Operation Overlord D-Day Normandie

[doogal]

spaatz under tedder was instructed some time prior to the landings to aim at the rail system and its junctions :on dday the combined fighter and fighter bomber forces flew constant in land / target of oppurttunities thou a haevy programme due to possible miss drops from 5am -9am alhougt the section of coast had been hit as part of a pre-arranged strategy.
It seems hard to imagine the heavies off loading the men are working ashore?


doogal

looking for pen pals on this subjecty

[Carl Schwamberger]

Concur with Carl that miscommunication didn't help. OTOH I believe 9th A/F was pretty well tapped out with the tasks they had on the morning of D-Day - they certainly couldn't have handled all five beaches. Remember, there were an awful lot more hys available in England than there were mdms and lts.

Maybe the 9th AF was at it limit. I'd have to examine the resources and pick over the target lists and the mission assignments for some time to see if anymore efficiency could be wrung out. In practical terms that is. There were all sorts of techniques that could have doubled the power of Allied air support, but actually implementing those for Neptune is problematic. ie: retraining 8th AF aircrew in medium level bombing techniques may have been impractical that spring

On a tangent it would be interesting to compare the efficiency of the 9th vs the 8th AF in terms of bombs on target and destruction to the target.

[Carl Schwamberger]

It seems hard to imagine the heavies off loading the men are working ashore?


doogal

looking for pen pals on this subjecty

Someone imagined it, hence the instruction to avoid bombing the approaching assualt boats.

[Delta Tank]

Carl and all,

The unit that bombed Utah Beach flew parallel to the beach because they knew that the paratroopers were beyond the beach, so any bombs dropped long could possible land on friendly troops. The 8th AF heavies did not have that problem to contend with, therefore they could fly parallel to the beach or perpendicular, they chose perpendicular. Bombing altitude, IIRC, the 8th AF Heavies flew high because it was safer. They could of flown parallel and lower, that is below the clouds, so that they could see the target, but they chose not to.

Mike

[Carl Schwamberger]

I've heard that one before. Also that the paralle bomb run ensured more hits on beach positions. The other reason surfaced was the flight routes had to be more or less north to south to prevent massed aircraft formations from intersecting.

[HMan]

Still if you dont change any of those items a better result could still be had by doubling the NGF time to an hour and increasing the intensity of the fires. Why that was not done may have had something to do with the inexperience of Bradley & some key 1st Army staff, and perhaps with the ability of the naval commanders to provide the ships.

Bradley had experience in N. Africa and Sicily, so I wouldn't call him inexperienced. At least for US COs in
the ETO, AFAIK. Or was there some CO that would have been better?

[Sheldrake]

Still if you dont change any of those items a better result could still be had by doubling the NGF time to an hour and increasing the intensity of the fires. Why that was not done may have had something to do with the inexperience of Bradley & some key 1st Army staff, and perhaps with the ability of the naval commanders to provide the ships.

Bradley had experience in N. Africa and Sicily, so I wouldn't call him inexperienced. At least for US COs in
the ETO, AFAIK. Or was there some CO that would have been better?

Gosh zombie thread comes shambling through the deserted mall of Good Friday morning.

Four points

#1 The German defences were based around a network of concrete emplacements designed to fire in enfilade along the beach with the seaward side protected by a metre of reinforced concrete capable withstanding a hit from a 1000lb bomb. Nothing in the armament of the allied navies or air forces of 1944 was capable of destroying positions, except by luck. An extra hour's naval bombardment or even a repeat strike by the 8th AF was not going to destroy the defences. The purpose of the bombardment was to Neutralize the defences - i..e. keep the defenders heads down to allow small combined teams of infantry and engineers to get close and personal with the defenders. The bombardment strength was calculated in 1943 on the baseline of the bombardment that worked at El Alamein.

#2 There was no strategic or tactical or surprise on D Day, but there was sufficient operational surprise to prevent the Germans deploying their reserves in time to prevent the landings succeeding. The German high command expected the allies to land in 1944 somewhere between Cherbourg and Ostend. The questions was exactly where and when- and where should the Germans position their reserves. The German troops on the beaches were alert - which is what the Allied planners had expected since Dieppe. It was not possible to sneak thousands of troops at night ashore anywhere. Operationally the landings were a great surprise. The deception plan and combination of scattered airborne landings and a dawn seaborne assault confused the Germans.They could not identify where to send the powerful armoured reserves or whether, even they were looking at the main attack or a diversion. Delaying the landings to allow the navy an extra hour ofnaval gunfire,might have made it easier for the Germans to work out what was happening.

#3 The Assault landings were not supposed to take place with as little fire support as happened. The 8th and 9th AF should have been attacking the beach defences in the hour before H Hour. The decision by Ike to launch the assault despite poor weather meant that a 1000yd safety margin was applied to heavy bombers, which dropped most of their bombs inland.

#4 The assault landings on D Day were a great success, achieving a permanent lodgement with much lower casualty rates than either expected or suffered by comparable operations, such as Saipan a week later. This left historians and the media scratching around looking for a contraversial angle to sell books, TV advertising and newspapers.

[Delta Tank]

To all,

I just don’t understand why the US Navy didn’t send more bombardment ships. Two light cruisers in the Brooklyn or Cleveland Class would or could of made a world of difference at Omaha Beach. A Brooklyn Class cruiser had 15 six inch guns and a Cleveland Class cruiser had 12 six inch guns.

Mike

[Delta Tank]

To all,

And another thing! Why didn’t the bombardment ships get closer to their targets! The closer the better, you can see better, your weapons are more accurate.

Admiral Richard L. Conolly, aka “close in Conolly”. “He gained the nickname "Close-In Conolly" from his insistence that fire support ships should be extremely close to the beach during amphibious assaults. Conolly believed that strong fortifications could be neutralized only by direct hits, which could only be achieved from the shortest possible range.[1]” (from wiki)

Mike

[yantaylor]

The three beaches in British and Canadian sector were relatively successful, Utah was also a success, well almost, mainly down to landing on the wrong beach which turned out to be less defended. Omaha was a bad spot but I suppose it needed taking and fair enough to the US troops who landed there, as the 29th was a green division but they got the job done in the end. Not sure if some of the Rangers got diverted to Omaha due to the weather.

For me the two main mistakes made on Omaha was there was not enough of Hobart’s Funnies to equip the US landings and there was failures in the air bombardment.

But as some one said earlier, a lot of allied casualties were down to divisional artillery and mortars because these field pieces and medium mortars were zeroed onto the beach before hand and I am sure that these weapons used all their ammo doing this job and struggled to get re-supplied, which gave the Americans breathing space.

Has anyone else heard of this ammunition problem? Or am I wrong here.

I am sure that one of two ships tried to get as close to Omaha beach as they could without beaching, this was after reports that things had gone pair shaped and it was turning out to be a blood bath.

Yan.

[Delta Tank]

Yantaylor,

Yantaylor wrote this: “For me the two main mistakes made on Omaha was the refusal to use Hobart’s Funnies and the failure of the air bombardment.”

The US Army did not refuse the funnies!! This has been covered on this Forum many times. Richard C Anderson, devoted a chapter in his book to this lie. Here is the title of the book: Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall: The 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers on D-Day Hardcover – December 16, 2009

Mike

[Delta Tank]

To all,

Funnies. https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic ... s#p2085031

Mike

[yantaylor]

I apologize Mike, we didn't have enough, so I shall amend my post. I don't have Richards book and I don't remember that thread.
But the bombers still missed

[Delta Tank]

Yantaylor,

Yup the bombers missed, and of course I have heartburn with that also.

Mike

[yantaylor]

Hi Mike.
I am going to Normandy in July on a tour, it is a 60th birthday present from my missus.
I am looking forward to visiting Juno beach as my father landed here with the Canadians, apparently his LAA regiment was attached to the Canadian forces.
My uncle was a commando and he landed on Sword beach.

Yan.