[Legbreaker]

I think you're close to the truth there Web. At least it's as good a theory as any other and appears to fit the evidence quite well.

Something else to keep in mind is that Nato were not prepared for the offensive, having being essentially dragged into the war by Germany. Many of the Nato divisions, particularly US units, weren't even deployed to Europe until well after the commencement of hostilities.

This early phase of the war was fought essentially on peacetime stocks and with units who'd basically grown complacent. Nobody really expected to enter into WWIII (even though they'd been training for it for decades), so when reality struck them in the face, it took time to react appropriately.

It is my opinion that while on paper the participant units were strong, the reality was a bit different. This is not to say they didn't perform well, just that they could have performed much better given a few more months warning, preperation and training.

And then there's the lack of France in the alliance, not to mention Italy basically switching sides. Units tasked in the prewar plans to offensive actions suddenly had to be retasked to holding the flanks or attacking regions previously assigned to the French, possibly without adequate numbers of maps, etc.