Hello. I am a new member here and I am doing some research for an essay about the imperativeness of Canada's presence in the Normandy Invasion of 1944. Canada invaded Juno beach and was required to cut off the Caen-Bayeux highway, and take over the Carpiquet Airfield.

Now what I need to know is HOW important were these objectives? Why was this highway so important? What did the Germans have in Caen that could not be allowed to go Bayeux, or vice versa? As well, did this airfield beside Caen house major German warplanes?

I thank anyone for considering these questions. For the sake of a formal bibliography, I would appreciate if you could provide me with links to the sources of your information.

Thank you all very much.

Caen was an important road junction and was vital to secure the Eastern flank of the invasion bridgehead. The road from Caen/Falaise is absolutely straight with few gradients of any kind and provided a direct route ultimately to the Seine crossings and to the centre of France ; conversely it would be a vital route for German armoured reinforcements.

I do not believe that , at the time of the invasion, Carpiquet housed major Luftwaffe units - it was seen as a vital objective by the Allies, one of whose priorities for the invasion was the securing of airfields/landing grounds which could be used by 2nd TAF.

It's worth noting that the Allies considered that the militarily logical course of action for the Germans would be to fall back to the high ground behind Falaise and the River Dives - but Hitler demanded a 'no retreat' policy, especially where Caen was concerned.

These are only my views derived from a number of sources : you may find D'Este 'Decision In Normandy' ( 1983 ) and Copp, 'Fields Of Fire - The Canadians In Normandy' ( 2003 ) useful.

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

Ah I see that's exactly what I needed to know. Thank you very much. I will look into those books as well.

If i'm not mistaken, after the breakout the highway out of Normandy was also crucial for the war effort by getting the supplies to the pursuing Allied armies.
This supply route was dubbed 'the red ball express', and shuttled supplies across France. The red ball express only shut down when the port of Antwerp was taken and opened for shipping.

Well welcome new-comer. Anyways, I haven't got anything on that essay, but U.S.A histroy is easy.

Yes, we Canadians seem to always want to prove why we were a necessity to every battle fought. It was mostly quite the opposite; the US could have easily done Canada's job with much more efficiency. So writing an essay proving what's really not true is a hard task.

Thank you all for your help.

The Rad Ball didn't in fact use the Caen/Falaise road - the Americans used roads which were slightly further south to establish a number of main supply depots in the Chartres-Dreux area.

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"Stand by to pull me out of the seat if I get hit" - Guy Gibson

More on Red Ball Express

Lesser known details of WW2 part three

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I have commuted on the Chartres Dreux road for years without knowing this. There is nothing but fields in between those towns. However there is an airfield still in use south of Dreux and another one west of Chartres on the road to Paris. If you go slighty towards the east while driving from Chartres to Dreux you will get to Nogent which was another field and most of all Maintenon, which was a major amno depot and Luftwaffe headquarters (Chateau) .

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