[dragoon500ly]

deleting this post as evidence of why I should never use a Blackberry while traveling by air...

This thread originally started as a comment on humorous episode in 1945, thanks to Admiral Lee, I’ve set back and started thinking about the level of Eisenhower’s leadership and strategic insight in the ETO. I think that I can say, without fear of contradiction, that his initial role as Commander In Chief Mediterranean did not go well. His lack of prior leadership positions (in the interwar years, he was a staff officer) certainly impacted his role in the North Africa campaign. Far too many opportunities were lost. Not only was this a reflection of Eisenhower spending too much of his time on the political aspects of his CinC position, it also reflected the horrible level of training and experience that was prevalent through out the units under his command, especially when thrown into combat against veteran German formations. The result was a foregone conclusion. It was only later, as he got rid of ineffective leaders and combat experience began to impact tactics, that his soldiers were able to begin to face the Germans on near equal footing.

The performance of the Allies in Sicily showed the growing maturity of the American Army and while not perfect and still riddle with many mistakes, the Sicily campaign showed Eisenhower’s growing capabilities as a leader.

Operation Overlord was Eisenhower’s finest showing yet. The initial pre-Ike COSSAC plans called for a three division landing in Normandy and built upon the horrible lessons of Dieppe. With the appointment of Eisenhower to SHAEFE and the assignment of Montgomery to command the assault, the plans were boosted to encompass a larger five division landing. Perhaps Eisenhower’s greatest failing of the Overlord operation include the weak pre-landing bombardment, the use of strategic bombers in a tactical role (ignoring the simple fact that the heavy bomber crews were not trained for this role) and his instance on the use of strategic bombers to cut the French rail network to shreds, instead of allowing them to complete their assaults on the German oil production/storage facilities. Coupling this with his tendency not to second-guess his operational commanders, especially Bradley and Montgomery, resulted in a slower and much more costly breakout from the beachheads. While the bocage played a significant part in the delay, it was the focus on the training for the assault landings and the lack of focus on the impact of the hedgerow fighting that played such havoc on the Americans.

The only advantage to the weeks of hedgerow fighting was to wear down the defending Germans, here the impact of the devastation of the French rail network paid off for short term gains by forcing German reinforcements and supply convoys into long road marches, at the mercy of Allied air superiority. As the front line forces loss more and more personnel and equipment and received less and less supplies, the advantages of the Allied ability to resupply and reorganize their battered formations gave them a critical advantage. By the time of Operation Cobra, Allied superiority finally allowed the breakout from Normandy and set into motion the Battle of Falaise.

In the operations to encircle and destroy the Germans in the Falaise Corridor the failings of Eisenhower’s style of leadership can be most seen. His failure to push the British-Canadian forces in the north and the American forces in the south to complete the encirclement, allowed significant numbers of Germans to escape to fight again another day. True they suffered horrendous losses in equipment, but the Germans would be able to make up significant numbers of that lost equipment by the end of 1944.

In the pursuit phase of the operation, the ability of the Allies to get just enough supplies forward to allow their columns to move that extra twenty miles played holy havoc on the German attempts to reorganize. It was only when the logistic tail started to grind to a halt as the Allies approached the Belgian and German borders that the Germans gained enough time to start reorganization. Here Eisenhower’s orders to destroy the French rail network came back to haunt him as the Allies were forced to rebuild the network almost from the ground up…this forced the Allies to adopt such expedients as the Red Lion/Red Ball Express to field supplies by truck towards the front lines. While a fantastic miracle of improvisation, by the end of 1944, the wear and tear on the Allied truck fleet and the increasing distance from the D-Day ports/beaches slowed the Allied advance to a near crawl.

One of the greatest mistakes of the European fighting took place around the port of Antwerp. While Montgomery was able to seize the port before it could be demolished, he neglected to clear the long approaches to the port of their protective coastal artillery batteries, which also prevented Allied minesweeping efforts to remove the naval mines blocking the approaches to the port. Instead, Montgomery focused on being the first to cross the Rhine River, at Arnhem. While Eisenhower did request the 21 Army Group to clear the approaches, Montgomery was allowed to override this order so that he could launch Operation Market-Garden, the largest airborne operation of the war so far. His plan called for a corps thrust up what was essentially a two-lane hardtop road, with much of the road built upon dike. Utterly dependent on the seizures of critical bridges, Market-Garden was doomed to failure before it was even launched. The only gain from this operation was a salient leading nowhere and thousands of needless losses.

Eisenhower’s failure to manage his subordinate commanders also reached into the U.S. Army as Bradley started a series of assaults into the Hurtgen Forest. Here several divisions were thrown into head-long attacks into prepared defenses that resulted in these divisions being bled white in return for little or no gain.

Having walked the terrain of the Hurtgen Forest, including the infamous Kall Trail, all I can say about this was that Bradley should have been relieved of his command. It is quite evident that little or no reconnaissance of the terrain was undertaken, and the requirement to use, what can be kindly described as a steep, over-grown, dirt goat track as the main line of advance and later as a divisional supply route (that was also completely overlooked by a German-controlled ridge) was proof that the commanders involved were negligent in their duties.

The Battle of the Bulge is rightly claimed as the greatest battle that the U.S. Army fought in World War Two. Here the U.S. Army showed its worst and greatest traits. Eisenhower’s role in managing battle was to allow Bradley to manage the initial fighting and then, as the Germans advanced to the River Meuse, to select Montgomery to command the northern shoulder. This decision was highly unpopular with U.S. commanders. Looking back, it was the correct decision. Bradley’s placement of his Army Group headquarters so far forward, led to the endangerment of his communications with his troops on the northern shoulder. What else could have been done?

As the war entered 1945, Eisenhower’s Broad Front strategy, so cursed by Patton and Montgomery the year before, finally began to pay off as the Germans, suffering brutal losses were forced to defend everywhere, with fewer troops and equipment. The crossings of the Rhine River and the encirclement and defeat of Army Group B crushed the last hopes of a German defense in the West . While pockets of Heer, SS, Luftwaffe and Volkstrum units fought on, there was little doubt that the war would soon be over.

Overall, Eisenhower’s genius was not such as his handling of the military strategy, certainly he let many opportunities to inflict greater losses on the Germans slip through his fingers. His genius, instead lay in managing the Allied forces and controlling his collection of prima donnas and keeping them focused on the key objective, the defeat of Nazi Germany. Could a MacArthur have managed to do so well?