Operation OVERLORD (1944)

Beachheads of Normandy

The fateful battle for Europe is joined by sea and air


Americans crawl ashore through gun and artillery fire onto a French beach. Many were knocked down by the waves, lost their guns and ammunition.

The weather was not good for invasion last week along the coast of Normandy. Rain soaked the streets of the lovely old city of Caen, capital of the Norman Empire, and splashed against the gray walls of the cathedral at Bayeux. Along the beaches from Cherbourg to Le Havre fog blew in with the west wind.

But in spite of the heavy surf, troops and supplies came in by sea as paratroops and glider-borne infantry came by air to drop inland. Whenever the skies cleared, if only for an hour, Allied planes attacked the German airfields, railroads and troop concentrations. By the end of the week, the American beachhead at the mouth of the Vire had been consolidated with the British beachhead to the west of the Orne, Bayeux and Isigny had been captured and there was heavy fighting near Caen. Within four days after the first landings, U.S. Thunderbolts and RAF Spitfires were flying from airfields in France.

By week’s end, too, the first strategic objectives of the campaign had emerged. The Allies were trying to take Cherbourg as fast as possible. According to the Germans, from whom most news of the actual fighting was still coming, the Allies had made three new tank landings and had dropped paratroops near Lessay in an attempt to sever the Cherbourg Peninsula. Meanwhile, also according to the Germans, who threatened to stop giving out news unless the Allies gave out more news, the Allies were fighting east of Montebourg, less than 15 miles could be crossed, the Allies would have one of France’s best ports – used extensively by Americans in the last war – where supplies could be landed and whence an attack on Paris could be mounted.

While the weather was still had, the whole attack, supplies and all, moved slowly. Gen. Montgomery, field commander for the U.S., British and Canadian armies, moved his headquarters to France. Gen. Eisenhower called a council of war on a battleship off the French coast. By prearrangement, Gen. Marshall, Gen. Arnold and Adm. King turned up in London to get a closer look at what was going on. The fighting grew more desperate, the tempo of thrust and counterthrust more furious. Caen held out stubbornly against British attacks. The success of the invasion was still not certain. The Germans had 50 divisions at their disposal in France and their Luftwaffe had still not thrown in its strength, whatever its strength might be. The Allies had other armies to throw into the battle for Cherbourg or into landings on other beaches along the invasion coast.

The pictures were taken by LIFE photographer Robert Capa who went in with the first wave of troops. Although the first reports of landings indicated little opposition, his pictures show how violent the battle was and how strong the German defenses. His best pictures were made when he photographed the floundering American doughboys advancing through the deadly hail of enemy fire to goals on the beaches of Normandy.


The first wave of U.S. assault troops race through boiling surf to the beach. From the higher ground tapping machine guns have brought down several men in the water. This landing was one of the U.S. seaborne attacks made on June 6 between Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue and Isigny.


Troops crouch behind shallow-water obstacles installed by Germans. Tanks out of camera field to the right move up to silence German fire. These men waited for second wave of boats, then followed the tanks up the beach. Two landing craft may be dimly seen at left.


Crawling through the water, U.S. soldier edges toward the beach. Immense excitement of moment made photographer Capa move his camera and blur picture. The Germans were still pouring machine-gun and shellfire down on the beach, apparently from concrete pillboxes.


Men in the second wave also take cover until all their boats have come in. Behind them men are jumping into water to their necks. Their heads can be seen just above surface. Combat engineers cleared lanes through obstacles farther offshore so that boats could get in.


Thin black line of invasion force assembles on the beach for push against German positions on heights, obscured by haze and battle smoke. Men pause on beach to get water out of their equipment and to make sure that another wave is following so they will not be cut off.


Loaded with four vehicles, a U.S. LCT cruises easily toward shore. Plume of white smoke drifting across beach is from smoke shells laid down by naval guns to screen landing forces outlined against the smoke at right is an LCT (Landing Craft, Infantry).


The scene of battle was overhung by dark, heavy clouds, dirty weather, which hampered Allied air cover, whipped up six-foot waves in the Channel. During the crossing, many of the men became violently ill. But despite their illness, they were quietly and effectively heroic. The ships shown in this picture are only the forward fringe of enormous armada which carried the landing force to France. Larger craft offshore were unloaded by smaller boats. Some were unloaded by giant “rhino” rafts made of rectangular steel chambers bolted together.

Casualties

Ships bring back wounded and dead


In Coast Guard LCT, medical officer, wearing two bars on his big Navy-type helmet, prepares to give transfusion to crewman hit by German shell fragments.

After photographer Capa made the acutely real landing pictures which appear on the preceding five pages, he left the hazardous beach in a Coast Guard LCT which was evacuating the wounded and dead to a hospital ship standing offshore. As he waded out to get aboard, his cameras were thoroughly soaked. By some miracle, one of them was not too badly damaged and he was able to keep making pictures. The excitement was not over by a long shot.

As Capa’s LCT pulled away from the beach, it was hit three times by shells from German shore batteries. Several of the Coast Guard crew were killed and others seriously wounded. The boat began to list badly, but it managed to get back to the hospital ship. There, most of the wounded were taken off, despite the list and heavy seas. One man, however, was too seriously hurt to be moved, and it was necessary for a medical officer to give him a plasma transfusion on the spot. As he prepared to do this, Capa snapped the picture shown above. The next picture, showing a few of the first men to fall in the invasion of Europe, was made by Capa after he had boarded the hospital ship.


The first dead of the invasion, shrouded in white bags, are laid in neat rows on the deck of a U.S. hospital ship, which takes them back to English graves.

Although the extent of the U.S. casualties in the Normandy landings has not yet been announced, they were generally lighter than expected. The wounded have received magnificent care. The evacuation chain set up by Maj. Gen. Paul R. Hawley, head ETO surgeon, appeared to be working smoothly. Invasion reporters who never got to France at all found a minor epic in the return of the wounded to English ports on the day after the first assault. Some of them walked off the ships, with their uniforms torn and their bandages hastily applied, but swiftly and safely carried out of the battle zone. Others came on stretchers carried by Negro litter bearers, their personal belongings piled beside them. some carried their boots, with French sand still clinging to the soles, on their litters. Many spoke of fine work done by medical men on the beaches. Said one man, “They’re right in there, giving morphine and bandaging wounds while the bullets whiz past their ears.” Another report told of a difficult abdominal operation performed in a pitching LST under improvised lights.

Three wounded Canadians chose an unorthodox but astonishingly simple method of getting themselves to a hospital in England. According to a dispatch to the New York Times, they walked out of a dockyard to which they had been brought and hailed a taxi. Their leader, Lt. C. R. Bond of the Royal Canadian Navy, said to hospital attendants, “We’re back from France.”

The big days

Sudden storms and sudden death shook history’s greatest armada
By Charles Christian Wertenbaker


From air, the landings looked like scale model with LCTs (left and top), smaller LCTs (upper right), ducks (center). Tanks, vehicles are mounting road at right. Bottom object seems to be armored truck with raised apparatus for bridging barbed wire. A pillbox is on fire at bottom.

By cable from U.S. Force HQ ship in the English Channel –
D-Day minus three was a clear, mild day with a fresh breeze blowing in the Channel from the west. Aboard this ship, the USS Acamar (a false name), there were quiet, intense preparations for directing the battle ahead. AA and machine-gun crews were briefed; there was a general-quarters drill during the afternoon. Ship’s officers collected signatures on brand-new 100-franc notes which, with luck, would be their mementos of the invasion.

Every half hour or so, tank landing ships and infantry landing craft would appear around the headland to the east and glide toward us. The boats joined a swarm of similar craft. Each boat fitted closely against the next, as if for security, so that in the mass they lost all identity and became a floating island of men and metal. Only the movement of a hand or face showed that it was not all metal.

Late in the afternoon, the mass began to break apart; each boat became a boat again, and each man a creature with arms, body and head, and a brain to keep all together. The boats, hundreds of them in single file, moved to anchor. It would not be long. In all the ports, boats were moving, gathering, and along the coast, caressing the shore, one convoy of a thousand big and little ships was already on its way to a beach in Normandy.

At midnight, Gen. Eisenhower and his staff were studying the weather reports. For some days, they had known that a low-pressure area was moving eastward in the Atlantic but the weather experts had expected it to turn north before it reached the Channel. Instead, the gale had come straight on, with another slighter blow behind it. This was probably the hardest decision Gen. Eisenhower ever had to make. Perhaps he remembered the Spanish Armada and the disaster that overtook it. At any rate, sometime before dawn he chose the cautious course. At 5:45, the Acamar’s radio buzzed: “Stand by for important message.” Just before 6:00, the message came: The invasion is postponed for a minimum of 24 hours.

The landing boats scurried back. A brace of destroyers went barking after the thousand-ship convoy that was bearing toward Normandy with its radio sealed. All around the coast of England, ships, big and little, on missions, big and little, had to slow up or turn around, the greatest armada in history broke up before it was assembled.

D-Day minus two

Sunday, June 4, was a day of decisions perhaps more difficult to make than the one that had delayed the start by 24 hours. Because of the tides, there were only three days in early June when the invasion could begin. They were the 5th, 6th and 7th. The 5th had been picked for D-Day because on this day at 6:00, the tide would have been a little more than halfway between ebb and flood – that is, high enough to land fairly well up the beaches and on sand instead of mud, and low enough to land before the first series of beach obstacles were reached. Not for two more weeks, until June 19, 20 and 21, would a similar series of conditions again prevail. And so, on this Sunday, the decision to be made was whether to invade on Tuesday or Wednesday or whether to postpone the invasion for a fortnight.

All day Sunday, it blew a gale, churning up the water even where the Acamar and the command ship of Adm. Alan G. Kirk and Lt. Gen. Omar Nelson Bradley were sheltered. At 1:30 that afternoon, Gen. Bradley visited his headquarters ship to check reports and plans. The naval officers at the meeting wanted 48 hours to reassemble their forces. Gen. Bradley was in a hurry. Finally, Adm. Kirk agreed that he could be ready for Tuesday. The British were also ready. H-Hour was moved back by half an hour in the new tentative plan. Gen. Eisenhower promised a tentative decision by evening, a final, decision by 6:00 in the morning.

By evening, the new plans were worked out. By evening it was pouring rain. The wind whipped spray over the open boats and the rain blotted out the faces of the men in them. Some of them were ending their fifth day in the boats. “They’re pretty tough by now,” said an officer watching them through glasses, “but I’ll bet they’ll be glad to hit the beach.” “The poor sons of bitches,” said another, “they’re lucky to be where they are.”

Around 9:00, the gale had blown itself out and the smaller one following it was not so much feared. The forecast: clear Tuesday morning, with weather closing in by evening. That would be good for the airborne landings, for the air bombardment, for observation for the naval bombardment.

D-Day minus one

Monday morning at 6:00, the final confirmation came. The day was cloudy and cold. The staff officers looked at the sky, shrugged and put their trust in the weatherman. A sleepy colonel said, “Win, lose or draw – and there ain’t no draw – they can’t call it off now, thank God.”

By late afternoon, the command ship was gone. The small boats were gone. One by one the destroyers left the harbor. At 10:00, when the clouds broke and the low sun shone across the water, the harbor was almost empty. Then, gathering her flock of small boats around her ad with two destroyers shepherding the flock, the Acamar, last big ship to leave, set out under full steam for the invasion of France.


Two ducks and two halftracks towing 37mm anti-tank guns are already on beach, as men carrying Springfield rifles prepare to debark from LCVP.


Some seriously hurt wait to be evacuated. Foreground, an emergency first-aid kit and a Mae West.


Dead Americans end their adventure on a cobble-stoned beach of Normandy, probably toward the end of the peninsula. The worst casualties were taken in first half hour on beaches. German casualties included a surprising number of prisoners, few of them of first-line quality.


In the tall grass behind the beach, Americans seek cover while in the background tanks advance on a shelled house that was probably a Nazi strongpoint.


Truck moves over road completed by U.S. engineers and covered with mat while ahead the engineers detonate mines.

D-Day

Tuesday, June 6, the invasion began almost exactly on schedule at 30 minutes past midnight. That was the time when airborne troops began landing by parachute at six hours before H-Hour, the actual moment of land attack. At the instant, the first parachutist lowered his head and fell toward the earth of Normandy, U.S., British and Canadian Armies had afloat or in the air some thousands of men and thousands of vehicles.

Landing on the western beach in the target area went well; by 7:30 a.m., one hour and a half after the sixth hour of the sixth day of the sixth month of the year 1944, two regiments of infantry and some tanks were ashore. On the eastern beach, waves were higher, obstacles more stubborn and the enemy prepared; a fresh division had been rushed there a few hours earlier. On this beach all tanks were swamped. The entire beach was under enemy fire and on most parts of it boats could not unload. Not until early afternoon did the first waves get off the beach and begin to spread out in the high ground beyond the bluffs.

From the sea, most of the larger warships were moving toward the beach that needed support. Dense smoke rose where the B-17s had taken care of the enemy battery, firing straight down the length of the western beach. But off the eastern beach there was a steady thunder of heavy naval guns firing, and on shore smoke rising from the beach and the bluffs behind. Beyond a dim church steeple stretched the gray beach spotted with boats and vehicles, and beyond that green fields and towns.

At two places where landing parties had found exits from the beaches, destroyers standing in close to the shore were pouring fire into the valleys beyond the exits and enemy guns were firing in the valleys themselves. On either side of the valley heavier ships crashed broadsides deep into the interior. Their guns spat orange flame. The air seemed to tremble as they fired.

On into the night destroyers stood inshore firing intermittently. From the enemy also came sporadic shelling while the engineers on the beach worked to clear some of the wreckage. On the beach, fires flared and died down. Out beyond the line of destroyers hundreds of ships lying at anchor were dark and silent under a cloudy sky. At 11:30 that night, enemy raiders came and the night was lit with bomb bursts and with tracers firing into the clouds. One ship, hit, flared brilliantly for no more than five minutes, lighting the whole eastern sky, then suddenly went out. Shortly after midnight, three raiders fell slowly flaming into the sea.

D-Day plus one

After less than five hours of sheer night, lighter streaks low in the sky showed where the moon was. The horizon appeared again and by ones and twos and dozens and scores the great flotilla appeared. Warships made black silhouettes like those printed in Jane’s Fighting Ships, and the smaller craft were at first mere blobs of black. Then all became clearly visible, down to the guns of the warships and the men aboard the landing craft nearby waiting for the moment of landing. The first Flying Fortresses appeared and, as the light grew, the obstacles on the beaches stood out sharply in the queer pre-dawn pink that make dark things darker. From the shore still came the sounds of shelling and of rifle and machine-gun fire as the first 24 hours of the invasion ended.

In the full light of day, you could look down from a bluff through the opening of the river valley at the beach spread out below. It looked like a great junkyard. Fro, the water’s edge at low tide to the high-water mark were landing craft, some impaled on obstacles, blown by mines, shattered by shellfire and stranded by the ebbing of the tide. Among them, following a narrow path from the water to the valley’s edge, moved a line of sound vehicles and a company of men just landed. As they passed, some of the men turned to look at the wreckage through which they moved: there was a bulldozer with its guts spattered over the sand, and another with its occupants spattered, an arm here, a leg there, a piece of pulp over yonder. There were discarded things all over the beach: lifebelts, cartridge clips, canteens, pistol belts, bayonets, K-rations. Behind the beach, across a wide, deep tank ditch half full of water was the casemated German 88 that had caused much of the wreckage. A clean shell hole through the steel shield of its narrow opening showed how it had been put out of action.


Echoes of World War I speak in pictures of Americans in France passing dead Germans…


…and stopping in a town (below) beside a Romanesque church. But these are paratroopers, a spectacular innovation of World War II. At right below is a Shell gasoline station.

By the afternoon of D-Day plus one, the battle of this beachhead was already the most desperate of the invasion. The Germans had set up machine-gun positions atop the bluffs; and these, with ingeniously concealed batteries, had raked landing parties. Casualties of some of the assault forces had been high. Now most of the beach was still under shellfire. The intermittent hammer of machine guns made another sector untenable and only in two places could forces be brought ashore. They were needed quickly – especially artillery and artillery observation planes – for it was inland from here that Rommel was expected to make his first counterattack.

From the bluff you could see beyond the beach almost 12 miles to sea, and all this expanse of water was filled with boats. There were, by a quick rough count, 665 vessels lying offshore, from the large transports on the horizon to the small landing craft near the beach. About five miles out lay the cruisers and battleships. Pumping salvos of high explosive into the enemy batteries inland. Yet in spite of their noise, and sharper sounds of enemy shells and our demolition charges on the beach, in spite of the wreckage and movement of men and machines across the beach, you could not fail to see the beauty of the scene to seaward. The Channel was as blue as the Mediterranean, and as still. In the blue, cloudless sky above it floated hundreds of silver barrage balloons, twinkling in the sunlight.

A narrow, dusty road twisted up from the beach to the bluff. Up it wound a column of men and vehicles. They moved slowly over the steel road and past signs saying “Achtung, Minen,” keeping to the road, to the top. There, overlooking the beautiful seascape with its twinkling balloons, was a cluster of large mass graves, and near them were men digging fresh ones. Beside the road, a single soldier lay full-length on his face, his arms stretched above his head in an attitude of repose, a bullet hole through the top of his steel helmet. Behind the bluff to the right was a field hospital, where the slightly wounded were lying on the ground before the tents. The smell of ether crossed the road. There were several French women working in the hospital, but they were too busy to talk.

The poppies were bright

There were bright red poppies and some yellow flowers in the field near the hospital but dust was beginning to cover them over. Behind the hospital was a barbed-wire enclosure already packed with prisoners of war. Nearly 500 had come in by Wednesday afternoon, and more were on their way down from the forward units. Most of them were under 20 or over 40; they were well-fed, well-shod and fairly well-clothed; and all wanted water. A captain explained to a guard that they had been drinking local water for two or three years and they saw no reason to wait for the chlorinated water the Americans drank. The guard gave the captain a drink. Many of the men were not Germans, but Poles and Balts and Russians who had been put there to die in the first assault while the crack German divisions assembled farther behind. But the officers were German. All of them looked stolid and resigned, and even the youngest ones seemed to have lived longer than their captors.

Along the road inland from the bluff, columns moved forward in the dust. Above a mile and a half inland was a regimental command post, on a road at the edge of a thicket. This regiment had come ashore at 2:00 of the previous afternoon, D-Day, and so far, had seen only light fighting. The worst things were snipers and mines, said the regiment’s colonel. Those machine guns which had moved up to the bluff just before the attack had slipped back into the thickets and into farmhouses and were sniping at the roads. There were also many concealed riflemen, and another officer said he had fund snipers in a house all dressed like Frenchmen and speaking French. Mines were small antipersonnel mines that blew off a leg, and they were everywhere. The colonel wanted to know if there was any news from the Russians and looked disappointed when there was not.

There were some French people on the road, going back whence they had been evacuated when we took the village. They were very old, or children. One old man was swathed in bandages from the waist up. They all shook hands when they were spoken to in French, but none of them would stop to talk when they might be getting home again, and all of them cared more about getting home than about anything else.

Late in the afternoon, a regiment that had been resting beside the road moved up to attack with the rest of its division. But the battle of this beachhead was still being fought on the beach itself, and the battle was now as much against time as it was against the Germans. Troops and tanks and artillery moved ashore slowly through the wreckage and mines and shelling, and for miles offshore landing craft were waiting to get into the beach. Just before sunset, warships increased the tempo of their shelling and bombers dropped load after load on the places where the enemy artillery was thought to be, but still the enemy shells found their targets. Engineers fought all night against time and by dawn had cleared two more exits from the beach. More forces moved ashore. Whether they would be in time to meet the expected counterattack, no one knew.


The western coast of Europe offered many landing places. Cherbourg Peninsula, riven by the valley of the Vire, was chosen because it commands the two best harbors – Cherbourg and Le Havre – between Brest and Rotterdam. The arrows show five Allied beach landings plus the raids, reported only by the Germans, on Guernsey and Jersey Islands and on the Calais district. Left arrows are mainly American; the right three mainly British. The Germans had long advertised that they expected invasion here. Hilly terrain is broken by small rivers cutting sharply through wooded farmland. Invasion has followed Vire and Orne rivers so far. The Seine still protects Le Havre, which will later become an objective if Cherbourg is cut off and taken.


The beachhead, as reported at week’s end, is shown in white on north coast of Normandy. The sea landings are indicated. Plane arrows show where the paratroopers and gliders are supposed to have landed in the continuing airborne campaign, by far the biggest such in the history of warfare. The main railway lines are shown. Allies had repeatedly cut line to Cherbourg at Bayeux, Carentan, and Sainte-Mère-Église. Germans claimed 20 Allied divisions opposed 10 German of the 7th and 15th Armies. Allied bombings pounded 25 German airfields in a 150-mile circle around the beachhead. Germans claimed to have identified 1st, 4th and 29th U.S., 7th and 9th British Armored, 50th British and 2nd and 3rd Canadian Divisions.


“Elsie” fleet (nicknamed from LC, or Landing Craft) sets out. In foreground is a box pontoon barge propelled by outboard motors. Pontoons can be fitted together to make dock. They bridge the water from ships to shore.


Men play cards on their way to France. They had each been given 200 francs to spend, but many lost the money before arrival. Said one, “I’ll borrow from Hitler.” One heavily armed soldier had a sign on his back, “Danger – Mine field.”


Protected by its own barrage balloons, invasion armada speeds along. In it were 4,000 ships, plus thousands of smaller craft. There were battleships, torpedo boats, submarines, minesweepers, cruisers, carriers and all kinds of landing ships. More of them were British than American.


The men listen to landing instructions. Before sailing, each soldier was given chewing gum, boxes of matches, a box of body insecticide, pipe, cigarette and chewing tobacco, water purification tablets, 12 seasickness pills and two vomit bags.


A box-pontoon barge is loaded down with trucks, tractor cranes, command cars and troops. Each vehicle has a name – Filthy Flora, Axis Doom, No Cum Chum, Adolph’s Answer, Ten Shilling Annie, For Ladies Only.


Under blankets two soldiers crawl to get out of the spray. As it usually does, the Channel made most of them queasy. Accordingly, they lost the meal of pork chops and plum pudding they had eaten on top of bacon and eggs before embarking.

Völkischer Beobachter (June 20, 1944)

Einer Gegen sechs Stahlkolosse –
Hitler-Jugend in der Bewährung

pk. Über der Küste der Normandie wogten die grauen Wolkenpakete eines trüben Junitages. Seit die Landungsboote von der britischen Insel herüberkamen und die Flugzeuge mit den Kokarden des Feindes Truppen absetzten, mischte sich auch der Rauch von Brand und Explosionen in den windgetriebenen Wirbel des tiefen Himmels. Das Lärmen von Granaten mit Abschuß und Einschlag, die von hüben und drüben ohne Sparsamkeit versandt wurden, war in der Luft und schwellte auch in den Stunden der kurzen Frühsommernächte nicht ab.

Zwei junge Grenadiere von der SS-Panzerdivision „Hitler-Jugend“ saßen irgendwo im Raum von Caen im selbstgegrabenen Deckungsloch. „Ihr habt hier gegen feindliche Panzer zu sichern,“ hatte der Sturmführer gesagt, der selbst die Einweisung vornahm. „Vor uns müssen welche stecken, also seid auf der Hut.“

Seitdem begrenzte die Welt der beiden, achtzehnjährig der eine und drei Monate älter der andere, eine jenseitige Hecke. Daß es dahinter noch etwas gab, Wiesen, Gebüsche und ebensolche Hecken, war ihnen klar, und das Poltern der Granaten aus Geschützen und Werfern, das Bersten der Bomben und das Morsen der Maschinengewehre verrieten es ja auch deutlich genug. Aber für die beiden Soldaten waren die Hecke vor ihnen und der Weg, der am Panzerdeckungsloch vorbei dorthin führte, jetzt die einzige Geographie. Man mußte in diesem Bezirk höllisch aufpassen und sich tarnen, weil es das Leben galt.

Minuten, vielleicht aber auch Stunden saßen die beiden Jungen im Erdloch. Zwischendurch schielten sie mal zu einem Luftkampf hinauf, der sich mit milchigen Kondensstreifen in den mittlerweile aufgeklärten Himmel grub. Aber die Hecke gegenüber blieb natürlich unter Kontrolle. Vögel, die der Schlachtenlärm immer wieder aufscheuchte, huschten dort aufgeregt ein und aus. Sonst aber blieb es ruhig, bis…

Ja, bis sich die Zweige auseinanderbogen und die Stirn eines gewaltigen britischen Panzers daraus hervorlugte.

Was sich nun im Deckungsloch der beiden jungen Soldaten ereignete, war das eigentlich Heroische, mehr vielleicht, als die Tat selbst, die sich anschloss.

Wie es drüben in der Hecke raschelte, flüsterte der eine: „Still jetzt, sie kommen. Siehst du, dort steht einer.“

Der Kamerad hatte ihn längst schon erspäht. – „Ich werde ihn anspringen.“ – „Nein, lass es mich tun.“ – „Du nicht, du kannst das nicht so und…,“ er suchte nach einer Begründung, „und dann musst du auch an deine Mutti denken.“ – Wirklich: er sagte „Mutti,“ der Junge.

Sie geschah in jenen Sekunden, diese hastige Zwiesprache, die sonst dem Schreck Vorbehalten sind. Nicht Ehrgeiz und erst recht keine Angst waren es, an denen Rede und Gegenrede sich entzündeten. Nur Fürsorge, das Einstehen für den Kameraden, regierten den Augenblick.

„Los jetzt. Schieß, so viel du kannst, aber schieß nicht auf mich.“

Der eine stieß sich den Kolben des Maschinengewehres in die rechte Schultergrube. Der andere aber, der Achtzehnjährige, war mit einem Satz aus dem Erdloch. Die Panzervernichtungsmittel unter dem Arm, sprang er den Panzer an, den Giganten des Schlachtfeldes. Er allein, ganz allein, ein Hitler-Junge!

Es war das Werk von Augenblicken, aber eine Tat, die das Leben wog. Sechsmal das eigene und das Leben ungezählter deutscher Soldaten.

Denn als er aus dem Rausch des Kampfes wieder zurückfand, stand der Kamerad daneben und gab ihm mit einem Leuchten in den Augen die Hand. „Die tun keinem mehr etwas!“ sagte er und wies auf sechs große Feindpanzer, an denen die Flammen leckten. Hinter dem ersten waren noch fünf stählerne Ungetüme auf knirschenden Ketten herangekommen. Und jedem von ihnen jagte der junge Soldat das Panzervernichtungsmittel in den Leib. Man muß ein Held sein, um so etwas zu vollbringen.

Hernach auf dem Divisionsgefechtsstand war es wie vorher im Erdloch. Nur sagte jetzt jeder von den beiden nicht „ich,“ sondern „er,“ als der Kommandeur fragte, wer denn eigentlich den Löwenanteil trage. Dann nahm er Eiserne Kreuze beider Klassen und heftete sie den beiden jungen Grenadieren an die Feldbluse. Goldene Panzervernichtungsabzeichen waren einstweilen nicht zur Hand. Hier vorne ist ja die

Munition wichtiger. Darum gab der Kommandeur sechs Einzelvernichtungs-Abzeichen. Sie hätten ihre Pflicht getan und Mut bewiesen, lobte er dann die beiden jungen Soldaten, und weil gerade er, der Ritterkreuzträger es sagte, waren sie sehr glücklich. Alle, die mit dabeistanden, wie er die Bewährung auszeichnete, empfanden es wie eine Feier. Als sie später darüber sprachen, waren sie sich einig: Auf solche Jugend darf, nein: muß der Führer stolz sein.

Kriegsberichter ALEX SCHMALFUSS

Innsbrucker Nachrichten (June 20, 1944)

Schwere Feindverluste in der Normandie

London weiterhin unter Störungsfeuer – Neue Verluste der Invasionsflotte – Harte Kämpfe in Italien

dnb. Aus dem Führer-Hauptquartier, 20. Juni –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

Die Kämpfe in der Normandie verliefen gestern für den Feind besonders verlustreich. Auf breiter Front versuchte er im Raum Tilly-Livry mehrmals mit starken Infanterie- und Panzerkräften unsere Front zu durchstoßen. Alle Angriffe scheiterten. Südwestlich Tilly wurde dabei ein feindliches Bataillon völlig zerschlagen, der Bataillonsstab gefangengenommen.

Auf der Halbinsel Cherbourg fanden keine größeren Kämpfe statt. Der Feind fühlte lediglich mit gepanzerten Aufklärungskräften gegen die Südfront der Festung Cherbourg vor.

Der Raum London liegt weiterhin unter unserem Störungsfeuer.

Heeres- und Marineküstenbatterien zwangen vor der Halbinsel Cherbourg mehrere feindliche Schiffe zum Abdrehen.

Fernkampfbatterien der Kriegsmarine schossen in der vergangenen Nacht im Kanal mehrere Schiffe eines nach Westen laufenden feindlichen Geleitzuges in Brand.

Die Luftwaffe setzte auch in der letzten Nacht die Bekämpfung der Schiffsansammlungen vor dem Landekopf erfolgreich fort. Nach zahlreichen Bombentreffern wurden schwere Explosionen beobachtet.

Bei dem bereits gemeldeten Angriff deutscher Kampffliegerverbände in der Nacht vom 18. zum 19. Juni wurden nach abschließenden Meldungen zwei weitere Handelsschiffe mit 18.000 BRT und ein Zerstörer versenkt. Außerdem wurden ein weiterer Zerstörer, ein Tanker von 8.000 BRT und ein Frachter von 7.000 BRT schwer beschädigt. Eine Fliegerdivision unter Führung von Generalmajor Körte hat sich bei diesen Einsätzen besonders ausgezeichnet.

Über dem Landekopf und den besetzten Westgebieten wurden gestern 29 feindliche Flugzeuge abgeschossen.

Die schwache Besatzung der Insel Elba setzte auch gestern im Nordteil der Insel den Kampf gegen den weit überlegenen Feind hartnäckig fort und brachte ihm schwerste Verluste bei. Sie wurde in der vergangenen Nacht auf das Festland übergeführt.

In Mittelitalien hielten die starken Angriffe des Feindes auch gestern an, ohne daß es ihm gelang, den erhofften Durchbruch zu erzielen. Besonders erbittert tobte der Kampf im Raum von Perugia, wo der Feind in mehreren aus starken Infanterie- und Panzerkräften gebildeten Angriffsgruppen gegen unsere Front vorstieß. Gegenangriffe unserer Truppen brachten die feindlichen Angriffe zum Stehen.

Aus dem Osten wurden außer erfolgreichen örtlichen Abwehrkämpfen südöstlich Witebsk keine Kampfhandlungen gemeldet.

Leichte deutsche Seestreitkräfte beschädigten im Finnischen Meerbusen zwei sowjetische Schnellboote.

Vor der Karelischen Landenge eingesetzte Sicherungsfahrzeuge der Kriegsmarine schossen fünf sowjetische Bomber ab.

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (June 20, 1944)

Communiqué No. 29

Coordinated attacks all along the north front in the CHERBOURG PENINSULA have brought the port under artillery fire. After liberating the town of BRIQUEBEC, Allied troops made further advances toward the village of RAUVILLE-LA-BIGOT.

East of VALOGNES, our troops gained some ground. Another advance reached to within two miles of VALOGNES and cut the road from there to BRIQUEBEC.

Further east, the enemy was once again driven from TILLY-SUR-SEULLES after fierce fighting.

Heavy day bombers attacked the PAS-DE-CALAIS yesterday afternoon striking through thick clouds at the pilotless aircraft launching sites. From this second attack of the day, three bombers are missing. Small formation of medium bombers and fighter bombers also attacked these targets.

In spite of bad weather, light aircraft escorted shipping and patrolled the beaches. Some fighters broke through the cloud screen to bomb and strafe locomotives, motor vehicles, barges and warehouses behind the lines. They encountered intense flak at low level. From these operations, two medium bombers and 15 fighters are missing.


Communiqué No. 30

Allied troops are attacking the outer defenses of CHERBOURG.

MONTEBOURG has been liberated and our forces are on the three sides of VALOGNES, where heavy fighting is in progress.

Our positions in the area of TILLY are firm. Very heavy fighting continued near HOTTOT yesterday.

Bad weather in the battle area limited air operations until midday today.

Fighter-bombers and bombers with fighter escort attacked flying-bomb bases in the PAS-DE-CALAIS area during the morning. Several hits were scored on these and other military installations.

Other formations of fighter bombers hit a bridge over the LOIRE near NANTES, destroyed a railway bridge at GRANVILLE, and bombed rolling stock and motor transport at TRAPPES, southwest of PARIS.

Fighter bombers also successfully attacks railway tracks at a number of places both north and south of CHARTRES. Twelve Fw 190s attempted to interfere with operation. Five of them were destroyed in the air combat for the loss of three of our aircraft.

The Free Lance-Star (June 20, 1944)

CAPTURE OF CHERBOURG BY YANKS IMMINENT
9th Infantry Division now only four miles from port city

Germans fall back on city’s defenses

Where Yanks close trap on Germans

map.62044.ap
Arrows indicate U.S. advances including the breakthrough to the west coast of the Cherbourg Peninsula between Barneville and Saint-Lô-d’Ourville, thereby trapping thousands of Germans to the north. The principal other U.S. gain was a drive east of Vire River to within less than six miles of Saint-Lô.

Bulletin

New York (AP) –
Troops of the 9th Infantry Division have captured Saint-Martin-le-Gréard, four miles from Cherbourg, the London radio said today in an NBC-recorded broadcast.

SHAEF, London, England (AP) –‘
U.S. troops plunged within four miles of Cherbourg late today in an all-out offensive of mounting fury, and also seized Valognes, 10 miles southeast of the great harbor.

The veteran U.S. 9th Infantry Division spearheaded the deepest drive directly south of Cherbourg – a death pocket for perhaps up to 50,000 Nazis – advancing to Saint-Martin-le-Gréard only four miles away.

On the southeast approach to the transatlantic port, other doughboys seized Valognes and pushed a mile beyond, and cleaned the Germans out of bypassed Montebourg, four miles from Valognes.

The Germans were falling back upon the inner perimeter of Cherbourg’s defenses, Associated Press correspondent Roger Greene said in a dispatch from U.S. field headquarters. He added the Germans fell back from Valognes “without attempting a major stand.”

The power drive directly south of Cherbourg carried the 9th Infantry Division battering ram nearly six miles north of captured Bricquebec.

On the eastern coast of the trap tightening steadily on Cherbourg, a U.S. column drive two miles north of Quinéville.

Montebourg, won and lost by the Yanks in bitter street fighting and then bypassed in the push to Valognes, has now been completely occupied, Supreme Headquarters said.

Repulse counterattacks

Toward the eastern flank of the long Normandy front, British forces battling against a wall of Nazi armor struck two miles southwest of Tilly-sur-Seulles and seized Hottot-les-Bagues. Two Nazi counterattacks aimed at retaking the town were beaten back.

U.S. forces on the west coast also made progress north of Barneville, where the first breakthrough was made sealing off the top of Cherbourg Peninsula. Opposition in this sector was reported light.

The Germans have three semi-circular defense lines around Cherbourg, with the biggest stretching out six miles from the port. Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s offensive has pierced deep through this line and has apparently reached the second defense wall.

Air reconnaissance disclosed the Germans have been demolishing the port of Cherbourg and that it is in bad shape, indicating they had given up hope of holding it for very long.

There were indications the Germans were weaker on the western side of the peninsula than in the east.

Heavy aerial blows

The all-out Cherbourg drive was coupled with what happened to be the greatest air effort since the first days of the invasion, and more than 1,500 U.S. heavy bombers bombed targets in Germany and the rocket bomb platforms in the Pas-de-Calais area on the French coast.

Drawing new strength from other sectors of the Normandy beachhead, Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley sent his troops surging northward in what Supreme Headquarters called “coordinated attacks along the entire north front.”

Over the heads of the advancing doughboys, American big guns hurled streams of shells into the great port (France’s third largest), defended by possible 50,000 German troops now caught in the closing Yankee trap.

The deepest wedge was driven into the German ring of fortifications from the southwest. A column sweeping forward from captured Bricquebec, 11 miles below the port, hurled the Germans back to the outskirts of Rauville-la-Bigot, a village between six and seven miles south and slightly west of Cherbourg.

Communiqué No. 29 from Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s headquarters said other U.S. columns to the east were driving forward in twin moves to flak Valognes, ten miles southeast of Cherbourg, after sweeping around Montebourg and cutting off isolated pockets of Germans there.

Wedge widened

The American wedge across the Cherbourg Peninsula is now 16 miles at its widest point and eight miles at its narrowest. Expanding to the north, Gen. Bradley’s Yankees are now racing rapidly toward the main German defense line six miles south of the port.

It was expected that a matter of hours would show the strength of these defenses and whether the Germans can manage to swing the muzzles of the port’s long-range guns from the sea to repel a land attack.

The German-held Channel Islands have guns capable of shooting to the Cherbourg Peninsula at extreme range, but headquarters said there is no reason to believe “they can seriously interfere with the American advance.”

German troops all along the north front were reported apparently badly disorganized. Front dispatches declared many of the high Nazi officers had been killed and, in some sectors, units had been cut to pieces.

No gains were reported in the Carentan area to the south and it seemed apparent that Bradley was content merely with holding actions there while driving all-out for Cherbourg.

The building up of the beachhead forces and supplies was hampered yesterday, however, by a wind of 25 miles an hour which whipped up five-foot waves along the beaches. A 60-mph gale swept the Channel.

1,500 U.S. bombers hit rocket coast

Oil refineries and war plants in Germany also attacked robot bombs continue to fall in southern England

SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
More than 1,000 U.S. heavy bombers, possible the greatest force in history, today simultaneously attacked rocket-bomb platforms in the Pas-de-Calais and an array of objectives in central Germany ranging from oil refineries to airplane and tank plants.

The giant armada equaled if it did not surpass that sent out last Wednesday to attack French airfields, bridges and the Emmerich oil refinery in Germany.

With its big fighter escort, the entire sky fleet totaled upward of 2,000 planes.

The heavy bombers blasted synthetic oil plants and oil refineries around Hanover, Hamburg, Magdeburg and Politz, a tank depot near Magdeburg, and an airplane wing repair and parts plant near Brunswick.

The Germans reported the U.S. fleet was attacked by large formations of fighters and that heavy air battles were fought.

16 land in Sweden

Stockholm reported 16 of the heavy bombers made forced landings at the Malmö Airport.

Returning crewmen said they found clear weather over Germany but were forced to bomb through a cloud cover over the Pas-de-Calais. Today’s giant operation took a part of the fleet more than 550 miles, almost to the Polish border to hit Politz, about 10 miles north of the Baltic seaport of Stettin in far eastern Germany.

While the U.S. bomber and fighting fleet was coursing across Europe and smashing again at the ramps from which Germany’s rocket-bombs are launched, lighter Allied aerial forces swarmed across the Channel in improving weather and renewed the harassment of German forces in Normandy.

Today’s bomber formation was the fifth force of more than 1,000 heavyweights the U.S. Air Force has sent out since D-Day.

The big assault was the third within 24 hours against the Pas-de-Calais area from which rocket bombs continue to stream into southern England today.

The Germans put up a heavy flak barrage over the Pas-de-Calais in defense of their rocket installations.

Luftwaffe grounded

The German Air Force hugged the ground yesterday and last night, however. There were no reports of a German plane being shot down during that period. Allied losses were three heavy bombers, two mediums and 15 fighters – all victims of anti-aircraft fire.

Sharpshooting anti-aircraft gunners and relays of swooping fighter pilots blasted dozens of Nazi robot planes out of the sky overnight and the Allies appeared to be getting the range on this new weapon today, the sixth of the “buzzbomb” blitz.

The Germans tried a handful of comet bombs June 13, but did not set the sustained attacked going until June 15.

In one district alone, four flying bombs were shot down by night fighters within a few minutes. Three exploded in the air in quick succession.

The Germans were launching the robots in no particular order. Sometimes as many as five came over almost together.

In daylight today, the Germans kept winging the one-ton bombs into England at sporadic intervals. The British Air Ministry announced that new and secret measures were being taken to wipe out the cross-Channel attacks.

Home folks warned

As flying-bomb delirium swept Germany, there were indications of increasing uneasiness among Nazi propagandists that the German population was due for a tremendous letdown.

In extolling the new weapon and giving elaborate reports of panic in London, German broadcasters voiced frequent cautions against expecting too much.

Dispatches from some neutral countries reported many Germans now believe Germany will win in Western Europe within the next few weeks and they are singing the “We Are Sailing Against England” song again.

“Please don’t believe in miracles,” warned a Berlin radio political spokesman, Dr. Scharping. “Hard trials are still ahead.”

Trapped Nazis are told to surrender

New York (AP) –
German troops cut off at Cherbourg by the U.S. advance were warned over BBC facilities today that their position was hopeless and that surrender would be their wisest move.

“Any attempt to evacuate you through the coastal waters of Cherbourg Peninsula would be pure suicide,” the Germans were told.

The warning, made in German by a British officer, reminded the Germans that other German troops under command of Col. Gen. Jürgen von Arnim had been trapped by the same U.S. 9th Infantry Division on the Cap Bon Peninsula in Tunisia and had not regretted their decision to surrender.

Estimating their number at 20,000, the speaker said:

I am addressing myself to the German soldiers who have been cut off on the Cherbourg Peninsula.

The warning, as reported to the OWI, then went on to tell the Germans that the American wedge to the sea was being strengthened and that:

The further you are being driven back, the more the pocket in which you are trapped and which is surrounded by the sea on three sides, is being tightened, the more your concentrations of troops and vehicles become vulnerable to bombing and strafing by Allied planes and the destructive fire from Allied naval guns.

New fighter aces bag Nazi rockets

SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
The U.S. 9th Air Force is producing a new type of fighter “aces” among its fliers who have joined the sky patrols waiting to shoot down German rocket bombs.

Mustang pilot Lt. Lewis Powers of Albuquerque, New Mexico, shot down two and shared another with an RAF fighter last night in addition to one he hailed the previous night.

Lt. Powers sighted the first coming in at about 2,000 feet. He dived on it, gave it several bursts and watched it crash.


U.S. gun bags first robot plane

SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
A few seconds after shooting the last bolt into place on a 40mm gun destined for Normandy, an alert U.S. Army maintenance crew used the weapon to bag what is thought to be the first pilotless plane shot down in southern England.

A second hit was scored with the second round after Capt. Albert E. Reuning of Jackson, Mississippi, commanding officer, spied a projectile hurtling toward the field.

Editorial: On to Cherbourg!

By The Washington Post

The success of the American forces in cutting off the Cherbourg Peninsula has placed the enemy on the horns of an extremely difficult dilemma. Two courses, neither of them pleasant, are open to Rommel. On the one hand, he can throw into the Battle of Normandy troops and material he has been saving for use elsewhere. He cannot yet be sure that the landings in Normandy are the only ones planned by the Allies. His actions to date suggest that he is convinced there will be more landings elsewhere. To meet the problem such new landings would create he must keep an iron reserve of the bulk of the 50-60 German divisions in France and the Low Countries. Yet if her fails to reinforce the German troops now being pushed out of the Cherbourg Peninsula or facing annihilation in Cherbourg itself, the position of the Allies will be greatly strengthened.

Much hard fighting may still be necessary to take Cherbourg. But it will be taken, and even if the Germans demolish its port facilities, it will be a great boon to our troops. It will greatly simplify the problem of supply and make possible the deployment of a much larger Allied force in France than has been the case hitherto. Our operations in Normandy have necessarily been hampered to date by the lack of such a first-rate port.

We have much reason to be gratified at what the Allied forces have already accomplished. It is true that we have paid a tragic price for those gains. American casualties during the first 10 days of the Normandy operation amounted to more than 15,000, of which more than 3,200 were killed. Yet these losses represent only a fraction of the losses that were anticipated during the months and weeks while plans for D-Day were going forward. In those days, the idea was seriously advanced in responsible military circles that Allied casualties during the first phase of the liberation might be as high as a quarter of a million or even half a million men. Fortunately, these estimates proved wrong. Considering the enormous difficulty of the task we had to face, our casualties have been very moderate indeed.

Völkischer Beobachter (June 21, 1944)

Sieben Tage Kampf um Cotentin

pk. Hier wird die Chronik der ersten Woche des Kampfes gegeben, den die Kampfgruppe H. südlich Cherbourg zu bestehen hatte.

ERSTER TAG: In den späten Abendstunden des 5. Juni sind zwei Lastensegler, sichtlich verirrt, niedergegangen. Sechs Gefangene werden gemacht, eine amerikanische Pak eingebracht, ehe die Invasion richtig begonnen hat. Kurz nach Mitternacht wird in der ganzen Normandie Alarm gegeben. In den folgenden Stunden häufen sich die Meldungen über das Auftauchen von feindlichen Luftlandetruppen und gelandeten Lastenseglern. Die Kompanien setzten in ihrem Raum überall zu großen Streifen an. Bis zur Landfront von Cherbourg wird das Gelände gesäubert. Die Zahl der Gefangenen und der erbeuteten Waffen nimmt ständig zu. Allmählich werden die Umrisse der feindlichen Pläne erkennbar.

ZWEITER TAG: Bei St. M. ist der Gegner wieder aus der Luft gelandet. Diese Kräfte werden in einem harten Häuserkampf gestellt. Bei N. springt ein feindliches Luftlandebataillon direkt in die Bereitstellungen eines deutschen Bataillons und wird völlig vernichtet. Ein anderes deutsches Grenadierbataillon rieb zwei amerikanische Bataillone auf. Die feindliche Artillerie hat schwerste Verluste, In der Nacht haben die feindlichen Bombenangriffe auf die Städte der Normandie eingesetzt. Die Bevölkerung ist, mit kleinen Koffern ausgerüstet, irgendwohin in den Wald gezogen und kampiert nun im Freien oder hat auf Farmen Unterschlupf gefunden. Die feindlichen Jagdbomber kurven die Straßen ab, schießen auf alles, was sich regt.

DRITTER TAG: Deutsche Fallschirmjäger kämmen das Gelände durch, vernichten feindliche Widerstandsnester. In A. halten sich die Pioniere der Kampfgruppe und eine Batterie gegen den vielfach überlegenen Gegner. Schließlich schlagen sie sich zu den eigenen Truppen durch. Nur der Kommandeur sichert mit zwölf Mann ihren Abzug, Die kleine Gruppe wird von amerikanischen Panzern umstellt. Die Amerikaner zwingen den Pionieroberleutnant K., auf dem Vorderteil eines Panzers aufzusitzen und so fahren sie weiter gegen unsere Stellung. In einem Hohlweg kann Oberleutnant K. entkommen und sich zur eigenen Truppe durchschlagen.

VIERTER TAG: Neuerlich werden Einflüge von Lastenseglern und Transportflugzeugen des Gegners gemeldet. Das Stück Normandie, das er hier besetzt hält, sieht wie eine Zigarrenkiste aus, deren eine schmale Seite auf Cherbourg weist. Über den Städten der Normandie stehen die Rauchschwaden der Zerstörung, Frauen graben wie irr mit bloßen Händen im Schutt. Sie suchen ihre Kinder. Eine klettert mit wirrem Haar und zerfetzten Kleidern durch die Bombentrichter und schreit: „Erschießt mich!“

FÜNFTER TAG: Gegen die Übermacht des Gegners, der all seine Mittel auf diesen Punkt der Küste konzentrieren kann, müssen unsere Soldaten einen schweren Kampf bestehen. Ständig ziehen feindliche Geschwader und Jagdbomber über sie hin. Die Gefangenenlager erhalten immer größere Belegschaft. Ein amerikanischer Hauptmann sagt: „Ich hätte nie gedacht, daß die Deutschen ihre Gefangenen so gut behandeln.“

SECHSTER TAG: Ein Durchbruch in Carentan wird im Gegenstoß mit der blanken Waffe zurückgeschlagen. Der General fragt in einer Bereitstellung der Grenadiere einen Unteroffizier: „Wo stammst du her?“ – „Aus Frankfurt am Main.“ – „Dann weißt du ja, was du mit denen auf der anderen Seite abzurechnen hast.“

SIEBENTER TAG: Bei ihren Angriffen setzten die Amerikaner alle Mittel ein: Panzer, Flammenwerfer; ihre Flieger bemühten sich, unsere schweren Waffen niederzuhalten. Trotzdem werden ihre Angriffe zum größten Teil abgeschlagen. Bei Gegenstößen werden zahlreiche Gefangene eingebracht und große Beute gemacht. Ein Gefangenentransport wurde von amerikanischen Tieffliegern angegriffen. Dabei wurden 28 Amerikaner von ihren eigenen Landsleuten getötet oder verwundet.

Kriegsberichter ERICH PECHER

Landungsschiffe zum Überfall auf Europa

Mit der Notwendigkeit, Landungsunternehmungen schnell und einigermaßen sicher durchführen zu können, hat sich bei den Amerikanern und Engländern ein neuer Schiffbauzweig entwickelt, der sich mit dem Bau von Landungsfahrzeugen verschiedener Art befasst. Die Engländer haben sogar schon vor Ausbruch dieses Krieges besondere Angriffsboote zur Landung von Sturmtruppen hergestellt und auch praktisch erprobt. In großem Maßstab aber haben die Konstruktion und der Bau von Landungsschiffen und Booten erst im Laufe des jetzigen Krieges eingesetzt. Welchen Umfang er angenommen hat, geht unter anderem aus einer Aussprache im amerikanischen Kongress hervor, in der davon gesprochen wurde, zu einer wirklich den großen Erfolg versprechenden Invasion müßten 60.000 (!) Landungsfahrzeuge bereitgestellt werden. Das ist sicher eine der üblichen amerikanischen Übertreibungen, aber weit in die Tausende hinein reicht, wie die Invasion an der französischen Kanalküste zeigt, die Zahl der großen und kleinen Einheiten dieser Schiffstypen mit Sicherheit.

Bei den in Frage kommenden Fahrzeugen unterscheidet man 1. Landungsboote (Landing Craft, Abkürzung LC), 2. Landungsschiffe (Landing Ships, Abkürzung LS) und 3. Transporter mit zusätzlicher Landungsbootausrüstung.

Im Allgemeinen werden die Fahrzeuge so konstruiert, daß das Vorschiff aufklappbar ist. Damit wird erreicht, daß der Inhalt – Mensch, Fahrzeuge und sonstiges Material – nachdem das Fahrzeug auf den Strand aufgelaufen ist, unmittelbar über eine Klappbrücke an Land gelangen kann. Voraussetzung dafür ist sandiger Strand, der das Auflaufen der Fahrzeuge ermöglicht. Die aufklappbare Bugkonstruktion hat den Nachteil, daß sie die Seefähigkeit der Fahrzeuge ziemlich stark beeinträchtigt. Bei den großen Landungsbooten wird unterschieden zwischen Infanterie-Landungsbooten und Kampfwagen-Landungsbooten.

Am stärksten ist bisher das seefähige Infanterie-Landungsboot von etwa 250 Tonnen Wasserverdrängung in die Erscheinung getreten. Es läuft 18 Seemeilen (34 Stundenkilometer) und nimmt bis 250 Mann auf. Der Fahrbereich ist groß, 1500 Seemeilen (2500 Kilometer). Da die Boote über See gehen, hat man – um die Seefähigkeit zu erhalten – auf die Bugklappe verzichtet. Das Ausschiffen der Mannschaft erfolgt über zwei ausfahrbare Fallreepe. Zahlreiche dieser Boote sind bereits bei den Landungen in Italien benutzt worden. Die Überfahrt von den Bauwerften in den USA über den Atlantik haben sie mit eigener Kraft durchgeführt, wobei sie sich anscheinend gut bewährt haben.

Die Kampfwagen-Landungsboote verdanken ihr Entstehen der zwingenden Notwendigkeit, Panzerwagen bei Landungen möglichst schnell ansetzen zu können. Ihr Fassungsvermögen beträgt je nach ihrer Größe von 120 bis 350 Tonnen 3 bis 6 Panzerwagen. Sie laufen 14 Seemeilen (25 Stundenkilometer).

Alle diese Boote sind mit einer Anzahl von 2- und 4-Zentimeter-Flak bewaffnet.

Die kleinen Landungsboote, deren Seefähigkeit naturgemäß sehr beschränkt ist, bewegen sich in den Grenzen von 4½ bis 18 Tonnen. Von ihnen sei das schnelle Mannschafts-Landungsboot (4,5 Tonnen) und das Landungs-Sturmboot (7,5 Tonnen) hervorgehoben. Diese kleineren Boote werden im Allgemeinen auf den Landungsboottransportschiffen herangebracht. Das schnelle Mannschafts-Transportboot wird vornehmlich bei überfallartigen Unternehmungen, in erster Linie bei Nacht verwendet. Ein derartiges Boot kann bei einer Besatzung von 4 Seeleuten 20 Mann Landungstruppen befördern. Das 7¾ Tonnen große Landungs-Sturmboot soll bei Landungen an verteidigten Küsten eingesetzt werden. Es ist mit 5-Millimeter-Panzerung versehen, hat eine Bugklappe und ist je nach Bedarf mit Granat- und Nebelwerfern oder auch mit zwei Maschinengewehren bewaffnet. Bei einer seemännischen Besatzung von 5 bis 6 Mann kann es 35 Soldaten oder 4 Tonnen Material aufnehmen.

Eine besondere Abart der kleinen Landungsboote sind die amerikanischen Amphibienboote. Sie können, obgleich nur 2,5 Tonnen groß, 25 Mann aufnehmen. Ihre Geschwindigkeit an Land beträgt 60 Stundenkilometer, im Wasser jedoch nur den fünften Teil. Diese Fahrzeuge werden auf Kampfwagen-Transportschiffen verladen und über die Bugklappe zu Wasser gebracht. Sie wurden zum erstenmal in Sizilien benutzt. Neben den vorgenannten Landungsbooten, die sich wie das Infanterie-Landungsboot schon zu kleinen seegehenden Fahrzeugen ausgewachsen haben, ist eine große Anzahl von Landungsschiffen für den Transport starker Truppenverbände vorgesehen.

Es lag nahe, in erster Linie die Fährschiffe, die den Verkehr auf den Kanälen und auf engen Meeresarmen betreiben, für die Landungen nutzbar zu machen. Das ist auch in weitgehendem Maße geschehen. Bei bisherigen Landungen sind derartige, für ihre besonderen Zwecke noch verbesserte Fähren eingesetzt worden, daneben aber auch vollkommen neu konstruierte Schiffe, deren Laderaum bis zu 30 Panzern oder eine entsprechende Anzahl von Kraftfahrzeugen aufnehmen kann.

Die Landungsschiffe sollen die Landungsboote in die Nähe der geplanten Ausschiffung bringen. Zu solchen Landungsboottransportschiffen wurden unter anderem auch holländische und belgische Kanalschiffe umgebaut. Das holländische Kanalfährschiff Queen Emma kann sechs bis acht Landungssturmboote, zwei Motorlandungsboote zu je 18 Tonnen und 450 Mann Landungstruppen an Bord nehmen. Zum Teil entwickeln diese umgebauten Fährschiffe Geschwindigkeiten bis zu 25 Seemeilen (47 Stundenkilometer), so daß sie auch schnelle Kriegsschiffverbände begleiten können.

Die Kampfwagen-Landungsschiffe sind neue Konstruktionen, die sowohl in England als auch in Amerika gebaut werden. Man kann damit rechnen, daß sie mindestens 20 Panzer mit sich führen. Der amerikanische Typ kann sogar ein kleines Kampfwagenlandungsboot von 120 Tonnen an Bord nehmen. Die Landung der Panzer erfolgt über die Bugklappe. Die Amerikaner haben gerade von diesem Typ eine stattliche Anzahl gebaut. Sie sind 3.000 Tonnen groß und laufen 16 Seemeilen (30 Stundenkilometer).

Unter den amerikanischen Amphibienfahrzeugen sei noch der in der Presse oft genannte „Alligator“ hervorgehoben. Seine Abmessungen sind: Länge 6,3 Meter, Nutzlast 2.300 Kilogramm, Zuladung 10 Mann. Die sehr wendigen Wagen erreichen im Wasser eine Geschwindigkeit von 10 Seemeilen (18 Stundenkilometer), an Land das Doppelte. Sie wurden zuerst bei den Landungen des amerikanischen Marinekorps in Guadalcanal benutzt.

Vorstehend sind lediglich die am häufigsten genannten und hervorstechendsten Vertreter der Landungstransportmittel behandelt. Darüber hinaus haben unsere Gegner noch viele Abarten der einzelnen Typen entwickelt. Da die deutsche Wehrmacht die Absichten der Gegner kennt und durch die bereits vorliegenden Erfahrungen des jetzigen Krieges auch über die zur Anwendung kommenden Mittel unterrichtet ist, kann man in Deutschland der nun begonnenen Invasion unter Einsatz der modernen Landungsmittel mit aller Ruhe entgegensehen.

Br.

Innsbrucker Nachrichten (June 21, 1944)

Schwere Abwehrschlacht in Italien

Die großen Verluste der Invasionsflotte – Das Störungsfeuer auf London hält an – 58 Terrorflugzeuge abgeschossen

map.062144.dnb

Aus dem Führer-Hauptquartier, 21. Juni –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

In der Normandie wurde der feindliche Brückenkopf östlich der Orne weiter eingeengt. Feindliche Angriffe südwestlich Tilly wurden zerschlagen, 15 Panzer dabei abgeschossen. Angriffe des Gegners nördlich Valognes scheiterten. Gegen die Südfront der Festung Cherbourg fühlte der Feind mit schwächeren Kräften vor, die abgewiesen wurden. Mehrere gepanzerte Spähwagen wurden in Brand geschossen.

Bei den Kämpfen im Landekopf hat sich die Besatzung eines Stützpunktes der Luftnachrichtentruppen unter ihrem Kommandanten Oberleutnant Egle durch besondere Tapferkeit ausgezeichnet.

Das Störungsfeuer gegen London wird fortgesetzt.

Kampfflugzeuge erzielten in der Nacht Bombentreffer auf feindliche Schiffsansammlungen vor der normannischen Küste.

Seit dem 6. Juni versenkten Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine sowie Heeres- und Marineküstenbatterien vor der normannischen Küste und im Kanal, nicht eingerechnet die feindlichen Verluste durch Minentreffer, 2 Kreuzer, 4 Schnellboote, 27 Fracht- und Transportschiffe mit 167.400 BRT und 12 Panzerwagenlandungsschiffe mit 18.300 BRT. Durch Bomben-, Torpedo- und Artillerietreffer wurden 3 schwere Kreuzer, 3 weitere Kreuzer, 21 Zerstörer, 9 Schnellboote, 68 Handels- und Transportschiffe mit 287.000 BRT, 2 Landungsfahrzeuge mit 4.000 BRT und ein Dampfer mittlerer Größe beschädigt.

Auf einer Frontbreite von über 140 Kilometer tobte auch am vergangenen Tage in Mittelitalien die große Abwehrschlacht in unverminderter Stärke. Immer wieder versuchte der Gegner unter scharfer Zusammenfassung seiner Kräfte diese Front aufzureißen. Am harten Widerstand unserer Truppen scheiterten alle Durchbruchsversuche des Feindes. Nach Bereinigung örtlicher Einbrüche war die Hauptkampflinie am Abend voll in unserer Hand. Lediglich im Raum nordwestlich Perugia kamen die Kämpfe noch nicht zur Ruhe. Die blutigen Verluste des Feindes waren besonders hoch.

Während der gestern gemeldeten Rückführung unserer Truppen von der Insel Elba wurden bei der Abwehr von See und Luftangriffen zwei feindliche Schnellboote versenkt, zwei weitere schwer beschädigt und zwei Jagdbomber abgeschossen. Dabei haben sich die unter Führung des Korvettenkapitäns Wehrmann stehenden Kampffähren und die Marineküstenbatterie Piompino besonders ausgezeichnet.

An der südlichen Ostfront, südlich der Smolensker Rollbahn und südöstlich Witebsk scheiterten örtliche Vorstöße der Bolschewisten.

Sicherungsstreitkräfte der Kriegsmarine versenkten am 19. und 20. Juni im Finnischen Meerbusen in harten See- und Luftgefechten fünf sowjetische Schnellboote, beschädigten weitere sechs, von denen ein Teil in Brand geriet, und schossen neun feindliche Flugzeuge ab. Ein eigenes Fahrzeug ging verloren.

Starke nordamerikanische Bomberverbände führten am gestrigen Vormittag Terrorangriffe gegen die Städte Hamburg, Hannover, Magdeburg und Stettin. Es entstanden Schäden und Personenverluste. Luftverteidigungskräfte vernichteten 58 feindliche Flugzeuge, darunter 49 viermotorige Bomber. Weitere 23 viermotorige Bomber mußten nach Angriffen unserer Jäger und Zerstörer auf schwedischem Gebiet notlanden.

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (June 21, 1944)

Communiqué No. 31

Allied troops advancing on CHERBOURG have reached prepared positions defending the deep-water port.

VALOGNES, LES PIEUX, COUVILLE and RAUVILLE-LA-BIGOT have been liberated.

In the TILLY area, three German attacks have been held.

There has been active patrolling on all other sectors of the front.

Flying-bomb sites in the PAS-DE-CALAIS, a coastal battery at HOULGATE and gun positions in the CHERBOURG PENINSULA were targets for medium and fighter-bombers yesterday afternoon and evening.

Other fighter-bombers struck at locomotives, troop trains and railway installations in widespread areas of northern FRANCE. Preliminary reports show that 11 enemy aircraft were destroyed, while four of ours are missing.

Last night, light bombers attacked railway centers at MÉZIDON and CHARTRES and other enemy communications. Night fighters destroyed two enemy aircraft.


Communiqué No. 32

Allied forces have made further progress in the battle for CHERBOURG and the area held by the enemy is steadily diminishing.

Our advance up the entire peninsula has been rapid. On the east, we have driven forward astride the main road north from VALOGNES. To the west a broad thrust has taken us to within five miles of the sea, liberating the villages of TEURTHÉVILLE-HAGUE and ACQUEVILLE.

Heavy fighting continues in the TILLY-CAEN area, where attacks and counterattacks have left the front generally unchanged.

In other sectors, there has been patrol activity.

Dense cloud over the battle area limited air operations this morning. Five flying-bomb sites between CALAIS and AMIENS were attacked by medium and light bombers.

The Free Lance-Star (June 21, 1944)

YANKS FIGHTING INSIDE CHERBOURG
Powerful assault overcomes Nazi defenses in suburbs – full of city due hourly

Possibly 50,000 Germans face surrender or death

Allies press toward Cherbourg

map.62144.ap
Enlarging the wedge driven across the Normandy Peninsula to cut off the port of Cherbourg from the rest of France, Allied forces were reported within a few miles of the city in the vicinity of Saint-Martin. Arrows on map indicate direction of Allied drives.

SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
U.S. troops smashed within 1,500 yards – less than a mile – of Cherbourg’s waterfront today, driving between two fortress bastions under cover of air and artillery bombardment.

The fall of the great supply port seemed only a matter of hours tonight.

The piledriver offensive crashed through the suburbs along the inland road between Fort du Roule and Fort Octeville, Nazi strongpoints shuddering under bombs as well as leaflets calling on the trapped Nazis to surrender.

Nazi demolition squads worked feverishly to cripple the port – through which the Allies could pour a flood of men and supplies into Normandy.

Other advances

Another force rolling the trapped Germans back on the left flank seized Acqueville, at the base of Cap de la Hague, the land finger jutting northwest of Cherbourg and possible offering a chance of escape by sea.

Troops on the right flank advanced beyond Valognes, and Supreme Headquarters declared “good progress” was made toward the prize harbor today.

Supported by powerful artillery and air bombardment, veteran U.S. troops assaulted Fort du Roule, within a mile of Cherbourg’s docks, and Fort Octeville, bastion two miles in front of the military harbor area, blasted by Nazi demolitions.

Last-ditch stand

The Germans staged a last-ditch defense in these strongpoints, and fighting was reported in the built-up suburban section of France’s third largest port.

Eighty Nazi tanks have been destroyed by the Allied liberating armies to date, Supreme Headquarters said.

Heavy fighting was reported in the Tilly-sur-Seulles area near the center of the front, and a U.S. spearhead to the west had pushed within two miles of Saint-Lô, communications hub of Normandy.

The assault upon the two forts at Cherbourg sprang forward from Saint-Martin-le-Gréard, four miles south of the port.

Fort de Roule, a major key to control of the besieged German stronghold, stands atop a 450-foot hill.

The French worked for more than a century building up Cherbourg’s forts and defenses and the Germans are now making a last stand in the inner ring – which embraces part of the city itself.

Smoke hung over the city as the trapped German defenders carried out hurried demolitions in the strategic harbor, now in plain view of the attacking U.S. troops.

Escape cut off

German defenses have stiffened and there are indications the Nazi High command has ordered a house-to-house fight by some 25,000 to 50,000 Germans now left with virtually no chance to escape. Allied broadcasts last night urged the trapped garrison to surrender.

Although the three main roads to Cherbourg from the south run into one main highway bottleneck just outside the city, U.S. troops were apparently closing in from three sides – south, west, and east.

Communiqué No. 31 from Supreme Headquarters this morning announced that the towns of Valognes, Les Pieux, Couville and Rauville-la-Bigot were in Allied hands, but the advance U.S. line runs some distance beyond these points.

The suburban and city area which now has become a battlefield has an estimated population of 60,000. The population of the city proper, according to latest reports, is approximately 33,400 and an additional 27,000 live in the suburbs.

Doubt sea shelling

Despite German reports, the Supreme Command said it has no knowledge that Allied warships were shelling Cherbourg from the sea and declared such an attack was unlikely.

The port is protected by seven heavy coastal forts which should be much simpler to take by land assault than from the sea.

Only patrol activity was reported elsewhere on the Normandy beachhead except in the Tilly-sur-Seulles area.

The British announced the capture of Onchy, three and a half miles southwest of Tilly. At the same time, the Germans launched three heavy counterattacks on the newly-taken British strongpoint of Hottot, two miles south of Tilly. The attacks were reported held, but the situation in the village itself was obscure.

The Caen area even farther to the east was quiet.

A gale continued to blow in the Channel. Six-foot waves whipped over the invasion beaches, making unloading of supplies impossible for the time being.

Bad weather hampered aircraft over the battle area, but fighter-bombers blasted Cherbourg guns and forts. Many of the missions took to the air from landing grounds in Normandy.

German infantry shortage glaring

Gen. Eisenhower’s advanced post, England (AP) –
A glaring shortage of infantry in Normandy has compelled Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt to commit his prized panzer units to the actual line of battle instead of holding them in the rear as a striking weapon, and information reaching Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s headquarters today is that at least 78 Nazi tanks have been destroyed.

Reporters at advanced headquarters have been told that von Rundstedt is now in a position where he cannot bolster his crumbling Normandy defenses without weakening other areas, including Pas-de-Calais and Southwest France.

Sending the panzers into frontline battle, von Rundstedt sacrificed 18 Panthers and 27 Tigers, as well as other types. In addition, it was said here, many more German armored units have been crippled.

Editorial: Superior ordnance

While the major credit for the success of the invasion of France and the campaign in Italy obviously should go to the men who face the bullets, the enterprise could not have been so successful were it not for the superb equipment in the hands of the troops, equipment which enabled them to blast down strong German defenses.

It is not generally realized how many new weapons have been designed during this war. Gen. Brehon B. Somervell, commanding general of the U.S. Army Service Forces, recently said that “with the exception of the Garand rifle, there is hardly a piece of equipment un use today that existed at the beginning of the war.”

It is a bit difficult to think of Uncle Sam as an outstanding designer of implements of war, because he has been interested almost solely in the peacetime arts. In World War I, this country did not distinguish itself through the designing of brand-new weapons. But in this conflict, the inventive genius of America really got into stride.

Gen. Somervell points out that the best test of the value of American equipment is the fact that:

Our field commanders, instead of calling for equipment patterned after foreign models, as they did in the last war, are completely satisfied with the Made-in-USA weapons. They’re not asking for any British or German equipment.

The achievement of the ordnance division is more remarkable when it is remembered that the Germans had the advantage in this field as, being the aggressors, they laid their plans far ahead. They framed the pattern for the new type of warfare and they knew what type of equipment they wanted to prosecute such a war. It is to the credit of America that it surpassed the war’s creators in inventiveness and ingenuity.

Editorial: Nazi air strength

Unleashing of Germany’s “secret weapon,” the rocket bomb, against England – a device which has demonstrated only nuisance value – has stirred discussion of Germany’s air strength.

In all the thousands of words describing progress of the fighting on the Normandy front to the most minute detail, there has been little mention of German resistance by air. Undoubtedly, Allied commanders have a general idea of the size of Hitler’s once-boasted Luftwaffe. It has become plain that the German Air Force can offer nothing more than token resistance to the thousands of Allied planes now roaming almost at will over Europe.

When it was disclosed the Allied invasion forces were assembled on the English coast for six days before start of the Channel crossing, Hitler’s failure to send at least a few bombers against them points to only one conclusion. Here was the prize target of all time. Thousands of ships, side by side for miles, fully loaded with men and equipment, were sitting like ducks on a pond. Bombs dropped in their midst would certainly have taken terrible toll. Invasion might have been delayed for days.

But no planes came over, not a single bomber, in spite of the fact Berlin said it knew what was in the air. Even if the Germans had viewed it as just another bit of practice, it would have been worth shooting at.

Either Hitler had no planes to spare or he blundered again, missing an opportunity as he did following Dunkerque, when he hesitated to invade England. The conclusion must be that German air strength is on the wane, if it is not already at the vanishing point.

Cherbourg Naval Base is important

Besieged port is third ranking French harbor
By the Associated Press

Cherbourg, the transatlantic port for thousands of American visitors to Europe in peacetime, is the third naval harbor of France, a gun-bristling fortified city at the tip of the Normandy Peninsula jutting into the English Channel.

The triangular bay forming its harbors is protected on the north by a long and thick breakwater surmounted by strong forts, which guard the city of 36,000 peacetime inhabitants.

Through the long and steady Allied air offensive, the docks and quays and ships sheltered at Cherbourg repeatedly drew down firebombs and explosives.

The capital of an arrondissement in the department of La Manche, Cherbourg lies at the mouth of the Divette River 230 miles from Paris.

The city is said to be on the site of the Roman station of Coriallum, but nothing is definitely known about its origin. William the Conqueror founded a hospital and church there. Cherbourg was pillaged by an English fleet in 1295, and in the 14th century suffering during the wars with the English. It was captured in 1413, remaining in British hands until 1450.

Louis XIV began the task of making it a military port. Harbor works were begun under Louis XVI and continued by Napoleon Bonaparte with the French pouring vast sums into the construction.

The naval harbor, half a mile from the commercial harbor, consists of three main basins cut out of rock, and has a minimum depth of 30 feet. There are drydocks and other installations, and a naval hospital. The commercial harbor and transatlantic port is at the mouth of the Divette.

The chief industries are fishing, saw-milling, tanning, shipbuilding and metal work.