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DDay The Invasion Of Normandy Essay Research

D-Day: The Invasion Of Normandy Essay, Research Paper


When on D-Day-June 6, 1944-Allied armies landed in Normandy on


the northwestern coast of France, possibly the one most critical event


of World War II unfolded; for upon the outcome of the invasion hung


the fate of Europe. If the invasion failed, the United States might


turn its full attention to the enemy in the Pacific-Japan-leaving


Britain alone, with most of its resources spent in mounting the


invasion. That would enable Nazi Germany to muster all its strength


against the Soviet Union. By the time American forces returned to


Europe-if indeed, they ever returned-Germany might be master of the


entire continent.


Although fewer Allied ground troops went ashore on D-Day than


on the first day of the earlier invasion of Sicily, the invasion of


Normandy was in total history’s greatest amphibious operation,


involving on the first day 5,000 ships, the largest armada ever


assembled; 11,000 aircraft (following months of preliminary


bombardment); and approximately 154,000 British, Canadian and


American soldiers, including 23,000 arriving by parachute and glider.


The invasion also involved a long-range deception plan on a scale the


world had never before seen and the clandestine operations of tens of


thousands of Allied resistance fighters in Nazi-occupied countries of


western Europe.


American General Dwight D. Eisenhower was named supreme


commander for the allies in Europe. British General, Sir Frederick


Morgan, established a combined American-British headquarters known as


COSSAC, for Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander. COSSAC


developed a number of plans for the Allies, most notable was that of


Operation Overlord, a full scale invasion of France across the English


Channel.


Eisenhower felt that COSSAC’s plan was a sound operation.


After reviewing the disastrous hit-and-run raid in 1942 in Dieppe,


planners decided that the strength of German defenses required not a


number of separate assaults by relatively small units but an immense


concentration of power in a single main landing. The invasion site


would have to be close to at least one major port and airbase to allow


for efficient supply lines. Possible sites included among others, the


Pas de Calais across the Strait of Dover, and the beaches of Cotentin.


It was decided by the Allies that the beaches of Cotentin would be the


landing site for Operation Overlord.


In my opinion, the primary reason that the invasion worked was


deception. Deception to mislead the Germans as to the time and place


of the invasion. To accomplish this, the British already had a plan


known as Jael, which involved whispering campaigns in diplomatic posts


around the world and various distractions to keep German eyes focused


anywhere but on the coast of northwestern France. An important point


to the deception was Ultra, code name for intelligence obtained from


intercepts of German radio traffic. This was made possible by the


British early in the war having broken the code of the standard German


radio enciphering machine, the Enigma. Through Ultra the Allied high


command knew what the Germans expected the Allies to do and thus could


plant information either to reinforce an existing false view or to


feed information through German agents, most of it false but enough of


it true-and thus sometimes involving sacrifice of Allied troops,


agents or resistance forces in occupied countries-to maintain the


credibility of the German agents.


Six days before the targeted date of June 5, troops boarded


ships, transports, aircraft all along the southern and southwestern


coasts of England. All was ready for one of history’s most dramatic


and momentous events. One important question was left unanswered


though: what did the Germans know?


Under Operation Fortitude, a fictitious American force-the 1st


Army Group-assembled just across the Channel from the Pas de Calais.


Dummy t

roops, false radio traffic, dummy landing craft in the bay of


the Thames river, huge but unoccupied camps, dummy tanks-all


contributed to the deception. Although the Allied commanders could not


know it until their troops were ashore, their deception had been


remarkably successful. As time for the invasion neared, the German’s


focus of the deception had shifted from the regions of the Balkans


and Norway to the Pas de Calais. The concentration of Allied troops


was so great, that an invasion of France seemed inevitable. Bombing


attacks, sabotage by the French Resistance and false messages from


compromised German agents all focused on the Pas de Calais with only


minimal attention to Normandy. Also, German intelligence thought that


the Allies had 90 divisions ready for the invasion (really only 39),


so that even after the invasion of Normandy, the belief could still


exist that Normandy was just a preliminary measure and the main


invasion of the Pas de Calais was still to come. None of the German


high command in France doubted that the invasion would strike the Pas


de Calais. The F? hrer himself, Adolf Hitler, had an intuition that


the invasion would come to Normandy but was unable to incite his


commanders to make more than minimal reinforcement there.


Due to weather complications, the first step in the invasion


began a day late, on June 6 around 12:15 am. An air attack on


Normandy. The Germans saw the airborne assault as nothing more than a


raid or at most a diversionary attack. As the airborne landings


continued, Field Marshal von Rundstedt nevertheless decided that even


if the assault was a diversionary attack, it had to be defeated.


Around 4:00 am, he ordered two panzer divisions to prepare for counter


attack, but when he reported what he had done to the high command in


Germany, word came back to halt the divisions pending approval from


Hitler. That would be a long time coming, for Hitler’s staff was


reluctant to disturb the F?hrer’s sleep.


For the following 12 hours, Allied forces landed on five


beaches defeating with minimal casualties, the German defenses. It was


4 pm on D-Day before Hitler at last approved the deployment of the two


panzer divisions. Allied deception had been remarkably effective and


because Hitler had been sleeping and was then slow to carry out any


action, German power which could have spelled defeat for the invasion


had been withheld. The rest of the armoured reserve in France-five


divisions-and the 19 divisions of the massive Fifteenth Army in the


Pas de Calais, stood idle feeling that the main invasion was still to


come.


The next day, after word reached Hitler that German troops had


found copies of U.S. operation orders indicating that the landing in


Normandy constituted the main invasion, he ordered the panzer reserve


into action, but Allied intelligence was ready for such an emergency.


Through Ultra the Allied command learned of Hitler’s orders, and


through a compromised German agent known as Brutus, it sent a word


that the American corps orders were a plant. The main invasion, Brutus


reported, was still to come in the Pas de Calais. Hitler canceled his


orders.


Had Allied commanders known of the near-bankruptcy of troops


on the German side, they would have had more cause for encouragement.


The Seventh Army (German defense of Normandy) had thrown into the


battle every major unit available. The commander of the Seventh Army


was reluctant to commit any forces from the West (Brittany) to the


invasion, fearful of a second Allied landing. Meanwhile, most German


officials-their eyes blurred by Allied deception-continued to believe


that a bigger landing was still to come in the Pas de Calais.


In my opinion, the primary reason that the invasion worked was


deception. D-Day was a tremendous achievement for British, Canadian


and American fighting men, but it also owed an immeasurable debt to


Ultra and to the deception that Ultra made possible.

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