Operation Overlord: The Invasion of France, 1944
Copyright © 2006, Henry J. Sage

Strategic Plan for Overlord: Map

Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, commonly referred to as D-Day, was the largest amphibious operation ever conducted and perhaps the most complicated military maneuver ever undertaken. The mere numbers are staggering:

• The Allies landed 156,000 troops in one day, including 73,000 Americans, on the beaches and dropped 15,000 airborne troops behind enemy lines;
• Operation Neptune, the naval component of D-Day, involved 7,000 vessels, including 4000 transport ships, 1200 warships, countless small landing craft and about 200,000 personnel;
• Air support for the invasion involved 11,590 aircraft;
• The airborne (parachute and glider) drops involved 2395 aircraft and 867 gliders of the RAF and USAAF.
• Hundreds of thousands more military and civilian personnel supported the operation throughout the Allied nations, including underground workers in France.
• By D-Day + 5, June 11, the Allies had landed 326,547 troops, 54,186 vehicles and 104,428 tons of supplies.

Planning for the Normandy operation had been going on for months. General Dwight D. Eisenhower was in overall command of the Allied forces. British Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery was in command of the Allied land forces. General Omar N. Bradley commanded the American forces. General George S. Patton's Third Army was held out of the initial landings, partly as a ruse and partly because of his behavior problems which irritated General Eisenhower. (General Patton had made a troublesome public speech about postwar issues that had reverberated all the way back to Congress, even after General Eisenhower had cautioned the outspoken general about such things.) The Third Army landed several weeks later and assisted in the Allied breakout from the Normandy beachhead.

German commanders were Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. Prior to the invasion the Allies had engaged in extensive counterintelligence operations by creating a large volume of false radio traffic and even going to the extent of creating phony assembly areas on the ground packed with dummy vehicles and weapons. German intelligence had never been quite sure exactly where the landings were to take place, and the foul weather preceding and following D-Day contributed to their suspicion that the Normandy landings were not the real thing.  The German staff in Berlin was so uncertain about the scope of the Normandy landings that they failed to notify Hitler until hours after the invasion had begun.

The actual operation began just after midnight on June 6, 1944, when British and American airborne forces landed behind the German defenses known as the Atlantic Wall on the Cherbourg Peninsula. At daybreak the US First Army and British Second Army as well as Canadian, Polish, and French troops stormed the beaches of Normandy. The landings for the most part went more smoothly than had been hoped, but the V Corps of the First US Army on Omaha Beach met fierce resistance, though they managed to get a foothold about one mile deep by the end of the first day. Map of D-Day

From an editorial in the Washington Post, June 6, 2007:

On the day before the invasion of France, the supreme allied commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, wrote a note to be read in the event of the mission's failure and put it in his wallet. It said simply, "Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based on the best information available. The troops, the air and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.”

...We were pleased to see, from the Internet, that Eisenhower's brief note of June 1944 is now part of lesson plans offered for many students. It would be a good lesson for their elders as well, some of whom might even want to put it in their wallets.

When General Eisenhower received the first reports of the landings, his main concern was linking the American units that had landed on Omaha and Utah beaches and connecting them with the 82nd and 101st Airborne divisions, whose drops had been widely scattered. Eisenhower visited with the British and American ground commanders regularly and established a headquarters in Normandy early in July. Allied efforts were aided by the fact that the successful allied counterintelligence operations had led the Germans to believe that the Normandy invasion was not the main assault, with the result that an entire German army was held in reserve for several weeks.

While British forces tied up the main German resistance in the Caen area throughout June and early July, the American forces consolidated their hold on the Cherbourg Peninsula, since the port of Cherbourg was needed for the unloading of supplies.  In July the American forces were ready to attempt a breakout from the positions they had gained since D-Day. General Patton's third Army had been moved into France, and the American First and Third Armies were reorganized for tactical advantage. By late July the Allies were well on the move toward Paris.

As the American armored units which consumes huge quantities of ammunition and fuel continued to drive the Germans back, keeping the advanced combat units supplied remains a huge challenge.  Special motor transport units were established with trucks of fuel and supplies being driven virtually nonstop by teams of drivers who were organized into a unit known as the “Red Ball Express.”  The fact that American units were filled with bright young men was varying skills was a positive factor in solving various logistical and technical problems.

One example of American ingenuity came to the fore when it was discovered that tanks often had difficulty traversing irrigated agricultural areas because of lack of traction.  A young engineer in the ranks suggested that much of the defensive material on the beaches which had been dismantled by engineers could be used to solve the problem by welding onto the sides of the tanks strips of metal which would dig into the turf and give the tanks better traction.

Also apparent during the massive offensive was the force of matériel supplied by American factories.  Countless tons of ammunition and spare parts, vehicles, weapons, communications equipment and every other conceivable item needed for soldiers in battle arrived in huge quantities. An apocryphal story told of the incident of a German counterattack which had briefly captured at American position.  A German intelligence officer noticed a package containing a birthday cake which had been mailed to a soldier from his family.  Furious at the implication he demanded to know of his commander how Germany could hope to win a war when they were running short of fuel while the Americans could manage to get a fresh birthday cake to the front lines in a matter of days.

Tensions existed from time to time between General Montgomery and the American commanders, and General Eisenhower often found himself acting as referee in what can be described as politico-military squabbles.  Not only did he have to deal with strong-willed, hotheaded generals such as George Patton, he also had to deal with the French forces under General Charles de Gaulle. Eisenhower's initial plan had called for the bypassing of the city of Paris because it had no strategic or tactical significance.  General de Gaulle, however, had other ideas, and thus the assault was reorganized to include the recapture of Paris, which occurred on August 25, 1944.

The rapid advance of the American and British forces in August and September, 1944, lead to shortages in critical supplies, especially gasoline.  Armored vehicles and trucks were consuming minions of gallons and transporting it strains the resources of the quartermaster troops to their limit.  As the Allies study plans for the advance toward the Rhine tensions once against arose as different commanders put forth plausible plans for the advance.  The difficulty while others that there were not enough supplies to go around and General Eisenhower was faced with the problem of deciding where to allocate resources.  He was in a no-win situation, for no matter who received the lion's share of ammunition and gasoline, complaining was sure to follow.

Into the month of October various strategies were considered and as occurred frequently major units underwent reorganizations to take advantage of the abilities of the different divisions.  As winter approached the Allies settle down to prepare for the final assault on Germany itself.

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