The Super Summary of World History (80 page)

Figure 71 D-Day and Beyond

The Allies were racing to the Rhine. Paris fell rather quickly after De Gaulle’s French units disobeyed Eisenhower’s orders and diverted to the city. Eisenhower was forced to redirect troops to Paris, squandering valuable time and fuel. At least the Germans disobeyed Hitler’s orders to destroy the city. This diversion demonstrated the French war aims differed greatly from the English and Americans, and DeGaulle was going to pursue those aims no matter the cost to their fellow combatants. Because the Germans continued to hold the port cities on the Atlantic coast of France, and because a tremendous storm had wrecked one of the artificial harbors at Normandy, the Allies were having supply problems.
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Moving fuel, ammunition, and all the rest from Normandy to the German border was expensive and time consuming (that troublesome word again, Logistics). Eisenhower wanted the port of
Antwerp
captured at once, but again General Montgomery dawdled, and the Germans reinforced the area thus causing the British troops delays and hard fighting after Montgomery finally directed his soldiers to take the area. Engineers worked on clearing mines and obstacles planted by the Germans to stop shipping from entering the port. All these problems caused a significant postponement in opening the vital harbor.

General Eisenhower followed a broad front strategy for the Allied advance where the entire front moved forward simultaneously, and all sectors enjoyed an equal call on supplies. General Montgomery wanted to limit the advance to a narrow area that would demand the lion’s share of supplies. At first Ike refused the idea, but as the supply situation grew critical, he thought allowing the remaining supplies to be used for a narrow front attack could end the war sooner. Ike told General Montgomery to go ahead with
Operation
Market
Garden
, an assault with paratroopers and the British Thirty Corps designed to cross the Rhine from British positions near Antwerp. The assault was commenced on September 15, 1944.

Market Garden was a colossal Allied defeat. The plan itself was badly put together, and vital intelligence was ignored. Crack Nazi troops were in the region for rest and refitting, and the plans for Market Garden fell into German hands early in the operation. Thirty Corps’ advance ran into deep trouble because the single road available for mechanized movement was easily defended. After days of pounding and no sign of Thirty Corps or communication from headquarters, the British paratroopers were done. Thousands of elite British paratroopers were killed or captured.
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On September 19, 1944, American units began assaulting
the
Huertgen
forest
. This assault was useless from a strategic point of view. The forest was classic defensive terrain, and German paratroopers were dug in there supported by heavy artillery. For some reason, American generals Bradley and Hodges thought the forest was vital, and threw nine divisions in all into the fight, battling for
three
months
in an area where American firepower, air control, and ability to maneuver were useless. Huertgen was taken, but the cost was enormous for the advantage (if any) gained—
twenty-four
thousand
US
soldiers
dead!
US Generals Bradley and Hodges were responsible for this error in judgment and fully responsible for the lives of the men they sacrificed.

The
Battle
of
the
Bulge

December
1944

On December 16, 1944, Hitler launched a massive offensive through the Ardennes forest. This assault caught the Allies completely by surprise. Allied units stationed at the point of attack had either been manhandled in the Huertgen forest, or were green units moved into a quiet sector. Given the condition of the US units opposing the Germans, they fought well and delayed the initial German advance appreciably; nevertheless, the German blow made good ground in the first few days. The
Battle
of
the
Bulge
was on.

This attack was the brainchild of Adolf Hitler, forever the gambler, who staked his empire on one very risky roll of the dice. He managed to keep the assault a secret mainly because of radio silence. Allied intelligence was coming in through
Ultra
(the reading of Nazi radio transmissions) almost exclusively. Ultra intelligence reports were so unfailing Allied generals relied on little else. Furthermore, the Allies thought the Germans could not mount such an offensive. The Allied generals believed the Germans were finished.

Figure 72 Battle of the Bulge, Dec 1944

Somehow, against all odds, Germany scraped together several divisions—armored included—and enough fuel to
open
a major offensive. Allied air operations failed to prevent this achievement, neither had enormous German losses in men and equipment over the past months in the USSR and on the Western Front. However, the men assembled for this undertaking were
not
well
trained
. The officers and most of the noncommissioned officers were veterans, but the troops were green. Moreover, the fuel supply was short. Capturing Allied fuel was necessary to keep the advance going.

Hitler’s plan contained other flaws. The road grid his armored divisions moved over was awful. Small winding mountain roads, with small bridges, would be tough enough to attack over in good weather; however, for the assault to work the weather must be bad—very bad. Snow and overcast weather kept the Allied air forces on the ground, and this was essential for victory. German tanks traversed slick snow-covered roads surrounded by hills and trees that could, and did, hide defenders. Knocking out the lead German tank in these conditions stopped the entire column. Bad weather, large tanks,
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small winding roads, not much fuel, and a movement schedule that would prove impossible to keep, all added up to failure before the attack started.
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The experienced German generals knew the results before the attack started, the loss of Germany’s reserves. Hitler had blundered again.

On the morning of the attack, the US Army troops under fire did not see Hitler’s move as stupid. German tanks, artillery, and infantry were advancing everywhere, while American troops were falling back or fighting from encircled positions. Some German troops had a new assault rifle, the Sturmgewehr 44
,
developed from studies of how German troops actually fought in the field. American troops did not like this new development either. Valiant last stands seldom win wars, but American units fighting valiant, if small, last stands significantly hampered the German advance at key moments in the offensive. This proved critical as the battle developed. Hitler’s goal was the port of Antwerp. He knew his forces must reach the River Meuse, cross it, and get on to Antwerp before the weather cleared.

The German assault soon began running out of steam. The 101st Airborne Division moved into a vital road junction at
Bastogne
and held on despite repeated German assaults. German units on the point of attack who were approaching the Meuse ran short of fuel and were beat up by American tanks and artillery. The flanks of the American line held at St.Vith, and American counterattacks began to threaten penetration near the base of the bulge. General Patton’s Third Army made a ninety-degree turn north in record time and began assaulting the Germans holding the area between himself and Bastogne. As the weather cleared on Christmas Day, Allied air power began to pound German tanks and supply lines while Patton’s army relieved the defenders at Bastogne. It was over. Hitler reluctantly ordered the retreat that spelled the end for Germany in the west. With his reserves destroyed, Hitler possessed nothing to hold back the Allied tide.

The
Air
War
Over
Europe

1940
to
1945

Thus far, we have circumvented the air war over Europe. In fact, it was a massive undertaking involving resources on a vast scale for England, America, and the Nazis. The air war, from the outset, caused controversy. Bombing of civilians was a difficult thing to justify, but it was a requirement of total war. The Nazis started it, said Bomber Harris, and the Allies would finish it in spades. “They have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind,” is a well-known quote from Air Marshall Harris (known as Bomber Harris).

“The
pioneer
in
the
air
war
against
Germany
was
the
RAF.
The
RAF
experimented
briefly
in
1940
with
daylight
attacks
on
industrial
targets
in
Germany
but
abandoned
the
effort
when
losses
proved
unbearably
heavy.
Thereafter,
it
attempted
to
find
and
attack
such
targets
as
oil,
aluminum,
and
aircraft
plants
at
night.
This
effort
too
was
abandoned;
with
available
techniques,
it
was
not
possible
to
locate
the
targets
often
enough.
Then
the
RAF
began
its
famous
raids
on
German
urban
and
industrial
centers.
On
the
night
of
May
30,
1942,
it
mounted
its
first
‘thousand
plane’
raid
against
Cologne
and
two
nights
later
struck
Essen
with
almost
equal
force
 . . .
the
weight
of
the
RAF
effort,
compared
with
tonnages
later
employed,
was
very
small—sixteen
thousand
tons
in
1940
and
forty-six
thousand
tons
in
1941
compared
with
676,000
tons
in
1944.”
(The
US
Strategic
Bombing
Survey)

Thus started the night-area bombing of German cities. It was a practical matter. Daylight raids were too costly, and after dark it was impossibly difficult to locate a factory complex for pinpoint bombing.
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Britain felt it had to use its only method of striking back, so it made the decision to “carpet” or area bomb the cities producing the machines of war, and if the “civilians” who worked and lived there were harmed, so be it.

When the Americans arrived with their B-17 “flying fortress,” they were sure they could carry out daylight raids against German industrial targets. The American’s thought by using the top-secret Norden bombsight the B-17s could put bombs right on the industrial target, thereby avoiding unnecessary civilian deaths and damaged homes. In fact, the B-17’s bombs seldom fell on the target when dropped from high altitudes. In the beginning, American losses were high but acceptable. The British raids were costing them far less in terms of crew and aircraft losses, but at times the raids missed entire towns. American airmen went forward with the daylight bombing, but the losses were climbing. Bomber Command kept trying to talk the Americans into joining the night raids, but American commanders thought they were on the right track. It went unsaid, but at first the US Airmen thought their approach avoided unnecessary civilian deaths and was therefore morally superior. This did not hold as the war progressed to firebombing entire cities, and any attempt to justify the bombing was summed up by “they started it.”
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