Now an Army Group Commander who really impressed the H**L out of me was Black Jack Pershing. For example, of all the senior commanders in WWI, Pershing was the only one that was a general officer prior to the outbreak of the war. He was also a trained lawer.
These two items alone allowed him to out maneuver every attempt by the British to have the AEF ship over only riflemen and machinegunners; their stated desire was to use these troops to reinforce the depleted British divisions,following the 1916/17 battles. They were to serve under "experienced British officers" The problem is looking over the histories of the period, one is left wondering just how many experienced British officers had not been killed or wounded following the battles of the Somme and Ypres to name two particulary bloody diasters.
Pershing wanted to field American divisions, under American command. And there was unholy hell to pay when it became apparant to the British that the Americans were not going to turn over their troops to British command. When reading British histories from the post war period, one is left with the impression that the Americans were idiots, commanded by cowards and fools incapable of the simplest staff work. Every American victory was achieved at tremendous cost and only because of superior British cooperation by taking pressure off the Americans where there any successes...
The stand of the 3rd Division on the Marne and the counterattack by the 2nd Division at Belleau Woods gave notice to the Germans that the "green" Americans were well trained and aggressive. To be certain, losses were heavy when attacking the entrenched Germans; but to be brutally honest, every other Allied nation that had attacked dug-in Germans had suffered worst losses.
The difference was that the Americans were cracking the German defenses. When the Germans launched their sudden counter-attacks, the Americans were holding and then launching their own counter-attacks. They were taking the hard, bloody lessons of the previous years and learning from them.
By the end of the war, the German High Command regard the Americans as their most dangerous foe.
Throughout the American involvement, Pershing guided the AEF, protecting it from the Allies and leading it through its campaigns. In the post war years, certain British historians made it a point to slam Pershing for every decision he had made. But the greatness of Pershing is that he won, defeating the Germans on the field of battle and the British in the hallways of power. And there are damn few commanders who can make that boast!!!
