Western front-interesting bits of information

Jagdpanther´s debyt...

The Jagdpanther was considered by many to have been the most potent anti-tank weapon of the war, combining the armoured lines of the Panther tank and the awesome power of the 88mm gun. This was probably first demonstrated during the British advance through the Caumont Gap during "Operation Bluecoat" when the Jagdpanthers of Heavy Tank Battalion 654 engaged the Churchills of the 6th Guards Tank Brigade. A squadron of Churchills covering Point 226 suddenly started exploding one after another. Breaking cover from the "Bois du Homme" 2 Jagdpanthers covered by a third proceeded to pick off more of the British tanks only retreating when they came under fire. Although the 2 Jagdpanthers had to be abandoned due to track damage, they managed to destroy 14 of the Scots Guards tanks in an engagement which lasted only 2 minutes!

 

Some interesting discussions:

“Patton telephoned me that evening from Lucky Forward near Laval. ‘We’ve got elements in Argentan,’ he reported. ‘Let me go on to Falaise and we’ll drive the British back into the sea for another Dunkirk.’‘Nothing doing,’ I told him, for I was fearful of colliding with Montgomery’s forces. ‘You’re not to go beyond Argentan. Just stop where you are and build up that shoulder. Sibert tells me the German is beginning to pull out. You’d better button up and get ready for him.’” “A Soldier’s Story,” by General Omar N. Bradley

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Since Patton’s diary was a record of his intensely personal and often critical thoughts and comments, it was not published until after Eisenhower’s death. Patton had often criticized Bradley’s timidity and mediocrity in his diary.

There was much in Patton’s diary that, while interesting from a historical perspective, was hardly flattering. For instance, Patton wrote about Bradley,

“His success is due to his lack of backbone and subservience to those above him. I will manage without him. In fact, I always have; even in Sicily he had to be carried.” Patton’s Diary

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Sometimes Montgomery would give a speech without properly evaluating its effect on his men’s morale. In an address to a grenadier battalion before Mareth he told them that, “When I give a party, it is a good party. And this is going to be a good party.” His men remembered his words when 200 of their number didn’t return alive. At Market-Garden, a terrible disaster-plan of his in France, he told his men that he “wouldn’t want to miss this party.” Almost 2/3rds of them didn’t return.

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Montgomery’s Market Garden reaped a staggering 17,000 in killed, missing and wounded during the 9 day venture behind enemy lines.After 13,226 of his British troops had died, Montgomery decided to pull out and labeled the mission a “success.”
Bernhard, the Prince of the Netherlands at that time, seems to sum it up. It was he who said, “My country can never again afford the luxury of another Montgomery success.”

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The Germans didn’t know who was in command of the Third Army, but they did know that in seven days the Third Army had stolen 10,000 square miles from their “victorious Reich;” a faster advance than any army in history. They must have suspected that it was Patton, because the Germans always held Patton in higher respect than the Americans. After all, the Third Army’s stunning advance was far faster than the German blitzkrieg.
In one of the most stupid decisions of the war, Patton was ordered to halt at Falaise and wait for Montgomery to close the gap between the two cities. It took Montgomery 2 weeks to close the gap, during which most of the German divisions escaped. Had Patton been allowed to close the gap, the war would have ended in August 1944 (??)

http://www.pattonuncovered.com/html/war.html

September of 1944 was a difficult time for the Third Army. Montgomery had pressured Eisenhower into putting all the Allied production, manpower, and materiel behind his plan. As a consequence, Patton was left without gas to cool his heels at the gates of the fortress city of Metz.
Imagine Patton, entirely without gas, his army almost completely without food, watching helplessly as the Germans reorganized and filled Metz's forts. Patton’s tanks, at the outskirts of Metz, were helpless. Two thirds of his armor had no gas, while the other third had only enough ammunition for 7 rounds a day.

..After the Battle of the Bulge ended, the allied Armies drove onwards to the Rhine. Per usual, Montgomery was the last across, even though he had the largest operation prepared for crossing...

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It was at this time that Eisenhower made his incredibly foolish decision not to take Berlin. He then sent the Russians a copy of his plan to halt along the Elbe. Churchill – and Patton – were furious
Patton told the Secretary of State that, “We have had a victory over the Germans and disarmed them, but we have failed in the liberation of Europe; we have lost the war!”

After the end of the war, Patton was left to take care of domestic problems in Austria and Bavaria. At that time, Eisenhower’s policy was to bar all nominal members of the Nazi party in any civil capacity. Since 85% of Germans had become registered members of the Nazi party so as to escape extermination, it was clear to Patton that it would be impossible to run a country in this fashion. Patton disagreed with Eisenhower's orders – but as usual he obeyed them.

One day some newspapermen (always Patton’s enemies) arranged to trap him. They spoke, said witnesses, in a very condescending manner and aimed to get him angry. They asked him questions that they already knew the answers to and tried to trap him. They asked him what he thought of the fact that members of the Nazi party couldn’t hold any positions. They already knew Patton’s feelings on the matter, but if they could get him to express them, Patton would be discredited. "After all," one of the newspapermen said, "The Nazi party is a political party isn't it? Like the Democrats and Republicans?" "Yes," said Patton.

For that answer, Patton would lose command of the army he loved and had led so well.

 

Yeah--I agree with the reporters baiting Patton. They KNEW they could always get a rise from him by purposely saying the wrong things.

It wasnt so bad then as it is now. One cannot believe a word from any of their mouths these days.

 

Aye, but a lot of it can be put down to all great men of that time...All egotistical in their own way. If you dont want to court controversey you shouldnt go shouting out your views from the roof tops... Macarthur, Monty and Patton all from the same school in my view. Thats not to say not great, commanders in their own way, but none of them could pretend they were quiet aloof characters.

 

I completely agree wiht you.

 

POINTE DU HOC

Sorry if it´s a bit of a mess but trying to gather a story here...



http://search.eb.com/normandy/week2/Pointe_du_Hoc.html

http://www.worldwar2history.info/D-Day/Pointe-Du-Hoc.html

Pointe du Hoc is a promontory situated between two landing beaches that were taken by American forces in the Normandy Invasion. Formally part of the Omaha Beach invasion area (assault sector Charlie), it was itself the object of a daring seaborne assault on D-Day by U.S. Army rangers, who scaled its cliffs with the aim of silencing artillery pieces placed on its heights.

It provided an elevated vantage point from which huge German guns with a range of 15 miles could deliver fire upon both of the American beaches. Allied intelligence and photoreconnaissance had identified five 155-millimetre guns emplaced in reinforced-concrete casemates on the Pointe, and Allied commanders had determined that the neutralization of these guns was the key to the fate of the Omaha and Utah landings. The area of the Pointe was defended by elements of the German 352nd Infantry Division.

The task of neutralizing the guns, and of cutting the road running behind the Pointe from Saint-Pierre-du-Mont to Grandcamp, fell to the 2nd and 5th Ranger Battalions, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel James Rudder.

The Allied bombardment of Pointe-du-Hoc had begun weeks before D-Day. Heavy bombers from the U.S. Eighth Air Force and British Bomber Command had repeatedly plastered the area, with a climax coming before dawn on June 6. Then the battleship Texas took up the action, sending dozens of 14-inch shells into the position.Texas lifted her fire at 0630, the moment the rangers were scheduled to touch down

Once landed, however, the rangers engaged the Germans on top of the cliffs in a heavy firefight, and within minutes the first man was up. In small groups the rangers fought their way to the casemates, only to find them empty of the big guns.Out of the original 225 rangers, only 90 were still in fighting condition when the position was taken. They moved forward and cut the road behind the Pointe, and then a two-man patrol went down a narrow road leading south and discovered the guns some 550 yards (500 metres) from the casements. The guns were zeroed in on Utah Beach, and a German force, totaling some 100 men, was assembled a short distance away. Using thermite grenades, the two rangers melted and destroyed the guns' elevating and traversing mechanisms, rendering the pieces immovable.

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There was a dirt road leading south (inland). It had heavy tracks. Sgts. Leonard Lomell and Jack Kuhn thought the missing guns might have made the tracks. They set out to investigate. At about 250 meters (one kilometer inland), Lomell abruptly stopped. He held his hand out to stop Kuhn, turned, and half whispered, "Jack, here they are. We've found 'em. Here are the goddamned guns."

Unbelievably, the well-camouflaged guns were set up in battery, ready to fire in the direction of Utah Beach, with piles of ammunition around them, but no Germans. Lomell spotted about a hundred Germans a hundred meters or so across an open field, apparently forming up. Evidently they had pulled back during the bombardment, for fear of a stray shell setting off the amunition dump, and were now preparing to man their guns, but they were in no hurry, for until their infantry drove off the rangers and reoccupied the observation post they could not fire with any accuracy.

Lomell never hesitated. "Give me your grenades, Jack," he said to Kuhn. "Cover me. I'm gonna fix 'em." He ran to the guns and set off thermite grenades in the recoil and traversing mechanisms of two of the guns, disabling them. He bashed in the sights of the third gun.

"Jack, we gotta get some more thermite grenades." He and Kuhn ran back to the highway, collected all of the thermite grenades from the rangers in the immediate area, returned to the battery, and disabled the other three guns.

And with that the rangers had completed their offensive mission. It was 0900. Just that quickly they were now on the defensive, isolated, with nothing heavier than 60mm mortars and BARS to defend themselves

 

Another good one Kai--and thats interesting to still be able to see some of the bomb craters there.

 

Dietrich von Choltitz
Commander of Gross Paris
General von Choltitz became the Commander of Gross Paris on 7 August. He was given sweeping powers by Hitler to defend the city, and destroy it if this was not possible.

Sending the Swedish Consul General in Paris through the German lines to ask the Allies to come quickly, von Choltitz managed to fend off the ever increasing imperatives from Hitler to leave only scorched earth behind. Brennt Paris? Hitler demanded of General Jodl on the 25th of August; Is Paris burning?



Choltitz was a professional officer in the German army from 1914. He served in the invasion of Poland in 1939, the invasion of France in 1940, and the siege of Sevastopol in 1941-42. After serving in 1943-44 as commander of a panzer (armoured) corps on the Russian front, he was transferred in June 1944 to France, where his corps was ordered to hold the Cotentin Peninsula after the Normandy Invasion. On August 7 Choltitz, having failed to stop the breakout of U.S. forces into Britanny, was appointed military commander of the French capital city of Paris, German control of which was being threatened by the approaching Allied armies. Choltitz's orders, originating with Adolf Hitler himself, were to destroy bridges, major buildings, and other key facilities in the city rather than let it fall into Allied hands undamaged. Recognizing the military futility of these orders, and repelled by their barbarity, Choltitz instead agreed to a truce with French Resistance forces in the city and handed over Paris unscathed to General Philippe Leclerc on August 25, 1944.

Choltitz was held in a prisoner-of-war camp in the United States until 1947, whereupon he returned to Germany. Snubbed by fellow former officers, he wrote a book, Brennt Paris? (1951), in which he defended his disobedience of a leader whom he felt had gone mad. His book was the principal source for a best-selling popularization, Is Paris Burning? (1965), by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre.

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http://www.gobelin.dk/gobelin/fransk/kulthist/midtaep/midtaep.htm





On the Bayeux tapestry it is quite evident that it is William the Conquerer’s conquest of England at the battle of Hastings that is being depicted.

Von Choltitz had the Bayeux gobelin in Louvre at the time and Hitler wanted it in Berlin, I think. He had sent " museum SS" to collect it but Paris was taken before they could collect it with them. It has the invasion of England in it which probably fascinated him...



[ 23. January 2003, 01:02 PM: Message edited by: Kai-Petri ]

 

Great stuff on Choltitz too. He is oft forgotton but should not be--as he pretty much saved Paris from destruction--all to Der Fuhrers chagrin.

 

After Dunkirk 1940 the rest of the evacuations in France:

Western France Evacuations - The Battle for France begins on the 5th with a German advance south from the line River Somme to Sedan.

10th - The evacuation of British and Allied forces from the rest of France gets underway. Starting with Operation 'Cycle', 11,000 are lifted off from the Channel port of Le Havre

15th - Operation 'Aerial' begins with the evacuation of Cherbourg and continues for the next 10 days, moving south right down to the Franco-Spanish border.

17th - The only major loss during the evacuation from western France is off St Nazaire. Liner “Lancastria” is bombed and sunk with the death of nearly 3,000 men.

25th - The Allied evacuation of France ends with a further 215,000 servicemen and civilians saved, but Operations 'Aerial' and 'Cycle' never capture the public's imagination like the 'miracle' of Dunkirk. On the final day of the evacuation, Canadian destroyer “FRASER” is rammed and sunk by AA cruiser “Calcutta” off the Gironde Estuary leading into Bordeaux.

http://www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsAmphibious.htm

 

The Phantom Army and Normandy invasion

http://www.strategypage.com/articles/default.asp?target=ddaydeceit.htm&reader=long

The British and Americans created what amounted to an entire "phantom army" in order to fool the Germans. So successful were they in this effort that the Germans were convinced that the U.S. Army had some 20 percent more divisions than was actually the case, and the British Army nearly 70 percent!

The U.S., for example, created one army group (the "First United States Army Group," or "FUSAG ), one army (the "Fourteenth Army"), three corps, one armored division, five airborne divisions, and fourteen infantry divisions during the war for the specific purpose of deceiving the enemy. In addition, a further airborne division and nine infantry divisions which had been officially activated but not actually raised were more or less incorporated into this notional army, so that there were a total of 30 non?existent divisions officially part of the U.S. Army, a paper augmentation of about a third above actual divisional strength.

The creation of a "phantom" unit was surprisingly difficult. Initially it was almost impossible due to a peculiarity of U.S. Army regulations, which required the activation of new divisions on American soil. These restrictions had to be lifted before the creation of notional units for the purposes of deception could be undertaken.

Deception divisions were sometimes assigned numbers which fitted quite logically into the existing order of battle.However, some ghost units were given designations similar to those of existing formations, so that there was a notional "6th Airborne Division" as well as a real 6th Infantry Division, and a "17th Infantry Division" as well as a 17th Airborne Division. The idea was to be as confusing as possible. And some of the notional units had impassively high numbers, such as the "157th Infantry Division," to suggest that there were a lot more U.S. divisions out there than was really the case (89, plus six of Marines).

Double agents proved very useful for passing false order of battle information to the Germans, and even real enemy agents could be tricked into serving the Allied cause in this way. Other techniques included false radio traffic, "lost" documents, "accidental" slips of the lips in bars, and things like marriage notices in newspapers, wherein the groom's assignment was carefully noted.

One particularly clever trick involved National Geographic Magazine. The magazine was given official assistance in preparing a lavish full?color spread of U.S. military insignia, including army shoulder patches. The army cleverly arranged to have inserted among the legitimate insignia properly designed patches for most of the notional formations. Then, after only a few copies of the issue had been printed, the Army had the presses stopped. Within a few days a revised version of the insignia issue (June, 1943) was issued, with several interesting deletions.

Since the Army's heraldic design people were themselves unaware that the formations for which they had been requested to design insignia were fraudulent, they not only designed quite attractive and symbolic patches, they also issued proper manufacturing specifications for them.
Troops heading overseas were sometimes issued these false patches at their ports-of-embarkation.



Got any? probably worth a little fortune...

 

Kai, these are really amazing facts! I surely will have too look at them deeplier some other time and post some myself!

 

Pics of the commanders at the battle of the bulge:



Dietrich-von Rundstedt



Patton Mc Auliffe

etc etc

http://ardennes44.free.fr/page78.html

 

Hey Kai,

Thanks for the posting. I did a project for class last year and used that first picture of Pointe Du Hoc for my powerpoint presentation.

Unlike what "The Longest Day" said the guns were found. Now I read that they ran out of thermites and had to go back to get more to finish off the other guns. Did you come across that when you did your research?

Greg

 

Hi Greg,

Nice to hear some of the stuff I´ve sent has been of help!

As I recall the gun tracks were followed and all the guns were destroyed some way from the bunker complex.

 

It doesn´t always take months to make a great operation...

In february 1940, General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst (Kn.Cross 30.04.1940) was given the important task to plan the invasion of Norway. He was to invade both Denmark and Norway as quickly as possible. In five hours he had made a rough sketch of the invasion , presented it to Hitler, and was given order to proceed developing his plans.

http://www.nuav.net/weserubung2.html

I read this as well in the book Hitler by Rupert Matthews so I knew to look for it in the net.

 

The exercise for Sealion in Boulogne:

(to my knowledge Hitler and Raeder were present )

Operation Sealion - The One Exercise
One single main exercise was carried out, just off Boulogne. Fifty vessels were used, and to enable the observers to actually observe, the exercise was carried out in broad daylight. (The real thing was due to take place at night/dawn, remember).

The vessels marshalled about a mile out to sea, and cruised parallel to the coast. The aramada turned towards the coast (one barge capsizing, and another losing its tow) and approached and landed. The barges opened, and soldiers swarmed ashore.

However, it was noted that the masters of the boats let the intervals between the vessels become wider and wider, because they were scared of collisions. Half the barges failed to get their troops ashore within an hour of the first troops, and over 10% failed to reach the shore at all.

The troops in the barges managed to impede the sailors in a remarkable manner - in one case, a barge overturned because the troops rushed to one side when another barge "came too close".

Several barges grounded broadside on, preventing the ramp from being lowered.

In this exercise, carried out in good visibility, with no enemy, in good weather, after travelling only a short distance, with no navigation hazards or beach defences, less than half the troops were got ashore where they could have done what they were supposed to do.

The exercise was officially judged to have been a "great success".

http://www.flin.demon.co.uk/althist/seal1.htm

 

The western campaign for Luftwaffe in 1940 was not entirely "taking candy from a baby"...

Marshall Kesselring wrote: "The uninterrupted battle of our air force beginning on May 13th had literally spent the personnel and the material. After three weeks of combat, the air force units had fallen to 50 and even 30% below their theoretical effectiveness."

http://aerostories.free.fr/1940/page12.html

 

During the invasion of Normandy two Me-109's were recorded flyin over the "unconquerable armada" of ships that were out in the English channel. They reached the other side, from east to west, with not a dent in them. They decided to do it again, and again they were victorious in their joy ride over the thousands of AA and antiaircraft fire they received. These German fighter pilots are not only crazy but worthy of recognition.

 

The Luftwaffe could not have been in a more unpleasant situation on 6 June as nearly all the Reich defence units had been pulled back into southern France or into the interior of Germany to defend from the masses of US bomber formations. Pips Priller and his wingman from the stab of JG 26 were not the only Luftwaffe crews to fight on the 6th of June but are most noted because it has been in "all" the books. Pips actually flew an Fw 190 normally in the Normandie campaign and the Bf 109's were all that was left for their suicidal mission. What was going to befall the Reich defence gruppen in the next two months was to shatter the existance of the Luftwaffe fighter force from which it never recovered..........

~E