WW2 POSTERS

World War 2:
Plans for the Allied Invasion of France

Developing Alliance
Plans Developed
Selection of Commanders
Final Plans
French Resistance
German Forces
Deception Plan

PLANS FOR THE ALLIED INVASION OF FRANCE

World War Two French Propaganda Posters

Even though military resources in Britain were meager after the withdrawal from France in 1940, British forces soon began to plan a return to the Continent. In September 1941, the British Chiefs of Staff charged Adm. Lord Louis Mountbatten (later 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma), who headed the Combined Operations Headquarters, with investigating the technical problems of amphibious operations. Not long afterward the British joint planners drew up the first formal plan for a cross-Channel attack. This plan, which was called Roundup, assumed a marked deterioration of German strength. Projecting the use of relatively small British forces, it was designed to disrupt German withdrawal to the homeland in the final phase of the war.

Though American military officers were in England as observers as early as October 1940, the World War II alliance between the Englishspeaking nations began to take definite shape only in January 1941. This was the month when American and British military officers met in Washington for conversations that became known as ABC-l. The agreements reached-that the two nations were to maintain joint planning staffs in Washington and London and that, if forced into war with both Japan and Germany, the United States would join Britain in defeating Germany first-started the chain of events that led to the eventual cross-Channel invasion and victory in Europe. It was two months later, in March, when Congress passed the Lend-Lease Act, which authorized the United States to provide war materials for nations under Axis attack. By June, with the American observers in London having become the Special Observer Group and the British having sent representatives to Washington, the two countries were in close liaison. Though the United States still was not at war, American troops replaced British troops in Iceland in July 1941, and later in the summer began to construct naval and air bases in the United Kingdom, ostensibly for British use.

Developing Alliance

Immediately after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the German declaration of war against the United States, as American and British military leaders met in Washington in a series of conferences known as Arcadia (December 1941-January 1942), they reaffirmed the ABC-1 decision to remain on the strategic defensive in the Pacific while defeating Germany first. They decided to wear down German resistance in 1942 by air bombardment, by assisting the USSR, and by trying to gain the entire North African coast, before initiating in 1943 a large-scale land offensive against Germany across either the Mediterranean Sea or the English channel. They also created the Combined Chiefs of Staff (CCS ), consisting of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff and the British Chiefs of Staff, as the body to assist and advise President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill on the direction and conduct of the war. The most prominent members of the CCS were Gen. (later General of the Army) George C. Marshall, United States Army chief of staff, and Gen. (later Field Marshal) Sir Alan F. Brooke (later 1st Viscount Alanbrooke), chief of the Imperial General Staff. Because the CCS met only periodically, the American and British members did the detailed work of planning separately. Those most concerned with planning a European invasion were the Operations Division (OPD) of the United States War Department and the British Combined Commanders (the senior ground, naval, and air officers, together with Lord Mountbatten).

Differences between the Allies in general strategic outlook soon became apparent. The British, acutely conscious of the difficulty of a Channel crossing, aware of the need for special boats and equipment, and impressed by the strength of the German Army, favored a peripheral strategy, including ground operations in the Mediterranean or in Scandinavia and such indirect methods of attack as blockade, air bombardment, and the encouragement of subversive activities in German-occupied countries. Only when the Germans had been weakened to the point where an invasion would be sure of success was a cross-Channel attack to be launched. The Americans, more conscious of the needs of the Pacific war, and therefore impatient for victory in Europe, rejected the peripheral areas for major operations, for they believed that only by a showdown in northwestern Europe could the Germans be beaten.

As the first American ground troops (34th Division) arrived in Northern Ireland- in January 1942, the Special Observer Group was redesignated the United States Army Forces in the British Isles. Not long afterward, United States air force contingents began to arrive in England for eventual participation in the bombardment of German-held Europe, and in July American air crews in borrowed Royal Air Force (RAF) planes flew their first mission, a daylight attack against German airfields in the Netherlands. Then, in August, the Eighth Air Force, commanded by Maj. Gen. (later Gen.) Carl Spaatz, carried out the first bombing of Europe by American pilots flying American planes.

Because the Americans still were building up their strength and because British resources were hardly sufficient to carry out a cross-Channel attack alone, the British chiefs concluded that no cross-Channel operation was feasible in 1942 unless Germany showed unmistakable signs of collapse. Even 1943 remained doubtful. In March 1942, the OPD nevertheless began work on an outline plan for a full-scale invasion of Europe in 1943. The following month, General Marshall and Harry Hopkins, confidential adviser to President Roosevelt, went to London to try to gain British acceptance of the idea. The British agreed not only with the concept but also with a War Department proposal, code named Bolero, for a great buildup of American forces in Britain, with approximately 1 million men to be equipped and trained to carry out air operations in 1942 and a major invasion of the Continent in 1943. To implement the decision, Maj. Gen. (later Lt. Gen.) John C. H. Lee arrived in the United Kingdom in May to activate the Services of Supply. On June 24, Maj. Gen. (later General of the Army) Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived to take command of the European Theater of Operations, United States Army (ETOUSA ),.

Approval of the 1943 invasion-landings on a wide front between Boulogne and Le Havre, or Roundup, as it was called-did not solve the problem of what to do in 1942. That summer, President Roosevelt became increasingly convinced of the need for active operations in the European area before the end of the year. The commencement of a new German offensive in the USSR in June and British reverses in North Africa had their effects on his thinking. Fortunately, two decisive naval victories over the Japanese in May and June (Coral Sea and Midway) relieved the immediate threat to Australia and made it possible for the United States to divert greater resources to Europe. Despite the recommendations of General Marshall and Adm. (later Admiral of the Fleet) Ernest J. King, United States chief of naval operations (both of whom considered a North African venture a dispersal of strength), Roosevelt accepted a British proposal to invade North Africa that year (Operation Torch). The CCS appointed Eisenhower to assume immediate control of the planning. The decision to invade North Africa placed the Bolero-Roundup concept in jeopardy. Though planning for an eventual cross-Channel operation continued, Torch absorbed almost the entire effort and attention of the Allies in the European area. The invasion on Nov. 8, 1942, and the subsequent campaign through the winter and spring drained men, materiel, and supplies from the American buildup in the British Isles.

Meanwhile, the British had executed two daring raids against the German-held French coast. In March 1942, specially trained troops called Commandos launched a hit-and-run foray against St.-Nazaire and destroyed submarine pens and other naval facilities. In August, a joint British and Canadian command, with 5,000 Canadians, 1,000 British, and 50 United States Rangers, raided Dieppe in a miniature invasion to test amphibious tactics and techniques. Involving the full use of combined arms and the mass landings of infantry and armor to seize a beachhead, the Dieppe operation was designed not to hold a beachhead but rather to test the ability of the newly developed LCT (landing craft, tank) to land tanks across beaches, to see whether it was possible to capture a port in a frontal assault, to scrutinize the organization of air forces for overhead cover and support, and to test the naval management of a considerable invasion fleet. Of the 6,100 troops embarked for Dieppe, about 2,500 returned, including about 1,000 who never landed. The others were killed or captured.

Plans Developed

When the CCS met at Casablanca in January 1943, it was a time of optimism. The Germans had been decisively defeated in North Africa, though the campaign would continue until May. The Russians had taken the offensive after stopping the Germans at Stalingrad (now Volgograd), and Japanese expansion in the Pacific had definitely been checked. As a consequence, the greatest obstacle blocking offensive operations against the European continent that year was the relative paucity of Allied resources, particularly the shortage of shipping due to the effectiveness of German submarine warfare.

To make the Mediterranean safe for shipping, the Allies at Casablanca decided to invade Sicily after completing the conquest of the North African shore. By seizing Sicily, they hoped also to remove Italy from the war. To increase pressure on Germany, they agreed to initiate intensified air attacks from the United Kingdom, called the combined bomber offensive (Operation Pointblank). But for a major invasion across the Channel in 1943 the Allied leaders judged their resources insufficient. Though they set up a combined command and planning organization, it was designed to plan for small-scale raids and a return to the Continent in 1943 only if the Germans collapsed. A full-scale invasion was reserved for 1944.

Studying the Dieppe experience, the CCS planners concluded that the strength of the enemy defenses along the Channel coast required an immense concentration of power in the initial assault. Instead of dispersed landings, instead of many separate assaults by regimental and Commando units, it was better to make a single main landing. The beachhead initially secured should then be expanded and developed into a lodgment for the entire invasion force scheduled to follow. The area of initial assault and subsequent lodgment had various requirements. It had to be within range of fighter planes based in the United Kingdom; it had to provide airfields and sites suitable for constructing airfields soon after the invasion; it had to have at least one major port; and the landing beaches had to be sheltered from winds, suitable for prolonged maintenance operations, provided with adequate exits, and backed by good road nets. Furthermore, naval shelling, air bombardment, or airborne landings would have to be capable of reducing or crippling the beach defenses. The area most appropriate for initial landings, the planners decided, was the Channel coast of France between Caen and Cherbourg.

When the CCS approved this analysis on March 1, 1943, they transmitted it as the basic paper for cross-Channel planning to Lt. Gen. (later Sir) Frederick E. Morgan, a British officer appointed that month as chief of staff to the supreme Allied commander (COSSAC). In a subsequent directive issued on April 23, the CCS instructed Morgan to set up an Allied headquarters for the supreme commander, who had yet to be named, and to plan to invade northwestern Europe as early as possible in 1944. Meanwhile, in February 1943, General Eisenhower, the supreme Allied commander in the Mediterranean, had relinquished command of ETOUSA, with its headquarters in England, to Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews. In May, when Andrews died in an air accident, Lt. Gen. (later Gen.) Jacob L. Devers took his place.

In May 1943, at the Trident Conference in Washington, the CCS enlarged the Allied bomber offensive from the United Kingdom, decided to exploit the projected Sicily operation to ensure the elimination of Italy from the war, and set a target date for a cross-Channel operation on May 1, 1944. In the future, men, materiel, and supplies were not to be diverted from the Bolero buildup for Mediterranean operations; on the contrary, 7 Allied divisions were to return from the Mediterranean area to the United Kingdom. The Allies visualized 29 divisions available for the invasion of France by the spring of 1944.

The reason for this optimistic estimate was the success of Allied warships and planes in destroying a growing number of German submarines during the spring of 1943. The decrease in shipping losses, combined with an increase in shipyard production and the freezing of resources in the Mediterranean, made possible a tremendous buildup of American forces in the United Kingdom. It was predicted that 1,300,000 United States troops (400,000 air force and 900,000 ground combat and service troops, including more than 18 combat divisions) would be in the United Kingdom by May 1944.

During the summer of 1943, COSSAC formulated three plans: Cockade, essentially a deception operation designed to pin German forces down in the west by encouraging their expectations of an Allied invasion that year; Rankin, a blueprint for occupying the Continent in case of a sudden German collapse; and Overlord, an invasion in the Caen-Cotentin area with an initial assault of from 3 to 5 divisions. In reality a concept to be used as the basis for later detailed planning, Overlord accepted the risk of prolonged beach maintenance by depending on the development of two prefabricated ports (code named Mulberries) to be towed across the Channel during the invasion. Under Overlord the initial mission of the invasion forces was to gain a lodgment area between the Seine and Loire rivers in France. As increasing numbers of combat units entered the lodgment area, ports, airfields, and supply installations would be developed and organized to support a subsequent drive toward Germany.

The planners assumed that it would take three months to secure lodgment. They then expected a pause for logistical reasons before an advance could be made beyond the Seine. Because they anticipated that the Germans would destroy the facilities of Cherbourg and Brest, they thought of developing a major port of entry for United States forces on the south shore of Brittany at Quiberon Bay (Operation Chastity).

The Allied conquest of Sicily ( July-August 1943), the fall of Benito Mussolini ( July 25), negotiations for the surrender of Italy (eventually announced on September 8), and preparations for an Allied invasion of the Italian mainland (to be initiated on September 3), together with the Soviet seizure of initiative on the eastern front, provided a bright background for the CCS meeting at Quebec in August 1943. Though the CCS accepted COSSAC's Overlord concept, the debates between the Allies demonstrated divergent points of view. The British espoused a strategy essentially opportunistic, a view that reemphasized peripheral operations aimed at reducing German power by indirect attack (increased air and sea operations, plus intensified ground operations in the Mediterranean) in order to make the cross-Channel attack a success without question. They favored leaving the timing of Overlord somewhat indefinite. The Americans, wanting a power thrust to be made as quickly as possible, urged a definite commitment for Overlord, preferably May 1. The result was a compromise. Though May 1 remained the target date, it was not an altogether firm commitment. Yet the Allies agreed to give Overlord strict priority over operations in the Mediterranean. Accepting COSSAC's wish for a diversionary invasion of southern France, the CCS instructed General Eisenhower to draw plans for an operation to be executed from Mediterranean resources, timed to coincide with Overlord, and designed to gain lodgment in the Toulon-Marseille area, with a subsequent exploitation to the north and a juncture with the Overlord forces.

Selection of Commanders

Selecting a supreme commander for the cross-Channel invasion was no easy matter. When an invasion in 1943 had seemed possible and the bulk of the resources would have been British, Churchill had informed General Brooke that he was to command the invasion forces. Later, when the preponderance of American resources dictated the choice of an American commander, Roosevelt and the British as well inclined toward General Marshall. But because Roosevelt wished Marshall to remain in control of the over-all American effort (Marshall was invaluable in balancing the sometimes conflicting demands of the Pacific and European theaters), the president, in December 1943, appointed General Eisenhower supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force. Eisenhower's chief of staff, Lt. Gen. (later Gen.) Walter Bedell Smith, transformed the COSSAC staff into the Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF), with General Morgan remaining as deputy chief of staff. Eisenhower assumed his new position on Jan. 16, 1944, and General Devers was transferred to North Africa as commander of United States forces in the Mediterranean.

Gen. (later Field Marshal) Sir Bernard Law Montgomery (later 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein), who had led the Eighth Army in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy, was at the same time named to command the Twenty-first Army Group, the supreme British headquarters for the invasion. Eisenhower directed Montgomery to act as ground force commander during the initial phase of the invasion but reserved for himself the eventual control of the Allied land forces. The major ground commanders were Lt. Gen. (later Gen.) Sir Miles C. Dempsey, who commanded the British Second Army; Lt. Gen. (later Gen.) Henry D. G. Crerar, in command of the Canadian First Army; and Lt. Gen. (later General of the Army) Omar N. Bradley, who took command of the United States First Army and of the United States First Army Group (later renamed the Twelfth Army Group). Lt. Gen. (later Gen.) George S. Patton, Jr., placed in command of the United States Third Army, was to head the immediate American follow-up force.

Eisenhower's deputy commander, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur W. Tedder (later 1st Baron Tedder), acted as coordinator of the air forces: the tactical air forces organized under Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford L. Leigh-Mallory, who commanded the Allied Expeditionary Air Forces (AEAF) ; and the strategic air forces, composed of the RAF Bomber Command, under Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur T. Harris, and the United States Strategic Air Forces under General Spaatz. Adm. Sir Bertram H. Ramsay took command of the naval forces for the invasion, with Rear Adm. (later Admiral of the Fleet) Sir Philip Vian commanding the Eastern Naval Task Force, scheduled to transport British troops, and Rear Adm. (later Adm.) Alan G. Kirk the Western Naval Task Force, which was to carry the American assault forces.

Final Plans

After studying the Overlord concept, Generals Eisenhower and Montgomery concluded that the initial assault needed to be strengthened and yet made on a broadened front. This required additional landing craft, troops, and vehicles, and this in turn led to debate over whether the diversionary invasion on the Mediterranean coast of France, an operation code named Anvil, was really necessary. When the Anzio beachhead in Italy exerted its requirements for shipping, Eisenhower in March 1944 suggested canceling Anvil as an attack simultaneous with Overlord. In accepting the recommendation, the CCS assured SHAEF of the additional landing craft and other materiel needed for a stronger cross-Channel attack, but the complex requirements of assembling the means for the invasion of Europe had made it necessary to change the landing date from May to June. Meanwhile, on February 1, Montgomery, Ramsay, and LeighMallory had drawn the initial joint plan (Neptune) for the invasion. A refinement of the Overlord concept, Neptune was at the same time a directive instructing the subordinate headquarters to plan the assault in greater detail.

As finally completed in the spring of 1944, the invasion plan called for assaults by the United States First and British Second armies. The First Army was to invade the Normandy shore in the Carentan-Isigny area with two corps. Northwest of Carentan the 82d and 101st Airborne divisions were to drop near Ste.-MereEglise in order to assist the 4th Infantry Division of the 7th Corps to land on Utah Beach near Varreville. East of Isigny, in the 5th Corps zone, the 1st Infantry Division with part of the 29th Division was to land over Omaha Beach near Vierville-sur-Mer. Operating in the BayeuxCaen area, the British were to send the 50th Division under the 30th Corps across Gold Beach near Arromanches-les-Bains, the Canadian 3d Division under the 1st Corps across Juno Beach near Courseulles, and the 3d Division, also under the 1st Corps, across Sword Beach near Lionsur-Mer. The 6th Airborne Division was to drop northeast of Caen near the mouth of the Or.ne River to protect the British flank.

The troops making the amphibious landings were to be carried by naval transports to positions 11 miles offshore in the American zone and 7 miles offshore in the British zone. The troops then were to board LCVP's (landing craft, vehicle and personnel) and LCA's (landing craft, assault), each craft carrying about 30 men. The small craft were to go in abreast in waves and touch down at regular intervals along the length of the assault beaches. Following them were to be larger craft carrying heavy weapons, guns, tanks, and engineer equipment. Finally, LST's (landing ships, tank) were to nose onto the beaches and disgorge additional men, equipment, and supplies. Naval fire-support plans emphasized neutralizing enemy positions rather than destroying them. The air forces planned to maintain an umbrella of fighter planes to protect the ground and naval units from German air attacks and also to provide air bombardment to help the ground forces overcome obstacles impeding their progress ashore.

Long before the day of invasion, called D-day, the air forces had begun to play a significant preparatory role. Since 1942, British and American airmen had bombed military targets in German-occupied Europe, but no clear directive or over-all plan had existed before the combined bomber offensive directed by the CCS at Casablanca in January 1943. The targets of this offensive were the German industrial and economic systems and the morale of the German people. The Americans favored daylight precision bombing to destroy critical sectors of German industry. Believing daylight bombing too costly, the British favored night bombardment aimed at destroying entire industrial and military areas. Each operated according to its own doctrine, both concentrating on submarine construction yards, airplane factories, transportation systems, oil plants, and other war industries. In October 1943, attempts were first made to coordinate the bombings from North African and Italian bases with the combined bomber offensive from the United Kingdom.

In April 1944, Eisenhower took control of the strategic air forces and used them in support of Overlord. Though the over-all mission of destroying the German military and economic system remained, the particular mission was to deplete the German Air Force and destroy the facilities serving it, to destroy the German oil industry, and to disrupt rail communications, especially those that might serve the Germans in moving reinforcements to the Overlord lodgment area. Heavy air attacks in May 1944 shifted to bridges over the Seine, Oise, and Meuse rivers, and by June Allied air attacks had weakened the railroad transportation system in France to the point of collapse.

French Resistance

	World War Two French Propaganda Posters

Contributing toward the disruption of the railroads and highways in France were the efforts of the French resistance, a movement that had sprung up spontaneously after the surrender of France in 1940. As early as that year a headquarters established by Gen. Charles de Gaulle in London formed a special staff which was charged with organizing, directing, and supplying resistance units. For more than two years this agency worked to amalgamate the autonomous resistance groups. The culmination of its efforts was the formation of a National Resistance Council, which met for the first time in Paris on May 27, 1943, under the presidency of Jean Moulin. Representing not only the main resistance groups but also the principal political parties, the council recognized de Gaulle and his London headquarters as trustees of the French nation, responsible for founding eventually a French government based on democratic principles. De Gaulle's personal representative, Moulin, became the political leader of the resistance, and the National Resistance Council created an underground army organized on a regional basis. In the following month the Gestapo smashed the organization by making wholesale arrests. Moulin died under torture, and the leadership was decimated. The result was the decentralization of the resistance and its concentration on sabotage and paramilitary action.

Beginning in November 1940, the Special Operations Executive (SOE) , a British organization, encouraged, directed, and supplied the French resistance. Operating under the minister of economic warfare, the SOE eventually had the aim of developing the resistance into a strategic weapon that could be directed by Allied headquarters against military objectives in accordance with a master plan. The SOE therefore set up and maintained communications between London and resistance centers in France, parachuted agents into the country beginning in the spring of 1941, and dropped such supplies as explosives, small arms, flashlights, and radios. In 1942 the SOE parachuted 17 radio operators and 36 other agents into France.

At the beginning of 1943, when the Germans put into effect a forced labor draft in France, thousands of young Frenchmen, particularly in central and southern France, rebelled. To escape the draft, they formed maquis bands to conduct guerrilla warfare against the Germans and the collaborationist French Militia. The SOE assisted by increasing the amounts of supplies dropped into France. The American Office of Strategic Services (OSS) began to take part in the underground movement at this time by sending its own agents into France in cooperation with the SOE. The London headquarters of the OSS was fused with the British agency in January 1944, when American planes also began to fly supply missions to the resistance.

In the fall of 1943, COSSAC took responsibility for directing those aspects of the partisan and underground movements on the Continent insofar as they related to invasion plans. SOE and OSS operations came under the control of COSSAC and eventually under General Eisenhower's headquarters, SHAEF. Because it was hard to assess resistance strength, because German arrests could suddenly emasculate the movement, and because control of resistance activities was difficult and uncertain, the Allied planners decided to regard resistance help as a bonus rather than trying to use it to gain strategic objectives. Consequently, the underground army in France, numbering about 200,000 men, confined itself to gathering and transmitting intelligence information and performing sabotage in war industries, against railroads and canals, and against telephone and telegraph facilities. Accelerating its sabotage in 1944 against German troops and supply trains, the resistance cut tracks, destroyed bridges, and damaged locomotives in a campaign closely attuned to the Allied air offensive.

In late May and early June, in order to regularize the resistance activities, General de Gaulle, with the blessing of the Allied leaders, established a headquarters and staff in London for the French Forces of the Interior (FFI), with Gen. Joseph P. Koenig in command. The FFI then became a component of the Allied armies under Eisenhower, the supreme Allied commander. To link the resistance groups in France more closely to the Allied command, so-called Jedburgh teams ( consisting of a French and an American or a British officer, plus a radio operator) were parachuted into France in uniform shortly before D-day. About 87 teams were operational in France at one time or another. Though it is difficult to evaluate the effectiveness of the resistance, there is no doubt that it was a moral as well as a material force that contributed to the eventual defeat of the Germans.

German Forces

On the German side, Adolf Hitler exercised direct control over military operations. He was the supreme commander in chief of the armed forces (Wehrmacht). His staff was the High Command of the Armed Forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht or OKW ), headed by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel. Under OKW, in theory, were the Air Force High Command (Oberkommando der Luftwaffe or OKL), headed by Reich Marshal Hermann Goering (Goring); the Navy High Command (Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine or OKM), under Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz (Donitz); and the Army High Command (Oberkommando des Heeres or OKH ) headed by Hitler. In actuality, OKH directed the Russian campaign, while OKW was responsible for western Europe.

Navy Group West and the Third Air Fleet controlled naval and air forces in western Europe. The ground force field command was the Oberbefehlshaber West (OB West), which acted somewhat like a theater headquarters under Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, the commander in chief in the west, who operated under Hitler's close supervision. The operations staff of OKW, the Wehrmachtfuhrungsstab (WFSt), under Col. Gen. Alfred Jodl, was the direct agent between OB West and Hitler. Rundstedt controlled two army groups: Army Group G under Col. Gen. Johannes Blaskowitz, responsible for the Mediterranean (Nineteenth Army) and Atlantic (First Army) coasts of France; and Army Group B under Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, charged with defending the Channel coast with the Seventh and Fifteenth armies.

The chain of command that operated at the time of the invasion was Hitler, who made his wishes known through the WFSt of OKW (Jodi), to OB West (Rundstedt), to Army Group B (Rommel), and then to the Seventh Army, which was responsible for defending the lodgment area designated by the Overlord plan as the objective of the invasion force.

The steady drain of the eastern front left the Germans in France with two kinds of units, old divisions that had lost many good men and much equipment, and new divisions that were either of excellent combat value or were only partially equipped and trained. In June 1944, Rundstedt had 58 combat divisions, of which 33 were static or reserve divisions classified for limited defensive employment, 24 were well trained and equipped, and 1 was still being equipped. All the infantry divisions were committed on or directly behind the coast under one of the four armies or the armed forces commander in the Netherlands. The Seventh Army controlled Brittany and most of Normandy; the Fifteenth Army, the Pas-de-Calais.

The command in western Europe had its peculiarities. Rundstedt, for example, had no command over the Third Air Fleet, which was directly subordinate to OKL. The aircraft in France were too few in number for decisive effect; of the 400 fighter planes based in France, only half were operational because of shortages of spare parts, fuel, and trained pilots. Nor did Rundstedt control Navy Group West, under OKM, even though the destroyers, torpedo boats, and smaller naval vessels were based in ports within his jurisdiction. The air force had administrative control over parachute troops and antiaircraft artillery units; the navy controlled most of the coastal artillery. In addition, two military governors, one in France and the other in northern France and Belgium, were under OKH, though their security troops could be appropriated by Rundstedt to repel an invasion. Rommel, the Army Group B commander, was under Rundstedt, but Rommel's dominant personality and his prerogative of direct communication with Hitler, a prerogative enjoyed by all field marshals, gave him an influence greater than that due his formal command authority.

Rundstedt favored maintaining a mobile reserve to be rushed to the invasion area when the main landings were recognized. Rommel, believing that Allied air superiority would prevent the movement of a mobile reserve to the landing beaches to repel the invaders, depended exclusively on fortifications near the water's edge. Thus Rommel directed much of his efforts to building coastal defenses. He favored a large number of simple, field-type defenses over a few complicated and massive fortifications. He emphasized the use of mines, underwater obstacles, stakes, Belgian gates, tetrahedra, and hedgehogs in the hope of entangling the Allied troops as they landed and making them vulnerable to those who waited at the shore to repel them. Rommel's construction and minelaying required considerable labor. Because Organization Todt, the construction agency of the German Army, was employed chiefly in major port fortress areas and on railroad maintenance, the troops themselves worked on the Atlantic Wall in 1944, in many cases to the detriment of their training programs.

By the time of the invasion a new weapon was ready to be put into operation. This was the air missile called the V-1, for Vergeltungswaffe (vengeance weapon). From the Pas-de-Calais area the Germans would begin on June 13 to launch these flying bombs against England and its civilian population as a reprisal for Allied air attacks on German cities. In September, the V-2, a deadlier supersonic rocket, would be introduced.

Deception Plan

One of the vital elements of the invasion was the erroneous German expectation of landings in the Pas-de-Calais. Believing that a number of Allied divisions in the United Kingdom belonged to "Army Group Patton," the Germans concentrated a strong Fifteenth Army in the Pas-de-Calais, the coastline nearest to England and the area in western Europe closest to the classic invasion routes into Germany. The Allies nourished this belief by a gigantic deception plan designed to convince the Germans that Overlord was only part of a larger invasion effort. Naval demonstrations off the Channel coast, false messages, dummy installations, and other signs of impending coastal assault kept the Germans in a continual state of alert and alarm and immobilized the considerable force of the Fifteenth Army.

The Allied hoax continued well beyond the Overlord invasion. Early in July, the designation of the United States First Army Group was changed to the Twelfth in order to retain in England a fictitious headquarters that the Germans might think capable of launching another invasion. Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair, commander of the Army Ground Forces, who was visiting the European theater, was placed in command of the fictitious army group. Later, when McNair was killed while observing the battle in Normandy, Lt. Gen. John L. De Witt was rushed to England in order to give continuing verisimilitude to the Allied deception measures. When the Third Army was committed on the Continent, Patton's name was at first kept secret for the same reason. Eminently successful, the deception maneuvers fooled the Germans for nearly five months. During the invasion and the subsequent battle for Normandy, when the Germans could well have used reinforcements from the Pas-deCalais area, the Fifteenth Army remained untouched and immobile, awaiting an invasion that never came.