Could the Allies have prepared better for Normandy

[Stalins Organ]

Aff I think you missed something in Michael's post:

Why would an Australian officer be on loan to the RAN?

He's needling you for mis-typing that Aus officers were on loan to the RN, not the RAN.

[Affentitten]

Oh, missed that. Still, enabled me to expound on a favourite topic! And of course the RAN did hunt down subs outside the Pacific. Like in the Indian and Med.

[Michael Emrys]

Aff I think you missed something in Michael's post:

He's needling you for mis-typing that Aus officers were on loan to the RN, not the RAN.

You almost got it. What I was actually needling about was that he typed that the guy was on loan to the RAN, not the RN. But that's okay, I guess we just have to assume that you "down under" guys get everything backwards.

Michael

[mididoctors]

turing's bike and gas mask

use to tell people he wore the gas mask due to hay fever despite the fact the rides he went on seemed "pointless"

truth stranger than fiction.

[Stalins Organ]

I guess we just have to assume that you "down under" guys get everything backwards.

I'm glad to have bought some meaning to your otherwise insipid and tedious existance

[dieseltaylor]

For completeness, and for general information: I was asked weeks ago on the Axis History Forum for details of Crocodile use in the bocage by some poster.

A Pictorial history of the RTR by George Forty page 179

"Before the battalion leagured for the night a Crocodile flamed the hedges round the field and 40 Huns came out"

Seems then it waas effective for persuading Germans to give up - as I suggested. : )

Possibly the fact that the flame is not aimed at anyone in particular makes the concept of "Thay can't see me I will be safe" seem totally illogical and that surrendering is better than being accidental toast.

[JonS]

Winding back to before the fascinating diversion into the sexual mores of marine mammals ...

In 1940, the Brooke withdrew a division through the bocage, from approx Caen all the way to Cherbourg (ironically enough persued by a division commanded by Rommel). What Brooke took from the experience was that Bocage didn't present a significant obstacle to a motorised enemy. Of course ... in hindsight ... the force density presented by a single division is a little less than that presented by two armies, which in turn means that tactics which might work in the former (like infiltration) aren't really applicable to the latter.

The Allied advantage in firepower - especially artillery and airpower - was to a significant degree nullified by the close terrain of the bocage. Artillery and airpower are area weapons. To really bring them to bear requires a very good understanding of where you are, where the enemy is, and also requires some seperation between forces to avoid or reduce fratricide. As a generaly rule, none of those requirements pertained in Normandy - the enemies position was generally only vaguely known (hence the carpet bombing carried whenever the heavy bombers came to the party), units were often unsure of which field they were in since they all looked alike and distant reference points were impossible to see, and frontlines were occasionaly seperated by a single hedgrerow, and seldom by more than a single field or two. (A similar effect occurred in Vietnam, where the NVA and VC would "hug the belt" of the Americans to negate their ridiculously enourmous firepower advantage.) The same terrain also negated the Allied advantage in motorisation. While theoretically able to move a hundred miles a day, Allied divisions actually advanced at about at about one mile per week - a rate at which the horse-bound German army was able to keep up with.

Of course, as we now know, the bocage was an excellent force multiplier. The same two German armies being attacked by the same four Allied armies in pretty much any other terrain would have been destroyed in short order, since the Allied advantages of firepower and mobility would have destroyed any attempt to stand and fight, or run rings around any attempt to manoeuvre.

The high quality of the German Army, and the low quality of the Allied Armies, in Normandy has be greatly overstated in this thread. There were some excellent formations available to the Germans in Normandy, but there was a *whole*lot* of complete dreck as well. As I recall, there were something like 30 Ost batalions involved in the campaign, and pretty much all of the 23 infantry-type divisions *except* 352 and 3 Fallschirm were useless in anything other than defensive operations, in which they were at best adequate. As has been noted, whenever and wherever the Germans tried to counter attack they totally got their asses handed to them. In open country, bocage, hilly, or flat, infantry-heavy, panzer-heavy, or combined arms, on the first day while the Allies were at their most disorganised, or later when the Germans had time to plan and prepare; the circumstances didn't matter a jot. Whenever the Germans attacked in Normandy, they lost and lost *badly*.

The Allied divisions were pretty much cookie cutter, and had a pretty much cookie cutter level of training. Some had a considerable amount of prior experience too - the US 1st Inf and 2nd Armd (as already noted), plus the US 82nd Airborne, the British 7th Armd (as already noted) plus the British 50th and 51st Inf, plus a couple of Armd Bdes, plus numerous independant bn-sized elements (especially artilllery), plus command/HQ personnel, either individually or as complete groups (for example, Montgomery bought his 8th Army command team with him, pretty much complete, when he took over 21st Army Group). Certainly there were *more* units and men, especially from mid-to-late-June onwards, that were fed into Normandy with no prior combat experience, but realistically there was no way around that particular issue. The divisions were at least well trained for most military tasks. (Incidentally, one of the criticisms of 1st A/B Div during MARKET GARDEN is that their staffwork was of a poor standard, especially compared to those divisions that had been in action since Normandy - ie, a whole 2-3 months earlier.)

There are many, many things a military unit can train for. In fact, the list is esentially endless. Assault units trained for the assault, not unreasonably. Follow-up units trained - again not unreasonably - for the pusuit since that is what they had been directed to train for in the expectation (based on prior experience, analysis of likely enemy courses of action, and an assessment of the ground) that the Germans wouldn't deliberately allow the destruction of their last two first-class armies in a region of France that wasn't of any intrinsic value.

Going back to the original question, "Could the Allies have prepared better for Normandy", the answer is, of couse, yes they could have, had they had - in particular - better insight into what the Germans would do, and how they were going to use the terrain. However, the corrollary is ... what do you give up in order to prepare better? What recon and intelligence effort do you forego in order to better devine the enemy intentions? How much farmland do you rip up in order to allow 'realistic' training to occur in the UK ... and thus how many extra convoys of ships carry food to the UK are required, which means how much less military equipment carried across the Atlantic and how much internal redistribution capacity within the UK must be taken away from military needs onto civilian needs? There's no free lunch here - in order to use perfect hindsight and prepare 'better' the Allies have to do something else less well. What is it? Is that a reasonable cost/risk, given the circumstances of the time?

[Blackhorse]

Excellent post Jon! Spot on.