Could D-Day happen earlier?
- Thread starter Hattusas
- Start date
Anywhere on the Atlantic coast could be similar enough to the real D-Day. Though somewhere like Bordeaux might be too far away from England for an initial attack.
I was actually thinking of Operation Dragoon when I made the statement, not a landing at Bordeaux.
Well, yes. Theoretically the WAllies could have invaded continental Europe at any time, but that doesn't mean they would have been successful. Marshall wanted Operation SLEDGEHAMMER put into effect in 1942 and Operation ROUNDUP executed in 1943, both invasions of Northern France to create the second front, success for both were realistically unfeaseable at the time and would have courted disaster, but they could have happened if Marshall had got his way. A successful invasion of continental Europe from the East could only realistically have occurred in 1944 to have had absolute chance of success.
There were study Operation Sledgehammer a Allies version of Operation Sealion
But the target were the French seaports of either Brest or Cherbourg in Spring 1943, only problem heavy guarded by Wehrmacht
also the study of Operation Roundup in 1942.
The plan for an invasion of northern France in the Spring of 1943
as the Allies try the Dieppe Raid in 1942 what ended in bloody fiasco for landing forces,
They overwork there plans and start R&D on new technology like Mulberry harbors and the famous Hobart's Funnies
For Operation Overlord, they look in weakest point of Atlantic wall in northern France, what was Normandy.
at first the Germans thought they got a chance to block them there, because lack of big Harbors
until commando of Wehrmacht ask perplex "What do you mean, they bring there Harbor with them ?"
But the target were the French seaports of either Brest or Cherbourg in Spring 1943, only problem heavy guarded by Wehrmacht
also the study of Operation Roundup in 1942.
The plan for an invasion of northern France in the Spring of 1943
as the Allies try the Dieppe Raid in 1942 what ended in bloody fiasco for landing forces,
They overwork there plans and start R&D on new technology like Mulberry harbors and the famous Hobart's Funnies
For Operation Overlord, they look in weakest point of Atlantic wall in northern France, what was Normandy.
at first the Germans thought they got a chance to block them there, because lack of big Harbors
until commando of Wehrmacht ask perplex "What do you mean, they bring there Harbor with them ?"
Yes, if
It could with this as a prequel:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=280307
It could with this as a prequel:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=280307
1942, not 1943. The fear of a Red Army collapse declined significantly after the German defeat @ Stalingrad. In 1942 the combined chiefs of staff discussed if the Sledgehammer plan should be executed if the Red Army did collapse.
The Roundup plans drawn up in early 1943 were mostly contingency plans were the German army in the west to weaken signifcantly or collapse. Specifically the three 'Rankin' plans. Those centered around a coup de main with airborne and commando units to seize a weakly defended port for landing the main force through a harbor.
The Wiki articles linked above leave a lot of information out & have some distortions. I'd recommend Hyperwar as a on line source for info on the many Allied invasion plans. Tho even that has a weakness in not examining the several plans in detail, and it does not make clear how in 1941-42 the US & British were seperately writing plans for invading Europe. This dual set of plans has created a lot of confusion since & I am fairly certain no one has done a completely researched book on the dozen or so invasion plans written from 1941 to 1944.
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I've seen third hand refrences to a Brit plan for landing at Bourdeux. Have not searched out original sources for that. The story I have heard is these were drawn up in late 1940 & were designed to support the French should fighting break out between France & Germany. The primary objective may have been to open a route to ship material to the French army since the British army was undersized at the time.
An invasion of Normandy or elsewhere in northern France was certainly possible in 1943 and would likely have achieved similar, if not greater, success than OTL's landing. This is due to it taking place at a time when Army Group B lacked a serious armored reserve (And what it did have was in Army Group reserve, very far from a potential beach head), most of its infantry divisions were static, and the remainder were under strength and stripped bare of equipment for the East. The air war was also at a point where the Allies could destroy the Luftwaffe if openly challenged, as they did in Tunisia, Sicily, and Italy IOTL. It also has devastating effects on the Eastern Front; IOTL fresh divisions from the west were crucial in preventing the capture of Krivoi Rog in October (Along with massive depots and Army Group South's main double track rail line) and the collapse of 4th Panzer Army around Kiev. With those divisions instead fighting a campaign in France, German no longer has a fresh strategic reserve to shift east and faces the prospect of total defeat along the Dnieper.
What's harder is figuring out how to achieve a landing politically and logistically. Not only does Allied strategic planning in 1942 need to be radically altered, but planning in the Pacific needs to be changed in order to release the appropriate shipping.
What's harder is figuring out how to achieve a landing politically and logistically. Not only does Allied strategic planning in 1942 need to be radically altered, but planning in the Pacific needs to be changed in order to release the appropriate shipping.
Operation Anvil, the predcessor to the Dragoon plan, was scheduled for April 1944. In January 1944 Ike & Monty agreed that the Overlord/Neptune plan needed to be expanded from a three beach assualt to a four beach assault. That complicated things as there would not be enough time or amphibious shipping to run Anvil & then Overlord in May. Ike pondered the problem for over a week in January, consulted with the Admirals, and possiblly with Devers (I'm not certain) about exactly what the minimum for a Anvil operation might be. At the end Ike decided Overlord had to be as strong as possible & canceled Operation Anvil. But, he imeadiatly directed planning for a similar operation to be run as soon as practical after Op Overlord was executed. That redesigned operation was renamed Dragoon.
Pogues biography of Marshal, several bios of Ike, and Atkinsons recent history of the US Army in WWII all have descriptions of Ike wrestling with the problem of not enough amphibious ships for both anvil and Overlord.
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The last is the easiest. While Operation Cartwheel (nuetralization of Raubal) had been on the table since mid 1942 MacArthur had been arguing ceaselessly for expanding it, and for follow on operations west to the Phillpines. Mission creep was already underway in the South Pacific even as the Japanese were still fighting on Gudalcanal in December 1942. When at the January 'Symbol' conference in Casablanca the Allied leaders decided to not invade France in 1943 the US leaders gave in to MacArthur, authorized a expanded Cartwheel operation, and subsequent operations westward in the South Pacific. That effort had not been accounted for in the earlier stratigic planning during 1942. Not only was material for at least two additional corps sent away to the south Pacific, but each ton sent required approx triple the number of ship days at sea as a ton sent from the US to Europe. The wastage of material in the South Pacifc was significantly higher than Europe as well. Bottom line is Macs 1943 offensives in the South Pacific sucked away shipping and material that could have supported two or three additional corps in Europe or the Mediterranean.
The USN also jumped the gun, starting its central Pacific offensive in November 1943 with Operation Galvanic in the Gilbert islands. The build up for that started in August 1943 & drew off additional cargo ships and amphibs. Set the US central Pacific back to January 1944, and tell Mac to stuff it quite a bit of extra combat power can be sent to the ETO in 1943.
How does a 1943 landing affect North Africa? Better to gain experience against the Germans at Kasserine Pass than at Normandy. Even if we were still in North Africa, would Eisenhower and the rest have had time to absorb the lessons and make the necessary adjustments?
Neither were there any fortifications completed outside of the port cities. The Germans strategy from 1941 into 1943 had been to defend the ports and counter attack from the interior. In the winter of 1942/43 the typical beach defense was a company in a series of squad or platoon size outposts. in the autum of 1943 Omaha beach was defended by a understrength rifle battalion with a half dozen light guns and a single battalion of Cezch made light field guns in support. No anti landing craft obstacles, mines and barbed wire only within a few meters of the resistance nests. The offshore mine fields were thinner as well.
There was also the matter of the overall German forces in the west being a third smaller than in June 1944.
Depends on when the final decsion is made. The US forces were allocated for Op Torch under the assumption there would be a 1943 invasion. that was still on the table as far as the US was concerned until the January 1943 Symbol conference. Maybe the Brits came to operation Torch thinking otherwise but in the previous 1942 confrences they had agreed to keep it on the table.
The real decision came at the January 43 meeting. That was when Brooke & Churchill came down against it unequivocally, thus killing any possibility.
The Tunisian campaign was fought without significant ground force added in after December. so, no change there. The number of Allied aircraft in the Med was doubled from December to May, but the air forces in the UK were increased as well. The remaining factor is logistics. A build up for some sort of Sledgehammer or Overlord type operation cuts into supplies to Africa. That is unless the US South Pacific offensive of 1943 is not approved. In that case there would be more cargo shipping to run both a Tunisian campaign and build up material in the UK. Setting back the US central Pacific offensive four to six months makes yet more cargo ships available.
As it was it is questionable if all of the relevant lessons were asorbed by the planners of Overlord. Bradley & Montgomery had direct experience in exactly one amphib operation under combat conditions. One US division in the 1944 Overlord operation, the 1st Inf, had more than a few weeks combat experience. The other two the 2d Armored div & 82d AB Div had just a couple weeks combat in Sicily and Italy. Neither of Bradleys corps commanders in Op Neptune/Overlord had any direct experience fighting the Germans (Collins had two months experience against the Japanese.) The experience thing for the US Army was less than is often assumed.
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I'm thinking less about amphibious operations and more about operational planning and deployment. Please forgive the intellectual short cut of Wikipedia...
Training and tactical failures[edit]
The Allies studied the results equally seriously. Positioned by senior commanders who had not personally reconnoitered the ground, U.S. forces were often located too far from each other for mutual support. It was also noted that American soldiers tended to become careless about digging in, exposing their positions, bunching in groups when in open view of enemy artillery observers, and positioning units on topographic crests, where their silhouettes made them perfect targets. Too many soldiers, exasperated by the rocky soil of Tunisia, were still digging shallow slit trenches instead of deep foxholes.[42] The 1st Armored had also apparently not learned lessons from British forces on the receiving end of German anti-tank and screening tactics, though others in the U.S. Army were well aware of the deception.[43] The Allies had also allowed the Germans to attain air superiority over the battlefield, largely preventing effective Allied air reconnaissance and allowing relentless German bombing and strafing attacks that disrupted Allied attempts at deployment and organization. Attacks by the Luftwaffe in close support of German ground offensives often neutralized American attempts to organize effective defensive artillery fire.
Allied command failures[edit]
General Dwight D. Eisenhower began restructuring the Allied command, creating a new headquarters (18th Army Group, under General Sir Harold Alexander), to tighten the operational control of the corps and armies of the three Allied nations involved and improve their coordination (there having been significant friction during the previous month′s operations).
Most importantly for U.S. Army forces, the II Corps commander—Lloyd Fredendall—was relieved by General Eisenhower and sent to a training command assignment for the remainder of the war. However, the widespread custom amongst theater commanders of transferring senior commanders who had failed in battlefield assignments to stateside training commands did not in any way improve the reputation or morale of the latter. Instead of receiving a competent leader, those commands would now be saddled with the difficult job of convincing a disgraced commander to take the lead in advocating radical improvements in existing Army training programs — programs which, like Fredendall himself, had contributed to the embarrassing U.S. Army reverses in North Africa.[44]
Eisenhower confirmed through Major General Omar N. Bradley and others that Fredendall′s subordinates had no confidence in him as their commander; British General Harold Alexander diplomatically told U.S. commanders, "I'm sure you must have better men than that".[45][46]
While the lion′s share of the blame fell on Fredendall, Kenneth Anderson—as overall commander of British, French, and American forces—bore at least partial responsibility for the failure to concentrate Allied armored units and integrate forces, which Generals Harmon, Ward, and Alexander noted had disintegrated into a piecemeal collection of disjointed units and commands.[47] When Fredendall disclaimed all responsibility for the poorly equipped French XIX Corps and denied French requests for support, notably when under pressure at Faïd, Anderson allowed the request to go unfulfilled. Anderson also came in for criticism for calling on the three combat commands of U.S. 1st Armored Division for independent tasking (over the vehement objections of its commander, Orlando Ward[nb 4]) thus diluting the division's potential effectiveness.[48]
New leadership[edit]
On March 6, Major General George S. Patton was placed in command of II Corps, with the explicit task of improving performance. He normally worked directly with Anderson′s superior, General Harold Alexander. Bradley was appointed assistant Corps Commander and eventually commanded II Corps. Fredendall was reassigned to the United States, and several other commanders were removed or promoted "out of the way". Unlike Fredendall, Patton was a "hands-on" general not known for hesitancy, and did not bother to request permission when taking action to support his own command or that of other units requesting assistance.[nb 5]
Stafford LeRoy Irwin—who had so effectively commanded the 9th Division′s artillery at Kasserine—became a successful divisional commander and later went on to higher command as did Cameron Nicholson of Nickforce fame. Commanders were given greater latitude to use their own initiative, to keep their forces concentrated, and to make on-the-spot decisions without first requesting permission by higher command. They were also urged to lead their units from the front, and to keep command posts well forward (Fredendall had built an elaborate, fortified "bunker" headquarters 70 mi (110 km) behind the front, and only rarely emerged to visit the lines). The 1st Armored′s Orlando Ward—who had become increasingly cautious after Kasserine—was eventually replaced with General Harmon by General Patton.
Tactical and doctrinal changes[edit]
Efforts were made to improve massed on-call artillery and air support, which had previously been difficult to coordinate. While U.S. on-call artillery practices improved dramatically, the problem of coordinating close air support was not satisfactorily resolved until the Battle of Normandy over a year later.[citation needed] American air defence artillery also began the process of making substantial doctrinal changes. They had learned that, while Stuka dive bombers were vulnerable to .50 in (12.7 mm) anti-aircraft machine gun fire, maneuver units and field artillery in particular needed protection from aerial attack: in one division, 95% of the air attacks were concentrated on its artillery units.[50]
Emphasis was also placed on keeping units together, rather than assigning elements of each division to separate tasks as Fredendall had done. The II Corps immediately began employing its divisions as cohesive units, rather than parcelling out small units on widely separated missions. By the time they arrived in Sicily, their forces were considerably stronger.
Training and tactical failures[edit]
The Allies studied the results equally seriously. Positioned by senior commanders who had not personally reconnoitered the ground, U.S. forces were often located too far from each other for mutual support. It was also noted that American soldiers tended to become careless about digging in, exposing their positions, bunching in groups when in open view of enemy artillery observers, and positioning units on topographic crests, where their silhouettes made them perfect targets. Too many soldiers, exasperated by the rocky soil of Tunisia, were still digging shallow slit trenches instead of deep foxholes.[42] The 1st Armored had also apparently not learned lessons from British forces on the receiving end of German anti-tank and screening tactics, though others in the U.S. Army were well aware of the deception.[43] The Allies had also allowed the Germans to attain air superiority over the battlefield, largely preventing effective Allied air reconnaissance and allowing relentless German bombing and strafing attacks that disrupted Allied attempts at deployment and organization. Attacks by the Luftwaffe in close support of German ground offensives often neutralized American attempts to organize effective defensive artillery fire.
Allied command failures[edit]
General Dwight D. Eisenhower began restructuring the Allied command, creating a new headquarters (18th Army Group, under General Sir Harold Alexander), to tighten the operational control of the corps and armies of the three Allied nations involved and improve their coordination (there having been significant friction during the previous month′s operations).
Most importantly for U.S. Army forces, the II Corps commander—Lloyd Fredendall—was relieved by General Eisenhower and sent to a training command assignment for the remainder of the war. However, the widespread custom amongst theater commanders of transferring senior commanders who had failed in battlefield assignments to stateside training commands did not in any way improve the reputation or morale of the latter. Instead of receiving a competent leader, those commands would now be saddled with the difficult job of convincing a disgraced commander to take the lead in advocating radical improvements in existing Army training programs — programs which, like Fredendall himself, had contributed to the embarrassing U.S. Army reverses in North Africa.[44]
Eisenhower confirmed through Major General Omar N. Bradley and others that Fredendall′s subordinates had no confidence in him as their commander; British General Harold Alexander diplomatically told U.S. commanders, "I'm sure you must have better men than that".[45][46]
While the lion′s share of the blame fell on Fredendall, Kenneth Anderson—as overall commander of British, French, and American forces—bore at least partial responsibility for the failure to concentrate Allied armored units and integrate forces, which Generals Harmon, Ward, and Alexander noted had disintegrated into a piecemeal collection of disjointed units and commands.[47] When Fredendall disclaimed all responsibility for the poorly equipped French XIX Corps and denied French requests for support, notably when under pressure at Faïd, Anderson allowed the request to go unfulfilled. Anderson also came in for criticism for calling on the three combat commands of U.S. 1st Armored Division for independent tasking (over the vehement objections of its commander, Orlando Ward[nb 4]) thus diluting the division's potential effectiveness.[48]
New leadership[edit]
On March 6, Major General George S. Patton was placed in command of II Corps, with the explicit task of improving performance. He normally worked directly with Anderson′s superior, General Harold Alexander. Bradley was appointed assistant Corps Commander and eventually commanded II Corps. Fredendall was reassigned to the United States, and several other commanders were removed or promoted "out of the way". Unlike Fredendall, Patton was a "hands-on" general not known for hesitancy, and did not bother to request permission when taking action to support his own command or that of other units requesting assistance.[nb 5]
Stafford LeRoy Irwin—who had so effectively commanded the 9th Division′s artillery at Kasserine—became a successful divisional commander and later went on to higher command as did Cameron Nicholson of Nickforce fame. Commanders were given greater latitude to use their own initiative, to keep their forces concentrated, and to make on-the-spot decisions without first requesting permission by higher command. They were also urged to lead their units from the front, and to keep command posts well forward (Fredendall had built an elaborate, fortified "bunker" headquarters 70 mi (110 km) behind the front, and only rarely emerged to visit the lines). The 1st Armored′s Orlando Ward—who had become increasingly cautious after Kasserine—was eventually replaced with General Harmon by General Patton.
Tactical and doctrinal changes[edit]
Efforts were made to improve massed on-call artillery and air support, which had previously been difficult to coordinate. While U.S. on-call artillery practices improved dramatically, the problem of coordinating close air support was not satisfactorily resolved until the Battle of Normandy over a year later.[citation needed] American air defence artillery also began the process of making substantial doctrinal changes. They had learned that, while Stuka dive bombers were vulnerable to .50 in (12.7 mm) anti-aircraft machine gun fire, maneuver units and field artillery in particular needed protection from aerial attack: in one division, 95% of the air attacks were concentrated on its artillery units.[50]
Emphasis was also placed on keeping units together, rather than assigning elements of each division to separate tasks as Fredendall had done. The II Corps immediately began employing its divisions as cohesive units, rather than parcelling out small units on widely separated missions. By the time they arrived in Sicily, their forces were considerably stronger.
A French magazine (Guerres et Histoire) recently run an article stating that some elements in the Vichy military made contacts with London to ask wether they would support them in a French action against the Germans. Plans were started but Alambrooke is supposed to have ordered them to be kept from Churchill, so as not to give the prime minister any ideas...