gaulle’s response was precisely what Ike hoped for: “I assure you again that the French government is very happy to have a place in your army under your supreme command … and has the fullest confidence that you will conduct the armies of liberation to a rapid victory.”97

  As D-Day neared, Eisenhower and Churchill became apprehensive about conditions in France and de Gaulle’s continued absence. “It is very difficult to cut the French out of the liberation of France,” Churchill cabled FDR on May 26.98 With Roosevelt’s grudging approval, Churchill sent his personal plane to fetch de Gau
lle, who arrived in London on June 4. The prime minister immediately whisked him off to Ike’s field headquarters near Portsmouth, where, Churchill told Roosevelt, “Generals Eisenhower and Bedell Smith went to the utmost limit in their endeavor to conciliate him, making it clear that in practice events would probably mean that the Committee [FCNL] would be the natural authority with whom the Supreme Commander would deal.”99 Deftly, Churchill was preparing FDR for what would become the new reality in France.

  Churchill escorts de Gaulle to Eisenhower’s headquarters on June 4, 1944. (illustration credit 13.3)

  Eisenhower gave de Gaulle a half-hour briefing on OVERLORD. “He explained to us, with great clarity and self-command, the plan for the landing and the state of preparations to date,” wrote de Gaulle.100 “The ships were ready to leave port at any moment. The planes could take off at the first signal. The troops had been entrained for several days. The great machinery of the embarkation, the crossing and landing of eight divisions and the matériel which formed the first echelon was prepared down to the minutest detail.” It was quickly agreed that General Pierre Koenig, who commanded the French Forces of the Interior, would fold the Resistance into the French Army and would report to Ike.

  Eisenhower told de Gaulle he was worried about the weather, and had at most twenty-four hours in which to decide whether to go or not. “What do you think I should do?”

  De Gaulle, who was flattered to be asked, insisted the decision was Eisenhower’s alone. “Whatever decision you make, I approve in advance and without reservation. I will only tell you that in your place I should not delay.”101

  When the briefing concluded, Eisenhower, with evident embarrassment, gave de Gaulle the copy of a speech SHAEF wished him to deliver to the French people after the troops had landed. As Ike anticipated, de Gaulle refused. Aside from the limp military prose (which would have been reason enough to decline), de Gaulle rejected the idea that as head of the provisional government of France, his words should be written by the Allies. Instead, he wrote his own message—a masterpiece of subtle phrasing that implied he was broadcasting as president of France (though he did not say so), and that urged all Frenchmen to follow precisely the orders of the supreme commander (though he did not use that terminology).n “General de Gaulle and his chief of staff are anxious to assist every possible way and to have the lodgment effected as soon as possible,” Eisenhower cabled the Combined Chiefs after the meeting.102

  Future generals might find it useful to reflect upon the fact that on the eve of battle Eisenhower was cognizant of the responsibility he bore to preserve Europe’s historic shrines and symbols. “Bomber” Harris and Spaatz were not under Ike’s direct command, and he could not prevent the bombing of German cities even if he had wanted to. But to his own commanders—Montgomery, Bradley, Ramsay, and Leigh-Mallory—he issued an explicit order to preserve historic shrines whenever possible. Military necessity would inevitably require that some sites be destroyed. “But there are many circumstances in which damage and destruction are not necessary and cannot be justified. In such cases, through the exercise of restraint and discipline, commanders will preserve centers and objects of historical and cultural significance.”103

  On D-Day minus seven, with the battle plan set, Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory questioned the wisdom of dropping the 82nd and 101st Airborne divisions behind enemy lines on the Cherbourg Peninsula. Leigh-Mallory had always been skeptical of the plan, and recent aerial photos of German defenses convinced him that the divisions would lose 70 percent of their gliders and 50 percent of their paratroop strength to antiaircraft fire. Eisenhower was shaken. The airborne landings were essential to seize the causeways that would allow VII Corps to move inland from Utah beach and seize the port of Cherbourg. Without Cherbourg the invasion would be imperiled. “The whole operation suddenly acquired a degree of risk, even foolhardiness that presaged a gigantic failure, possibly Allied defeat in Europe,” wrote Eisenhower.104

  Leigh-Mallory was Ike’s commander in chief for air, and to protect him in case his advice was disregarded, Eisenhower instructed him to put his objections on paper. “I went to my tent alone and sat down to think. I took the problem to no one else. I realized that if I disregarded the advice of my technical expert and his predictions should prove accurate, then I would carry to my grave the unbearable burden of a conscience justly accusing me of the stupid, blind sacrifice of thousands of the flower of our youth.”

  After thinking the problem through, Eisenhower decided the drops would go forward. “Leigh-Mallory’s estimate was just an estimate, and our experience in Sicily and Italy did not support his degree of pessimism. I telephoned him that the attack would go as planned and that I would confirm this at once in writing.”o

  Unexpected problems continued to arise. No sooner had Ike replied to Leigh-Mallory than he received a phone call from Admiral Ramsay, his naval commander in chief, stating that Churchill intended to observe the invasion from the deck of the cruiser HMS Belfast. When Eisenhower objected, Churchill asserted that as Britain’s minister of defense it was his prerogative to participate, and that he was not subject to the orders of the supreme commander.p Technically, Churchill was correct, but the last thing Eisenhower wanted was to have the prime minister aboard one of the ships bombarding the French coast.

  Churchill had previously discussed his plan with the King, and George VI initially embraced the idea, telling Churchill he would like to come along. The King said he “had not been under fire since the Battle of Jutland, and eagerly welcomed the prospect of renewing the experiences of his youth.”105 But George VI soon had second thoughts. On May 31, 1944, he wrote Churchill that it would be a severe setback to the Allied cause “if at this juncture a chance bomb, torpedo, or even mine, should remove you from the scene; equally a change of Sovereign at this moment would be a serious matter for the country and Empire. We should both, I know, love to be there, but in all seriousness I would ask you to reconsider your plan.”106

  Churchill was not dissuaded, and at that point Eisenhower recognized the seriousness of the problem. At Ike’s direction, Bedell Smith contacted the King’s staff at Buckingham Palace, who then prompted His Majesty to write a second, more urgent, letter to Churchill. “I am a younger man than you, I am a sailor, and there is nothing I would like better than to go to sea,” said the King. “But I have agreed to stay home. Is it fair that you should then do exactly what I should have liked to do myself?…If the King cannot do this, it does not seem to me right that his Prime Minister should take his place.”107

  Churchill yielded, but was always resentful. “Since Your Majesty does me the honor to be so much concerned about my personal safety, I must defer to Your Majesty’s wishes, and indeed commands.”108 Later Churchill wrote,

  A man who has to play an effective part in taking grave and terrible decisions of war may need the refreshment of adventure. He may need also the comfort that when sending so many others to their death he may share in some small way their risks. No one was more careful of his personal safety than I was, but I thought my view was sufficiently important and authoritative to entitle me to full freedom of judgment as to how I discharged my task in such a personal matter.109

  Eisenhower’s lonely decision to drop the 82nd and 101st Airborne was preamble to an even lonelier choice: whether to buck the weather and attempt a Channel crossing, or postpone the invasion for two weeks. SHAEF planners had determined that the proper confluence of tides, moon, hours of daylight, and weather would occur from June 5 to June 7, 1944. The next opportunity would be June 19, when tidal conditions would again be favorable. D-Day had been set for June 5, but on June 3 the weather reports took a turn for the worse. By June 4, they were menacing. Group Captain J. M. Stagg, the unflappable Scot who headed SHAEF’s meteorological team, predicted low clouds, high winds, and formidable wave action on the French coast for the morning of June 5. Air support would be impossible, naval gunfire would be inefficient, and the handling of landing craft would be haz
ardous. The vast invasion armada was already at sea, and to stand down carried problems of its own. Eisenhower polled his commanders. Montgomery, concerned about the disadvantages of delay, thought the attack should go forward on schedule. Ramsay thought the landing could be managed, but said it would be difficult to adjust the naval gunfire. Tedder and Leigh-Mallory, the two airmen, were flatly opposed. Eisenhower, who deemed close-in air support essential, ordered a twenty-four-hour postponement.110

  The meeting reconvened at 10 p.m. on June 4, with still no break in the weather. Eisenhower set another meeting for 0400—six hours later—the last possible moment to order an assault on June 6. When the commanders assembled at Admiral Ramsay’s Portsmouth headquarters, the winds had reached gale proportions and the rain pelted down in horizontal streaks. Group Captain Stagg said the same conditions prevailed in Normandy, meaning that if the invasion had gone forward on the fifth, it would have been a disaster. Yet as Bedell Smith recalled, “There was the ghost of a smile on the tired face of Group Captain Stagg.”

  “I think we have found a gleam of hope for you, sir,” Stagg told Eisenhower. “The mass of weather coming in from the Atlantic is moving faster than we anticipated. We predict there will be rather fair conditions beginning late on June 5 and lasting until the next morning, June 6.” But the weather would close in again on the evening of the sixth, said Stagg, and conditions would turn foul. How long the bad weather would last, he could not say. But there was a window of about twenty-four hours when conditions would be tolerable.111

  Again, Eisenhower polled his commanders. Admiral Ramsay said whatever was decided, the signal had to be flashed to the fleet within the next half hour. He asked Stagg about the seas and the wind velocity, and said he was satisfied. Leigh-Mallory and Tedder thought it was “chancy.” Montgomery said, “Go!”112