D-Day happens with no British ground forces

Supposing the US army is forced to fight the battle of Normandy without help from British land forces - for whatever reason. For example, suppose they said to the Brits, look you guys can have the soft underbelly of Europe. We're gonna pull out our forces from the Med, concentrate everything we've got for an invasion of France. Then the Brits reply, very well old chap we will assume complete command in the Med and you can take complete and sole command of ops in France.

Do you think that the US army offensive would have been as successful as it was? Could they have mounted a five beach offensive?

Or assuming they went for the original plan of only three beaches, could the American forces alone have taken Caen on D+1?

 

Well, this would be probably what the axis would hope for in war..the allied separated and fighting their own wars.

I do think the US could go for five landing beaches in Normandy, but would Britain let them use their soil for starting the offensive in this situation? That would make it a lot harder, even if the troops for Torch got into ships in the US and showed it possible to make a long trip before landings. At least the co-operation before the invasion would be lower and that´s not a good thing.

How about the Royal Navy help? I guess you´d need their guns to protect the invasion troops?

Personally I find it hard to believe that Caen could have been taken on D+1. I guess it might have been possible, but with three beaches to start with, could Caen be a major target cosidering the first days?

 

I would assume that all other factors are equal. The only difference would be that the invasion troops would all be American, therefore removing any bickering between the nations. Of course the RAF and RN would support the invasion.

If Patton (with Clark, Keys and Truscott) commanded forces for Sword and Gold, would they have been more successful than the British in defeating the panzer divisions and moving more quickly into Falaise?

 

What of the Canadians?
I'm trying not to get confused here.Britain has Sicily and Italy, so most of the RAF will be stationed accordingly.
While the USAF is stationed in England.
So, Monty will have to slug his way up Italy's mountain roads by him-self?

As for the yanks,I don't know if even Patton had a workable plan getting through the hedge-rows.

 

The big question in this what-if isn't if the US alone would have had the troops to do D-day. They would have easily met that requirement. The big question is if landing craft and the Mulberries would be available in sufficent quantity to allow the landing. Landing craft availability was the major, if not only, determinant in the size of D-day or, Anzio or, Salerno for that matter. The Mulberry harbors allowed the Allies to land without capturing a port immediately. This too determines whether D-day can proceed. There were more than sufficent US divisions alone in theater to provide the troops.
Naval support would not have been a major issue either. Even if the US had to provide all of it (along with most or all of the air support) these were managable problems that did not tax US capacity.
Building the Mulberries in the US would have aleviated most of the problem with this item but, moving them across the Atlantic might have proved a bit challenging (U-boat interference would have been a minor consideration here...).
On the whole, I see no major obstacles to an all US D-day given the initial conditions you list.

 

NO! The US would have gladly let him have the French forces to assist him !!! Just think Monty with the French. It's like taking an accordian player on a deer hunt.....He does little to assist the hunt, makes an awful racket and, folds up at the first sight of a deer!

 

The only thing I know about the Canadians is that they supplied One third of the supplies used in World War II. Wonder if you took out that enormous contribution where any nation would have stood.

 

Oh and for the Canadian...If you want to know more about the contribution of Canadians look into www.camp-x.com and find out about Sir William Stephenson, code name Intrepid. Best book about him according to his personal secretary was one called The Quiet Gentleman.

 

The USA had the Lend-Lease with Russia and was also supplying other country's e.g Australia,England ect. with numerous goods.
I would say keeping the operation going logistically would be of little problem with out the Canadians.

 

I've just been thinking about a very important question, very similar to this.

If Great Britain had been defeated, could the US have invaded fortress Europe without the island as a base?

I think WWII itself gives us some samples that it could have been done, though maybe not in June 1944, in the actual circumstances (specially, thinking about that the Wehrmacht would have been as bled and worn out by the Eastern Front).

The US was able to build a gigantic and very sophisticated supply network to supply maybe 1 million men and a fleet of 6.000 ships across the largest ocean in the world and bring the war to a nation half a world away (which was about to be massively invaded too).

At Operation 'Torch' many American troops embarked not in the UK, but in the very USA…

I don't know about the previous bombing campaign, but the tactical air cover could be provided by aircraft carriers, right?

 

Britan if defeated would, IMO, make a huge difference.
U-boats have no worries from R. Navy.No more night-time RAF bombings.
And Bexley Park's code-breakers, who knew every German communication would be no more.

The Atlantic wall would'nt had to have been built,I don't think.

 

Well in 1944, every US fleet carrier (CV) and light carrier (CVL) was either in a shipyard being built or in the Pacific. The only carriers that the US was using in the Atlantic at this time were the escort carriers that were being used in the hunter killer groups. So right off the bat in order to make this kind of amphibious assault the US would have had to bring a suitable number of fleet carriers from the Pacific along with enough landing craft in order to pull off another "Torch" type of assault on the European continent. This possible could be done however it could only occur at the expense of the offensive drive being made in the Pacific against Japan. My opinion would be that after Torch the allies substitute North Africa for England, build up their forces and launch their invasion against southern France rather than against Normandy.