Supreme Commander (51 page)

Eisenhower was anxious to share other lessons he had learned with Marshall. He did not presume to tell the Chief how to organize or train his forces, but he did feel that his comments on individuals would be helpful. Eisenhower knew that Marshall intended to have at least two American armies in the operation. Bradley had already been picked to lead one of them. Eisenhower suggested Patton for the other. “Many generals constantly think of battle in terms of, first, concentration, supply, maintenance, replacement, and, second, after all the above is arranged, a
conservative
advance,” Eisenhower told Marshall, probably with Clark in mind. But he did add that “this type of person is necessary because he prevents one from courting disaster.” Marshall’s idea was to hit the beach with the untested divisions coming from the United States, holding back the experienced divisions until he was firmly ashore. The veterans would then lead the drive through the German defensive positions. Eisenhower recommended that he use Bradley to command the first wave, with Patton taking command of the veterans and leading the breakout.

“Patton’s strength is that he thinks only in terms of attack as long as there is a single battalion that can keep advancing,” Eisenhower declared. He would never consider Patton for an army group command, “but as an army commander under a man who is sound and solid, and who has sense enough to use Patton’s good qualities without becoming blinded by his love of showmanship and histrionics, he should do as fine a job as he did in Sicily.”
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The implication was that Eisenhower was the army group commander who could handle Patton.

The pressure to get a commander for OVERLORD appointed, meanwhile, was mounting. The operation was scheduled for early May, only a half year away, and Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Morgan, head of the COSSAC planning group, insisted that a commander had to be named so that firm decisions could be made. On that main point, as far as AFHQ could tell from the stroies told by visiting VIPs, Roosevelt’s mind was made up. It would be Marshall. According to the reports, the President felt that Marshall should have the chance to command in the field the army he had created, for if he did not his name would be lost to history.

The repercussions of shifting Marshall, however, were far from settled. Averell Harriman, passing through Algiers on his way to Moscow, told Eisenhower that the President would insist on Eisenhower’s coming back to Washington “to take over General Marshall’s job.” Secretary Stimson, it seemed, was a strong advocate of such a shift. Eisenhower still hoped for
something better. He did not accept at face value the secondhand reports he was receiving and was anxious for Smith to return from Washington with the straight word from Marshall. On October 19 Butcher reported that they were still waiting for Smith and “sweating it out in big drops. This uncertainty takes the pep out of everyone.…”
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The opposition to removing Marshall from Washington, meanwhile, was growing. Admiral King told Roosevelt that the Chief was a great teammate and should stay where he was. The elder statesman of the Army, General John J. Pershing, warned the President in mid-September that the proposed transfer of the Chief would be a “fundamental and very grave error in our military policy.” Marshall himself remained aloof from all the discussions. He never intimated to the President or to anyone else what his personal preference was.
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While Smith was gone and AFHQ marked time, another possibility for Eisenhower’s future opened. With a presidential election a year away, Republicans and other opponents of Roosevelt had started casting about for a candidate. MacArthur was one obvious choice and a boom of sorts began to develop for him. Inevitably, Eisenhower’s name also began to pop up. Arthur Eisenhower was bothered by this. He told his brother that MacArthur’s reputation was suffering because he refused to deny that he had political ambitions, and urged Eisenhower to make an emphatic denial of his own ambitions. On October 20 Eisenhower told his brother he had seen some “careless and ill-considered items in the newspapers” about his supposed candidacy, but he felt this would happen to any man whose name “appears with some frequency in the public print.” He felt no need to make “any statement whatsoever because to do so would, I think, merely be making myself ridiculous.”

Eisenhower did admit, however, that it would be disastrous for him to have the idea spread that he was interested in politics. “I flatter myself that such a development would constitute also some small injury to our national war effort.” He said he lived by one doctrine—to serve his country. The President had given him a responsible position, and “nothing could sway me from my purpose of carrying out faithfully his orders in whatever post he may assign me.” In conclusion, Eisenhower declared he would “not tolerate the use of my name in connection with any political activity of any kind.”
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Removing himself from the field was not that easy. In early October the World War Tank Corps Association passed a resolution supporting Eisenhower for the presidency. The members said they had no knowledge as to his political affiliations or beliefs but considered him presidential
timber by virtue of his outstanding leadership qualities. A number of newspapers played up the story, and George Allen, an old friend, sent Eisenhower one clipping from the Washington
Post
. In a covering note, Allen asked, “How does it feel to be a presidential candidate?”

Eisenhower glanced at the clipping, grasped a pencil, and at the bottom of Allen’s note scribbled, “Baloney! Why can’t a simple soldier be left alone to carry out his orders? And I furiously object to the word ‘candidate’—I ain’t and won’t.”
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Then Walter Winchell, in a radio broadcast, said that if the Republicans ran MacArthur, Roosevelt would take Eisenhower as his running mate on the Democratic ticket. Eisenhower’s comment was short: “I can scarcely imagine anyone in the United States less qualified than I for any type of political work.”
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Lacking any encouragement at all from the prospective candidate, the Eisenhower boom quickly faded from the infinitesimal into total obscurity.

Smith, meanwhile, had returned from Washington, and Eisenhower could concentrate on the important matters at hand. He eagerly pumped his chief of staff for information, but the results were disappointing. Smith confirmed that Marshall was to go to OVERLORD, taking command on January 1. He had already called Morgan to Washington for planning conferences. Beyond that nothing had been settled. Eisenhower would be either the American army group commander for OVERLORD or Army Chief of Staff. Smith reported that Marshall was afraid that putting Eisenhower in charge of the army group would be a comedown and would look bad. Smith said he assured the Chief that no one at AFHQ, least of all Eisenhower, minded, but Marshall still felt that Eisenhower should become Chief of Staff. Smith had also had an interview with Roosevelt, who said he too wanted Eisenhower in Washington.
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That seemed to settle it. To console himself, Eisenhower said that he did not really want a command in OVERLORD anyway. He had studied Morgan’s plans, which were based on a three-division assault. Morgan had been forced to limit the size of the attack because of the small number of landing craft the CCS had assigned to him. Under those circumstances, Eisenhower said, he was just as happy he would not be involved.
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But though the question of who would command OVERLORD was seemingly settled problems remained. One major remaining objection to Marshall’s leaving Washington was that he would have to leave the CCS. This objection was later to prove a decisive one. It meant that the strongest advocate of OVERLORD would not be at the CCS meetings
to force the British to keep their commitment to the cross-Channel attack. This appeared important because the British seemed to the Americans to be showing signs of wanting to back out. Their proposal to invade Rhodes and step up operations in the Balkans was only the most recent evidence of this desire. OPD and the War Department, therefore, wanted to give Marshall control of the operational forces in OVERLORD while allowing him to retain his seat on the CCS. This would give the Americans both ends of the stick, since they would have command of OVERLORD and still have the OVERLORD viewpoint fully represented in the CCS.
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In one version of the plan, Marshall would command all United Nations forces in Europe and the Mediterranean and would sit as a voting member of the CCS whenever that body discussed European matters. The advantage of the proposal was that it would give Marshall a position commensurate with his rank and ability. For him to become a mere theater commander, albeit in charge of OVERLORD, would be a definite demotion.

From the start the British objected strenuously. The American scheme had the effect—probably unintended—of destroying the authority of the CCS. In the Pacific and in Asia the theater commanders were responsible to their respective chiefs of staff, not the CCS. Europe was the only theater in which the CCS had real authority. If Marshall took command of both Europe and the Mediterranean and in addition sat on the CCS, he would in fact make the CCS superfluous. The British pointed out that there were “immense political implications” in the American scheme and asked that the existing machinery for the high-level direction of the war be retained. Changes should be confined to improving the machinery rather than embarking “upon an entirely novel experiment, which merely makes a cumbrous and unnecessary link in the chain of command, and which will surely lead to disillusionment and disappointment.”
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The implications were clear enough, although apparently neither Marshall, Roosevelt, nor the others involved saw them immediately. The Americans could not allow Marshall to step down to the level of theater commander, and the British could not allow him to stay on the CCS and in addition command in western Europe, Italy, North Africa, and the Middle East.
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The only solution seemed to be to give command in western Europe to a man of lesser stature than Marshall.

At British insistence, the CCS and heads of government were about to meet again, first at Cairo and then with the Russians at Teheran. They would take up the vexing questions of command structure as well as a
review of the strategy for 1944. The Americans were suspicious of British intentions, fearing that Churchill was trying to back out of OVERLORD. For Eisenhower and Smith these suspicions were increased as a result of a meeting with Churchill and the BCOS. On November 18 the AFHQ heads flew to Malta to confer with the British, who were en route to Cairo. Smith decided that the coming conference would be the “hottest one yet,” as Churchill was still unconvinced about the wisdom of OVERLORD and persisted in his desire to strike Germany through the “soft underbelly.” Churchill did say that if OVERLORD stayed on the agenda, with Eisenhower handing over the Mediterranean to a British theater commander and becoming Chief of Staff, he wanted Smith left with AFHQ to help the new boss there. Eisenhower said no—Smith would have to stay with him. He insisted that “this was one point on which I would not yield, except under directions from the President.”
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Two days later, on Saturday, November 20, Eisenhower flew to Oran to meet the President and his party, also en route to Cairo. The American delegation had come via the battleship
Iowa
. After it docked, Eisenhower accompanied the President and his party to the airport and flew with them to Tunis, where Roosevelt was to spend two days. Eisenhower went on a motor trip with the President, inspecting battlefield sites, both recent and ancient, and had a long talk. Roosevelt shifted quickly from subject to subject and Eisenhower found him a fascinating conversationalist. At one point the President touched on OVERLORD. He said he dreaded the thought of losing Marshall in Washington, but added, “You and I know the name of the Chief of Staff in the Civil War, but few Americans outside the professional services do.” Eisenhower confined his comments to saying he would do his best at whatever job Roosevelt gave him.
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Eisenhower had arranged for Marshall and Admiral King to stay at his cottage in Carthage, where he joined them before dinner. King began talking about OVERLORD. He said he had urgently and persistently advised Roosevelt to keep Marshall in Washington, but he had lost. “I hate to lose General Marshall as Chief of Staff,” King told Eisenhower, “but my loss is consoled by the knowledge that I will have you to work in his job.” Both Eisenhower and Marshall were embarrassed, but Eisenhower took King’s statement as “almost official notice that I would soon be giving up field command to return to Washington.”
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On the evening of November 21, Roosevelt, Marshall, King, and the remainder of the American delegation flew to Cairo. There they argued with the British about operations in 1944 and future command structure.
The Americans held out for the strongest cross-Channel attack possible, with an over-all commander for the forces of the Allies throughout Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Mideast. As had happened so often before, the British did not flatly reject OVERLORD; rather they wanted to center the discussion on increasing operations in the eastern Mediterranean. They did make it clear that they would never allow Marshall or any other American to have as much power as the JCS proposal envisioned.
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