Operation OVERLORD (1944)

531

On the Normandy front –
Casey: ‘Forgotten soldiers’ keep war machine in motion

Unrecognized, engineers and Signal Corps fight battle of communications and supply
By Robert J. Casey

U.S. front in Normandy, France – (July 19, delayed)
You don’t have to look at this war very long to realize that the most important part of it, aside from the riflemen in the frontlines, is to be found in the roads behind. Actually, it is here that you get some cohesive idea of the purpose and extent of the Allied drive.

Impressions of a battle, where it is fought behind dikes and hedges, necessarily must be isolated – a tank working here, infantry crawling through an orchard against machine guns there. But in the backroads and sunken lanes, you can see the war, terrible in its power, rolling forward with all the strange gadgets and accoutrements with which modern military science has equipped it.

No one who has not been tangled in it can envision the traffic on these channels from the beaches to the front. The principal routes are still good auto roads, or had been until D-Day changed the face of Normandy. Now, literally thousands of trucks, jeeps, tanks, halftracks, command cars, tractors, bulldozers, self-propelled artillery, motorcycles, mobile derricks and tank carriers pour over them 24 hours a day.

Pavements holding up

The pavements are holding up better than you would think. If any of them could be closed, a mile or two at a time for a few hours, the road crews that did the miraculous job of constructing airplane runways in England could lay new broad pavements over the old at an astonishing rate. But they can’t be closed and engineers work in disheartening competition with traffic.

Nobody thinks much about these forgotten men of the war, these pick-and-shovel soldiers, but as you follow the highway over newly-built bridges and past blasted villages and watch it widening and straightening before your eyes, you wonder how this battle, dependent as it is on mechanized material, could have been fought without them.

Wars in civilized communities seem to leave roads with typical scars, most of them on telephone and transmission lines. You’d naturally think wires strung on poles well away from the blasts on the pavement would suffer little damage from artillery or mines, but from every pole, festoons of broken wire hang like jungle growth. Flying fragments have found these impossible targets, cut the cables and shattered the insulators.

Other forgotten soldiers

So along with the engineers march other forgotten soldiers, the never-sleeping men of the Signal Corps. Along even the most remote lanes you are constantly passing signal trucks from which new wire is being reeled out in staggering quantities, thousands of miles of it.

You run into these men under shellfire at artillery observation posts and advance CPs enmeshed in communication webs that seem always a hopeless tangle, lifting wire out of ditches onto tree branches, hunting for breaks, making spices with no apparent concern for the death whistling over them or exploding around them.

The highways of the beachhead are marked with signs put there before the war by French touring clubs or local departments, more legible German markers and directions to American units, in a variety of colors and a jargon of codenames.

MPs on the job

Despite all this, a messenger might still have to go home with his important communication were it not for the MPs, who stand at every crossroads in the entire area. They are a remarkable set of men, these. Most of them never saw France until D-Day, but they can tell you which is the shortest road to any town you may name, where you make your turnings, which roads are well-paved, which under shellfire, and they have memorized more unit codenames and locations than you would find in a transatlantic cable book.

This is remarkable enough in itself. When you consider that command posts and dressing stations and such are constantly moving, it is something close to miraculous.

Civilians mingle oddly with the traffic along the roads and caravans of war give them priority. After all, whose country is it? Their carts and cattle mingle with artillery columns and families in horse-drawn buggies ride along with halftracks and tanks. Church processions and funerals go on as if there were no constant avalanche of transport on the throbbing pavements. As far forward as artillery echelons it is no uncommon thing to see them in silent ranks with front-bound doughboys.

Flags welcome liberators

War hasn’t displaced these people. It has merely infiltrated through them and the strangely incongruous lives of military and peasantry go their independent ways side by aide but never touching.

Since long before Bastille Day, flags have been flying from houses along the battle routes – French, American, English – most of them homemade and all of them odd to look upon. Over some doors in towns are banners bearing strange devices “Hail Roosevelt and de Gaulle,” “Death to the Boche,” “Welcome Americans our Liberators.” And, of course, there are always the inevitable children at every doorstep, waving two uplifted fingers at the soiled G.I.’s.

532

Völkischer Beobachter (July 22, 1944)

Moskau treibt Eisenhower an

Stockholm, 21. Juli –
Im Daily Herald wird der schleppende, Verlauf der britisch-amerikanischen Operationen an der Invasionsfront scharf kritisiert. In unterrichteten Kreisen wird dieser Artikel auf sowjetische Einflüsse zurückgeführt. Moskau sei mehr als unzufrieden mit Eisenhower und Montgomery, und die neuen verzweifelten Anstrengungen der Briten und Amerikaner an der Invasionsfront seien auf diesen Druck Moskaus zurückzuführen. Eisenhower und Montgomery hätten Anweisung erhalten, ohne Rücksicht auf alle Verluste eine Entscheidung herbeizuführen.

533

Führer HQ (July 22, 1944)

Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

In der Normandie führte der Feind gestern östlich und südlich Caen stärkere von Panzern unterstützte Angriffe, in deren Verlauf er an einigen Stellen in unsere Hauptkampflinie einbrechen konnte. Schon am Abend war jedoch das verlorengegangene Gelände durch Gegenangriffe unserer Truppen wieder in unserem Besitz und ein feindliches Bataillon vernichtet. Starke Panzerbereitstellungen des Feindes südöstlich Caen wurden durch Artillerie wirksam bekämpft. Nordwestlich Saint-Lô scheiterten heftige örtliche Angriffe des Gegners.

Kampfflugzeuge beschädigten im Seegebiet westlich Brest einen feindlichen Zerstörer schwer und schossen dabei ein britisches Sicherungsflugzeug ab.

Im französischen Raum wurden 73 Terroristen im Kampf niedergemacht.

Bei der Abwehr feindlicher Luft- und Schnellbootangriffe auf ein Geleit in der Deutschen Bucht schossen Minensuchboote, Sicherungsfahrzeuge und Bordflak der Handelsschiffe fünf feindliche Jagdbomber ab. Vor der niederländischen Küste beschädigten sie zwei britische Schnellboote schwer. Drei eigene Fahrzeuge gingen verloren.

Das Vergeltungsfeuer auf London dauert an.

In Italien führte der Feind fast auf der gesamten Front zahlreiche Einzelangriffe, die im Wesentlichen abgewiesen wurden. Nur am äußersten linken Flügel gelang es ihm, unter hohen blutigen Verlusten geringfügig Boden zu gewinnen. Erneute Angriffe gegen die neuen Stellungen scheiterten.

Im italienischen Raum wurden in der letzten Zeit 70 Terroristen im Kampf niedergemacht.

Im Osten wurden durch Gegenangriffe unserer Truppen östlich Lemberg einige Frontlücken geschlossen. Nordwestlich der Stadt erzielten die Sowjets weiteren Geländegewinn. Am oberen Bug wurden die auf das Westufer| vorgedrungenen Bolschewisten in harten Kämpfen aufgegangen. Zwischen Brest-Litowsk und Grodno griff der Feind mit starken Infanterie- und Panzerkräften an, konnte an einigen Stellen weiter Vordringen, wurde aber in den meisten Abschnitten unter hohen blutigen Verlusten und unter Abschuß zahlreicher Panzer abgewiesen.

Nordöstlich Kauen dauern die erbitterten Kämpfe an. Zwischen dem Seengebiet südwestlich Dünaburg und dem Peipussee wurden zahlreiche feindliche Angriffe unter hohen Verlusten für die Bolschewisten zerschlagen. In einigen Einbruchsstellen sind die Kämpfe noch im Gange.

In Luftkämpfen verlor der Feind 83 Flugzeuge.

In der Nacht waren die Bahnhöfe Borissow und Orscha das Angriffsziel schwerer deutscher Kampfflugzeuge. In den brennenden Bahnanlagen flogen mehrere Munitionszüge in die Luft.

Nordamerikanische Bomber drangen vom Westen und Süden in das Reichsgebiet ein und griffen mehrere Orte in Süd- und Südwestdeutschland an. Besonders in den Wohngebieten von München, Mannheim, Ludwigshafen und Schweinfurt entstanden Schäden und Personenverluste. Luftverteidigungskräfte vernichteten 68 feindliche Flugzeuge, darunter 55 viermotorige Bomber.

In der Nacht überflogen feindliche Flugzeuge Nordwest- und Südostdeutschland und warfen unter anderem auf das Gebiet der Reichshauptstadt eine Anzahl von Bomben. 6 britische Flugzeuge wurden zum Absturz gebracht.

Unterseeboote versenkten in harten Kämpfen 9 Schiffe mit 44.000 BRT und 2 Zerstörer. 1 weiterer Zerstörer und 4 Dampfer wurden torpediert. 1 Unterseeboot schoss außerdem einen viermotorigen Bomber ab.

534

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 22, 1944)

Communiqué No. 94

A number of enemy counterattacks on both western and eastern sectors of the front have been repulsed with a total of at least 14 enemy tanks knocked out.

A limited number of aerial patrols were operated during the period from midnight to noon today.

535

The Pittsburgh Press (July 22, 1944)

Two Nazi counterattacks smashed on French front

Allies wreck 14 German tanks as mud, rain bogs down British offensive near Caen
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer

Gestapo kills general in France

London, England –
A report reached certain Allied intelligence quarters today that a serious conflict between Nazi SS troops and the German Army over the recent Oradour-sur-Glane massacre resulted in the assassination of a German general. The unidentified general was reported assassinated by the Gestapo. He had gone to investigate the massacre when intercepted by Gestapo agents, the report said.

SHAEF, London, England –
Allied armies knocked out 14 German tanks yesterday in repulsing two futile counterthrusts mounted despite heavy rain which stalled the British push across the Caen plains toward Paris, it was officially announced today.

The limited counterattacks were repulsed south of Saint-André-sur-Orne below Caen and along the Périers–Saint-Lô highway south of Remilly-sur-Lozon.

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s shortest communiqué of the French campaign said today that “there is nothing to report,” and late in the day the word at Supreme Headquarters was the same.

A spokesman revealed that Gen. Paul Hausser, old-line Prussian officer, was commanding the German 7th Army facing the Americans in Normandy.

The German Transocean News Agency reported that the British had massed more than 10 divisions east of the Orne River, were moving up still more troops, and a “new major assault seems imminent.” The enemy report, lacking any immediate support in responsible quarters, said artillery fire was already increasing east of Caen but “the expected new attack has not yet started.”

British and Canadian forces waited in foxholes, trenches and ditches half-filled with water on an arc extending nearly five miles beyond Caen for clearing skies to resume their march toward Paris, 112 miles to the east.

Ground fog and low-flying clouds further immobilized operations and front reports told only of occasional artillery and mortar fire and routine limited patrols. Virtually all planes were grounded.

Desultory clashes were reported at Troarn, seven miles east of Caen, with the British vanguards in the outskirts and about 1,000 yards north of the town. South of Caen, the British were established firmly in Saint-André-sur-Orne, four miles down the Orne River, but headquarters retracted a previous announcement that they had taken Saint-Martin-de-Fontenay, a few hundred yards farther south.

A London broadcast said that “half of Troarn” was still in German hands, but the “fighting is going well for us.”

On the western half of the front, the U.S. 1st Army inched to within 4,000 yards north of Périers, made slight gains at several points south of the Périers–Saint-Lô highway and won positions 1,500 yards west of the Vire River four miles northwest of Saint-Lô.

536

Background of news –
Heavy bombers support troops in Normandy

By E. C. Shepherd

London, England –
The effectiveness of close support by intense heavy bombing gives fresh significance to Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery’s dictum that the air battle must be won before the land battle can begin.

Close support of heavy bombers helped to admit the Allied forces into Caen and, intensified, has helped the Allies to break out of Caen to the open ground to the south. The 1,000 heavy RAF bombers that opened the bombardment at dawn on July 18 encountered no fighter opposition, nor did most of the bombers during the morning.

The Germans had 500 or 600 fighters within range of the fighting. They have of late sent them out on patrol in packs of 40 and 50 but have generally avoided combat. If they still refuse battle, the Germans must expect to see their troops driven from one defensive position after another by such a bombardment as no artillery concentration has yet been able to produce.

If the Luftwaffe accepts the challenge and seeks to protect its troops from the heavy bombers next time, it can heave no guarantee that its fighter force will not be reduced to impotence. The Americans have learned in brilliant operations over Germany how to guard heavy bombers from fighter attacks and the RAF has been taking tips from them on the best method of employing fighter escorts for heavy bombers.

The Germans seem to have underestimated the possible power of close support by heavy bombers. Apparently, they expected the main close support to be given the Allied troops by their fighter-bombers.

Planes pave way for troops

The Allied air arm has been brought in to pry the German troops from their prepared positions and open the way from the Allies’ mobile land forces. This weighty form of close support came, not from local bases, but from stations in Britain against which the German Army can do nothing.

Apart from anti-aircraft fire, air defense of the orthodox kind is the only answer to this massive development in close support. The Germans, lacking adequate fighter defense, must expect it to continue.

We are entitled even at this early stage to doubt their ability to defeat or seriously, modify it. We can expect the big bomber radically to change the nature of battles, being justified in regarding it as suitable for use in close support of troops wherever air superiority has been established. It is usable with such a devastating effect in breaking defensive positions that it is likely to become an essential part of the barrage which usually opens an attack.

Two of the chief purposes which heavy bombers have thus far served far exceed the original idea of making troops “keep their heads down” while tanks and infantry go forward. Already the close support of heavy bombers has been scientifically directed to breaking the enemy’s strongest points and obstructing roads along which help might be brought to his forward positions.

New bombing technique

By bringing the whole technique of precision night bombing to this task Britain’s heavy bombers have made heavy and close support possible. They have been able to take on targets on the battlefield without endangering the lives of the adjacent British troops.

They have introduced a bombing method whereby an enormous weight of explosives can be put down on prescribed objectives in a short time without having to send over bombers in close formations which give flak its best chance. They have armed themselves by using bright-burning ground flares as target indicators with a means of identifying targets through smoke and dust.

In the dawn attack which opened the battle south of Caen, Britain’s heavy bombers sent down 5,000 tons of bombs in 40 minutes on targets nominated by the Army. No other means could have accomplished this.

537

McGlincy: Saint-Lô captured by 29th Division

Tired troops win tough battle
By James McGlincy, United Press staff writer

U.S. 1st Army HQ, Normandy, France –
The U.S. 29th Division, one of the first combat units to go overseas, was in the forefront of the Allied invasion of Normandy, and it was that former National Guard outfit which captured Saint-Lô after days of almost continuous fighting, it may now be revealed.

All the accolades that can be given troops should be given the 29th Division which fought until its men were exhausted, until it seemed impossible that men could stand on their feet any longer, until it seemed they finally must give in and withdraw from the lines.

But they didn’t give in, and they didn’t withdraw in spite of the losses they took. They fought until there was nothing except their stout hearts to keep them driving. Their bodies were tired, but still they had that spark left which makes men fight when they no longer know why they are fighting.

The 29th Division arrived in England in October 1942. A National Guard outfit, the division was composed originally of men from Maryland and Virginia, with a sprinkling of boys from Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia, but eventually they got all kinds of replacements until now the outfit includes men from all parts of the nation.

After rigorous training in Britain for 20 months, they finally got the assignment for which they were prepared.

And in carrying out that assignment, they wrote a battle epic which, when the full story can be told, will go down in history as one of the greatest of all time.

538

Reds impatient with Allied delay in France

Claim terrain in west favors advance
By James Aldridge, North American Newspaper Alliance

Moscow, USSR – (by wireless)
Each day Soviet observers get more worried about lack of development of the war in the west. The general attitude is: “You’ve established your position; now go ahead and develop it.”

For the past three days, articles by three leading Soviet commentators – Gen. Galaktionov, “The Observer” and K. Demidov – have taken the entire British press to task. The Russian writers do not like the tendency of the British press to apologize for the static situation on the Western Front.

These Soviet commentators disagree with American and British newspapers which say it is difficult to advance and maneuver from such a small area as the Allies hold in Normandy. They point to El Alamein in North Africa and to Italy as examples of how the Allies did and can maneuver and attack from small areas if they want to do so.

Says Reds’ job harder

Gen. Galaktionov also points out that as far as maneuvering is concerned, the Allies are better off in France than the Red Army is in White Russia. He says it is easier to maneuver along the good roads of France than it is in the marshland stretching from Vitebsk to Vilna and beyond.

Another criticism by these three writers is against the idea of the British and American press to go along with German Propaganda Minister Goebbels to divide the East and West into more important and less important fronts. Although the Allied newspaper comment has insisted that the Russian front is the more serious one for Germany, this flattery is not welcomed here. To these Soviet commentators, it seems to be an encouragement to Germany to put most of her weight on Russia.

Cite Tehran agreement

On Wednesday Mr. Demidov pointed out in Pravda, the Communist Party organ, that only one-tenth of the German Army is facing the Allies in France. Yesterday, “The Observer” repeated it in the same publication and stated that on July 8, the 2nd Airborne Division of the Reichswehr was taken from Normandy to Vilna where it was destroyed. To the Soviet commentators, the efforts of the Allies are still unbalanced.

For the most part these critics ask for no more than increased vigor and volume in the Allied attacks. They remind us of the Tehran agreement, which states that the Allies would attack in volume from the west and south as the Red Army attacked in volume in the east. The Red Army is attacking in volume, they say, but they are still waiting for the main Allied forces to be thrown into the battle in the west.

When this is done, the writers aver, Germany will be defeated quickly and completely.

539

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 23, 1944)

Communiqué No. 95

In the CAEN sector, east of the ORNE, Allied troops have cleared the enemy from the village of ETAVAUX. Our forces advanced southeast of ÉTERVILLE and MALTOT is in our hands.

North of PÉRIERS, we have crossed the SÈVES River in the vicinity of the village of SÈVES.

Fuel dumps at FORÊT DE CONCHES, MESSEI and CHÂTEAU DE TERTU were attacked by medium bombers early yesterday evening. Escorted night bombers attacked rail lines at BOURTH and military buildings near VANNES.

Bridges near BREST and CHOLET were hit by fighters and fighter-bombers. Locomotives were attacked, tracks severed and trucks destroyed in the areas of LORIENT, CHARTRES and ANGERS.

Two of our aircraft are missing.

Communiqué No. 96

Allied troops east of CAEN have cleared the enemy from the village of ÉMIÉVILLE. Enemy counterattacks were repulsed in the regions of yesterday’s advance near MALTOT and near SÈVES in the western sector.

Medium and light bombers, this morning, attacked six rail targets leading to the battle zone. Results were unobserved.

Other bombers, before dawn, harassed enemy communications at ROUEN, VIERZON and a number of SEINE crossings.

540

The Pittsburgh Press (July 23, 1944)

Allies battling in morasses of French mud

British take half of Troarn stronghold
By Phil Ault, United Press staff writer

map.072344.up
Fighting through morasses of mud, British forces have seized commanding heights in Troarn (1) as torrential rains slowed fighting in Normandy. Two Nazi counterattacks were repulsed, by the British south of André-sur-Orne (2) and by the Americans on the Saint-Lô–Périers highway (3). The Yanks were two miles from Périers.

SHAEF, London, England – (July 22)
British troops, fighting through morasses of mud like those in the last war, have won commanding heights inside Troarn, German stronghold seven miles east of Caen, and 14 enemy tanks have been knocked out in scattered actions across the wind- and rain-swept front, it was disclosed today.

British troops ironed out the Nazi salient south of Caen by capturing Maltot and Etavaux. Maltot is three miles west of Saint-André-sur-Orne on the Caen–Aunay highway. Etavaux is one mile northwest of Saint-André. A number of Nazi counterattacks were turned back, Saturday night’s communiqué said, with the promising British offensive of last week bogged down in the worst weather of invasion.

Lone air attack

Bumping their way through storm clouds, a force of about 200 U.S. Marauder and Havoc bombers and RAF Billy Mitchells bombed three fuel dumps and one railway target south of the battle zone in the lone major air operation of the day.

The Germans launched two limited counterattacks Friday despite the soggy weather, one south of Saint-André-sur-Orne on the Caen front and the other on the Saint-Lô–Périers highway in the American sector. Both were thrown back with severe enemy losses.

Third time in Troarn

The British entered Troarn for the third time Saturday and won the western half of the town before a torrential downpour caused a half-hour suspension of fighting. Smashing across the wooded rise just outside Troarn against fierce machine-gun and light arms opposition, they won high ground dominating the remaining German positions in the eastern half of the town.

Otherwise, the battle had bogged down, but German broadcasts said that Allied guns in the Caen area were drumming out a preparatory barrage for “a large-scale attack in the near future.”

For nearly eight hours, the weather had clamped a stalemate on the battlefields and there was no prospect of its lifting.

British rush stopped

The first great rush of British armor through the Caen gap had ended, because the Germans were once more in wooded terrain after being driven across the rolling farms just east of Caen. The infantry now faced the job of digging them out of one strongpoint after another.

Behind every grove, the Germans had concealed 88mm guns which pinned down the infantry until Allied infantry could get a bearing on the enemy batteries. Rocket-firing Typhoon fighters gave invaluable support Friday until the weather forced them down.

Two miles from Périers

On the American sector, doughboys huddled in foxholes where water was up to their armpits and their supply traffic was interrupted by the impassibility of all except the hardest surfaced roads.

Before the mud made further advances impossible, the Yanks had driven within two miles of Périers, strongpoint of the broken Saint-Lô–Lessay line, and taken positions 1,500 yards west of the Vire southwest of Saint-Lô.

Allied headquarters reversed itself on three towns reported captured Friday – raids on the Carentan–Périers highway, Berigny on the Saint-Lô–Bayeux highway, and Saint-Martin-de-Fontenay, just below Saint-André-sur-Orne. All three are still in German hands, the report of their capture being due to “mistaken map-reading.”

Hill 112, key height just northeast of Esquay in the Caen sector, is still in British hands, although the Germans are once more in possession of Esquay itself as well as Maltot to the north.

German broadcasts again asserted that strong reserves of an Allied army group commanded by Lt. Gen. George S. Patton Jr. had been observed in the Caen area and that a new Allied offensive will not long be delayed. More than 10 British divisions are concentrated in the area, the Germans said.

A Berlin broadcast of a German communiqué said that the British launched “major attacks” Friday and broke into the main German line at several points, but were thrown back by counterattacks. An entire Allied battalion was wiped out, the communiqué asserted.

541

Wolfert: Captured Axis troops fall into three main categories

But all share in war guilt through greed, apathy or by direct will
By Ira Wolfert

Saint-Lô, France – (July 22)
The German prisoners we are taking in France fall into three main divisions.

First there is the Nazi from the occupied countries and the greatest proportion come from Poland, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, the Ukraine, White Russia, Georgia and the Baltic countries, however, are also represented.

Then there are the Germans who themselves seem to represent the “occupied” country, meaning old Germany and Austria. Last – and least – are the Nazis themselves: The Hitler Youth, the SS (Elite) troops and so forth.

The German High Command seems to be treating its subjected soldiers as it treats the Allies. Its Slavs, Czechs, Balts, Austrians and old-type Germans are treated as the Italians were treated in Africa. They are the expendables. They fight the rearguard actions when the gasoline is short, as it seems to be for the Germans here. They are given no gasoline with which to escape with their equipment. And when the shells are scarce, they are rationed very stringently among these members of the German armies.

Get puzzled look

Whenever we drive for anywhere these are the people we take first, and scattered among them, salting and firming them, are the proper Nazis – the hard, young, killer-type of men who have known no other adult life but one of war. These soldiers get a puzzled look when you ask them to think on what they have just gone through and see whether their idea of the glories of warfare is the same as the Nazi idea.

The fact that the old-type Germans – the non-politicals – are tired old men from a kind of Nazi-occupied country within Germany was made clear to me in numerous conversations I have had with prisoners, particularly during the last week when the fighting reached a considerable fury in this narrow sector.

What the Germans, which I saw taken, said was so nearly identical that they can almost be quoted as one. These Germans, on whom Nazification had not taken hold so deeply, are fed up with Hitler and the Nazis, but they do not know how safely to get rid of them. they are not yet desperate enough to turn their guns against the Nazis who have a hold on their heads.

They have no sense of guilt over having started the war, and, therefore, see no reason why any people should exact vengeance from them personally.

“We are a little people,” they say. I heard this continually in wheedling, whining tones. “What could we do about it?” They blame the death and destruction that has come finally to them too, along with the rest of the world, simply on the mysterious malevolence they refer to as the war, and not on Nazism.

The attitude of the incorrigible Nazis is still that the Führer cannot be wrong. They still insist there will be an offensive that will win the war for Germany, and soon there will be secret weapons suddenly unveiled – the Luftwaffe will rise again, there will be enormous guns, and then 10,000 years of Nazified peace.

Parrot-like tone

It is plain in most cases that the Nazis saying all this do not believe it themselves. What they are saying and talking by rote comes with a parrot-like tone in their voices and a blank look in their eyes.

It was odd to see these three types of Nazis come shuffling together out of the ruins of Saint-Lô. They, like the Americans who fought them there, hardly had heard of the town until a few weeks ago. Now Saint-Lô has been nearly levelled to the ground. The walls of structures that still remain stick up crazily like broken bones out of a pile of dead.

The Germans soldiers walked humbly along a road that smelled strongly of death. It was impossible to distinguish among the three types as they slogged along and it was hard to see why anyone should bother to distinguish among them. Whatever their plight at the moment, they had brought this on themselves and on the rest of the world.

It was they who had made the landscape gaunt – the non-German Nazis with their greed; the non-Nazi Germans with their apathy and tolerance of the Nazis; and the Nazis themselves by their direct will. They all seemed to be accomplices in the same terrible, shocking crime.

542

Carlisle: Doughboys hail accuracy of 75s

Knocked out tanks prove sharpshooting
By John M. Carlisle

With U.S. forces in Saint-Lô, France – (July 22)
There were five Nazi Tiger tanks knocked out. They stood idly nearby, battered and abandoned, in a sunken road behind the hedgerow where the company was resting back of the lines.

One of them was thrust in the hedgerow itself, a twisted hulk beyond repair. Some of the G.I. Joes stood around it, and most of them were smiling. They liked the deadly accuracy of our 75mm guns on our own tanks that had knocked out these Tigers a couple of days ago.

Pvt. William J. Rosen of Royal Oak, Michigan, said:

Our tanks made some sharpshooting direct hits on that old Tiger there. That, sir, was fancy shooting, very fancy. When I was doing defense work back home and working on the tank arsenal assembly line, I never dreamed our boys could shoot that well.

Hates snipers

Pvt. Rosen talked of the snipers upfront. He said:

I’m getting so I hate them. They pot away at us all the time. Then when they run out of ammunition, they climb down and surrender. One of them got four or five of our men before we got him.

Pvt. Rosen then pointed to a cabbage patch in the middle of the open field. He said, proudly:

There were 40 Jerries and their officers in one pocket there and one of the last things we did was wipe them out. Our artillery had them pinned down, firing into them and behind them. we pinned them down with rifle fire from the front. We never gave them a chance. Our artillery is all right, mate, better than all right.

Across the back hedgerow, in another field, Pvt. Casimer W. Przetacznik of Detroit was cleaning his rifle. His arms and hands were scratched from the thorns of the hedgerow, but they had healed. But the scars still showed.

Dives through hedgerows

He said:

I just dive through those hedgerows when we have fixed bayonets and are advancing. Sometimes the Jerries are on the other side. They always surrender when you get that close to them. I learned right off the bat not to go through any hedge openings. The Jerries have them zeroed in with mortars.

Nearby was Pvt. Russell L. Dornbush of Muskegon, Michigan, a platoon runner, who was helping some pals clean a heavy machine gun. They handled it with all the care that a watchmaker handles expensive watches.

He said:

It’s not just kidding up there. Those burp guns [Jerry automatic pistols that look like portable machine guns] are popping at you from the hedgerows all the time. A bullet from a burp gun hit my cartridge belt, right over my stomach. I guess I turned 30 colors of the rainbow and…

543

Briton who escaped Nazis leads tanks below Caen

O’Connor, captured in 1940, escaped last fall
By L. S. B. Shapiro

With British and Canadian forces below Caen, France – (July 22)
Lt. Gen. Sir Richard Nugent O’Connor, commander of the tank forces that broke through into the area below Caen, paid high tribute to the assault formations that gained the original bridgehead and made it possible for him to gather his tanks for the battle that is now raging.

Gen. O’Connor told this correspondent shortly after he arrived:

Whatever the future may hold, there will be nothing to touch the beach landings and the seizure of the lodgment area.

The commander, looking fit and obviously happy to be in action again after confinement in an Italian prison camp for three years, spoke almost exclusively about the feat of the assault troops on D-Day when he was interviewed for the first time in France today.

Praises assault troops

He said:

I honestly do not believe there has been a greater military feat than that done by the assault formations. The Americans particularly had bad luck when they found a whole German division sitting on the beach where they landed and they fought their way through to take Cherbourg.

It was a magnificent show, the whole assault feat. Don’t let that be sidetracked by whatever the future may hold. There will be nothing to touch it.

Gen. O’Connor returned to action after a few months’ rest in England. He was a tank commander under Gen. Sir Archibald P. Wavell in the North African desert warfare of 1940 when he was captured. He escaped in Italy during the advance up the peninsula last October.

Not so good for tanks

I asked the general what his most vivid impression of fighting is now, as compared with four years ago.

He said:

Most striking to me is that I never have been the British Army so well trained and so fit as the forces in Normandy. As for the Germans, they still are very brave men, but they are stretched. I think it is significant that they didn’t attack our forces heavily during the first stormy days after the D-Day landings. Now they have brought their crack divisions into line instead of holding them as strategic reserves. Yes, I think they are badly stretched.

Looking over the country on which his tanks are fighting, he said:

Of course, this is altogether different from desert warfare. Wide outflanking movements by tanks such as we had in the desert is not easy here. The desert was the tank commander’s country.

544

Völkischer Beobachter (July 24, 1944)

In der Normandie und in Italien nur örtliche Kämpfe –
Abwehrschlacht im Osten tobt in größter Erbitterung

dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 23. Juli –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

In der Normandie wurde gestern südlich Caen erbittert um einige Ortschaften gekämpft, die mehrere Male den Besitzer wechselten und schließlich in unserer Hand blieben. Bei Angriffen südwestlich Caen erzielte der Feind einen örtlichen Einbruch, der abgeriegelt wurde. Die 21. Panzerdivision unter Führung von Generalmajor Feuchtinger, die seit Beginn der Invasion sich immer wieder ausgezeichnet hatte, hat sich in den Kämpfen der letzten Tage erneut bewährt.

In Südostfrankreich wurden in einem von Banden stark verseuchten Gebiet 268 Terroristen im Kampf niedergemacht.

Schweres „V1“-Vergeltungsfeuer liegt weiter auf dem Großraum von London.

In Italien führte der Feind auch gestern nur zahlreiche örtliche Angriffe, die abgewiesen wurden. In einigen Abschnitten waren die Kämpfe in den Abendstunden noch im Gange.

Im Osten tobt, die Abwehrschlacht mit großer Erbitterung weiter. Im Raum von Lemberg erreichten feindliche Angriffsspitzen den Ostrand der Stadt. Weiter nordwestlich stoßen motorisierte Verbände der Bolschewisten auf den San und westlich des oberen Bug in den Raum von Lublin vor. Unsere Divisionen leisten hier überall dem vordringenden Feind erbitterten Widerstand.

Auch zwischen Brest-Litowsk und Grodno sind heftige Kämpfe im Gange. Zahlreiche Angriffe der Bolschewisten wurden abgewiesen, eingebrochener Feind zum Stehen gebracht.

Nordwestlich Grodno wurden die Bolschewisten im Gegenangriff weiter nach Osten zurückgeworfen. Nordöstlich Kauen fingen unsere tapferen Grenadiere wiederholte Angriffe der Sowjets auf.

Zwischen Dünaburg und dem Peipussee wurden starke Infanterie- und Panzerkräfte der Bolschewisten unter Abschuß von 50 Panzern im Wesentlichen abgewiesen. In zwei Einbruchsstellen sind noch heftige Kämpfe im Gange. Nach Zerstörung aller kriegswichtigen Anlagen wurden die Ruinen von Ostrow und Pleskau geräumt.

Schlachtfliegergeschwader griffen wirksam in die Erdkämpfe ein und fügten dem Feind hohe Menschen- und Materialverluste zu. 59 feindliche Flugzeuge wurden zum Absturz gebracht. In der Nacht griffen Kampffliegerverbände den Bahnhof Molodeczno an. Es entstanden Flächenbrände und Explosionen.

Ein nordamerikanischer Bomberverband warf Bomben im Raum von Ploesti. Durch deutsche, rumänische und bulgarische Luftverteidigungskräfte wurden 28 feindliche Flugzeuge vernichtet.

Auf den Spuren der Invasoren

Genf, 23. Juli –
Der Daily Express-Berichterstatter Allan Moorehead gibt folgenden Lagebericht aus Caen: Die ganze Stadt mit ihren Vororten sei zwar jetzt „befreit,“ doch frage man sich, wenn man durch die Straßen gehe, was eigentlich „befreit“ wurde; denn das gesamte Arbeiter- und Geschäftsviertel stelle nach dem schweren Luftbombardement nur noch „einen Friedhof normalen Lebens“ dar. Die Bomben hätten das gesamte Aussehen der Stadt derart verwandelt, daß mit einem Schlage alle Caen mit der Vergangenheit verknüpfenden Bande durchschnitten wurden.

Aber nicht nur in Caen sehe es so aus, sondern in einer Ortschaft nach der anderen, durch die man in den alliierten Brückenkopf fahre. Geschichtliche Dinge gebe es so gut wie überhaupt nicht mehr und fast alle Merkmale der Kultur seien ausgelöscht.

545

England um eine Enttäuschung reicher –
Vergeblicher Ansturm bei Caen

vb. Berlin, 23. Juli –
Als die Briten Caen noch nicht in Besitz hatten, bezeichneten sie diese Stadt als die Schlüsselstellung für die Kämpfe in der Normandie. Folgerichtigerweise hätte man daraus schließen müssen, daß mit der Einnahme von Caen durch die Engländer die gesamte Front der Deutschen aufgerollt würde. Wenn man nur den Angaben der britischen Führung, wie sie zu Anfang der Woche in die Öffentlichkeit drangen, hätte folgen wollen, so wäre in der Tat das große Ziel auch erreicht gewesen. Wir hörten von dem endgültig erreichten Durchbruch, Wir erfuhren, daß die britischen Panzerverbände nun endgültig in freies Feld vorgestoßen seien, wir wurden schließlich darüber belehrt, daß die Schlacht in der Normandie nun ein ganz neues Gesicht, nämlich das des Bewegungskrieges, annehmen werde.

Inzwischen sind sechs Tage vergangen, inzwischen stehen die Briten 7 Kilometer südlich von Caen. Man kann den schneidenden Gegensatz zwischen dem Ziel des Generals Montgomery und dem erreichten Erfolg kaum sichtbarer machen als mit dieser nüchternen Angabe. Aus ihr werden alle entscheidenden Merkmale der letzten Kampfwoche an der Invasionsfront deutlich: der operative Durchbruch ist nicht gelungen, dass furchtbar mühsame Abringen des Gegners um jede Meile, um jede Hecke und jeden Bachlauf geht weiter, vom Bewegungskrieg kann überhaupt keine Rede sein, alles bleibt wie bei den flandrischen Offensiven der Briten 1917. Sie haben jetzt starke und schnelle Panzergeschwader, aber sie kleben damit nicht weniger am Boden wie die Infanterie des Feldmarschalls Douglas Haig vor 27 Jahren.

Manchmal weiß man nicht recht, ob man den Kämpfen im Brückenkopf überhaupt den Namen einer Schlacht geben soll. Natürlich verdienen sie diesen Namen nach der Ausdehnung des Geländes ebenso wie nach der Zahl der eingesetzten Streitkräfte. Was die Briten und Amerikaner jetzt im Landekopf stehen haben, hat die Zahl von 30 Divisionen längst überschritten. Dazu haben sie die Unterstützung durch außerordentlich starke, auch der Zahl nach übermächtigen Luftflotten. An der Erbitterung, mit der auf beiden Seiten gekämpft wird ist ebenfalls kein Zweifel, und dennoch zögert man hin und wieder, den vollen Begriff der Schlacht auf diese Kämpfe anzuwenden, weil ein wesentliches Merkmal fehlt: die großzügige, leitende und beherrschende operative Idee des Angreifers. Einmal sehen wir ihn dort einige Panzerdivisionen hinwerfen und einige Bauernhäuser erobern, dann wieder an anderer Stelle, dann wieder sehen wir ihn festliegen, dann versucht er es wieder mit den Bombenteppichen, dann werden von seinen Luftstreitkräften starke Verbände zur Zerstörung von Wohnhäusern weit hinter den Fronten abgezweigt – das Ganze macht den Eindruck der strategischen Unsicherheit und der Unfreiheit des operativen Denkens.

Natürlich ist es nicht erlaubt anzunehmen, der General Montgomery und sein Stab wüssten nicht, worauf es ankomme im Brückenkopf. Natürlich wissen sie, daß sie vor allem aus der Enge herauskommen müssen, die ihre Heeresgruppe fast erwürgt. Es ist auch selbstverständlich, daß sie sich seit den ersten Invasionstagen bestimmte Vorstellungen darüber machen, wie dieses Ziel zu erreichen wäre. Nur wenn es an die Ausführung dieser Pläne geht, dann verliert sich alles ins Kleinliche und Halbe. Auf die Karte schöne Pfeile einzuzeichnen, kann eben jeder Dilettant, erst bei der Umsetzung in die Wirklichkeit zeigt sich der Feldherr. Im Kampf mit den vielfachen „Friktionen,“ mit Nachschubschwierigkeiten, mit unerwartet hartnäckigem Widerstand, mit dem Ausfall von Vorhuten und von Nachrichtenmitteln – erst in dieser ständigen Auseinandersetzung mit den Reibungen des Alltags, die operative Idee zu entwickeln und fruchtbar zu machen, zeigt sich echtes militärisches Führertum.

Da die Deutschen es nicht lieben, ihre Gegner zu unterschätzen, sind sie auch leicht bereit, die Hindernisse anzuerkennen, die sich bei dem General Montgomery der Entfaltung der operativen Idee in der Normandie entgegenstellten. Das Gelände ist eng, es ist auch durchschnitten und Panzeraufmärschen feindlich, der Widerstand der deutschen Grenadiere und Panzer ist ungewöhnlich geschickt und ungewöhnlich hartnäckig, geschickter jedenfalls und hartnäckiger, als Eisenhower und Montgomery das angenommen hatten. Diese Tatsachen also kann Montgomery mit einigem Recht für sich anführen. Aber schließlich, es sind nun fast sieben Wochen seit dem Beginn der Invasion vergangen – Montgomery hat eine ganze Heeresgruppe, also eine ungeheuer kraftvolle Streitmacht zu seiner- Verfügung, er hat sogar von der im Südosten Englands stehenden Heeresgruppe Patton Divisionen bekommen, die ursprünglich gewiss nicht für ihn bestimmt waren, er hat die unbedingte Luftüberlegenheit – mit all dem verstrickt er sich doch immer wieder von neuem in den Kampf um Waldstücke und Gehöfte, mit all dem steckt er immer noch im Bereich der Taktik, in dem Gefechtsrahmen der Divisionen, und nicht in der Strategie.

Es müssen also doch wohl noch andere Gründe zu den eben angeführten hinzukommen, das Steckenbleiben der amerikanischen ersten und der britischen zweiten Armee zu erklären. Vielleicht kommt man der Aufhellung der Gründe für das Verzetteln der Offensive Montgomerys näher, wenn man heute eine kurze amtliche Mitteilung liest, die der General Eisenhower herausgegeben hat: Soundso viel tausend Flugzeuge, sagt er, sind gestern über den Invasionsbrückenkopf aufgestiegen und soundso viel tausend Tonnen Bomben haben sie wieder abgeworfen. Man sieht förmlich den Stolz des Generals, mit dem er diese Zahlen betrachtet – und plötzlich weiß man alles.

Da oben in der Führung der Westmächte sitzen Generale, die genau so wenig wie die politische Führung dieser Länder begriffen haben, was sich in Wirklichkeit seit 1917 verändert hat. Man erinnert sich an das Vorgehen Nivelles und Haigs 1917. Zehntausend Granaten auf den Quadratkilometer deutschen Frontabschnitts sind zu wenig? Dann muß man eben zwanzigtausend, dreißigtausend, vierzigtausend nehmen. Und hinterher wunderten Nivelle und Haig sich, daß sie immer noch nicht weiterkamen. Es ist jetzt nicht anders. Noch immer sind die Generale der Westmächte Anbeter der Zahlen. Sie rechnen sich auf dem Papier Divisionen, Batterien, Luftgeschwader zusammen und dann meinen sie, so müsse es nun gehen. Aber so geht es keineswegs immer – jedenfalls nicht gegen das deutsche Heer, das nun einmal auch in dieser vorübergehenden Periode der technischen Unterlegenheit das beste der Welt bleibt. Noch immer gibt sich die Göttin des Sieges nur dem Mann des kühnen Wagnisses hin und nicht dem, der seine Entschlußkraft in der kalten Rechnung erstickt.

Zu Beginn der Zwanzigerjahre erschien ein Buch, das in Sätzen voller schwungvollem Pathos die Führung der Westmächte im ersten Weltkriege verdammte, weil sie in Stupidität und Engherzigkeit nichts anderes gewusst habe, als in frontalem Anrennen gegen die deutschen Stellungen das Blut ihrer Landsleute zu verströmen, statt ihre schöpferische strategische Phantasie durch die Erfahrung zur echten Ideenfülle befruchten zu lassen. Der Mann, der diese bittere Kritik niederschrieb, hieß Winston Churchill…

546

Innsbrucker Nachrichten (July 24, 1944)

Tag und Nacht Vergeltungsfeuer auf London

Keine größeren Kampfhandlungen in der Normandie – Erbitterte Kämpfe in Italien – Feindangriffe blutig abgeschlagen

dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 24. Juli –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

In der Normandie kam es gestern zu keinen größeren Kampfhandlungen. Der Feind führte nur südwestlich Caen mehrere Angriffe, bei denen er neunzehn Panzer verlor, ohne Erfolge zu erringen. Am Westflügel des Landekopfes wurde ein örtlicher Einbruch im Gegenstoß beseitigt. Der Feind verlor dabei 450 Tote und 300 Gefangene.

Im französischen Raum wurden durch Fallschirm abgesetzte englische Sabotagetrupps und 219 Terroristen im Kampf niedergemacht.

Das Vergeltungsfeuer auf London wurde bei Tag und Nacht fortgesetzt.

In Italien führte der Feind gestern stärkere Angriffe gegen unsere Nachhuten nördlich Livorno, die im Verlaufe der Kämpfe auf das Nordufer des Arno zurückgenommen wurden. Besonders erbittert wurde im Raum nördlich Poggibonsi gekämpft, wo unsere Truppen alle feindlichen Angriffe blutig zerschlugen. Auch im adriatischen Küstenabschnitt blieben wiederholte Angriffe des Gegners erfolglos.

In Galizien und westlich des oberen Bug wurden zahlreiche von Panzern und Schlachtfliegern unterstützte Angriffe der Sowjets in erbitterten Kämpfen abgewehrt. Nur in einigen Abschnitten gewannen die feindlichen Angriffsspitzen weiter Boden. Im Stadtgebiet von Lemberg dauern die schweren Kämpfe an. Die Besatzung von Lublin behauptete sich gegen wiederholte feindliche Angriffe.

Zwischen Brest-Litowsk und Grodno sowie nordöstlich Kauen scheiterten Durchbruchsversuche des Feindes am zähen Widerstand unserer tapferen Divisionen. In einigen Abschnitten warfen sie die eingedrungenen Bolschewisten im Gegenangriff zurück. In diesen Kämpfen fanden der Kommandeur einer Kampfgruppe, Generalleutnant Scheller, und der Chef des Stabes einer Armee, Generalmajor von Tresckow, in vorderster Linie den Heldentod.

Zwischen Dünaburg und dem Peipussee wurden heftige Angriffe der Sowjets zerschlagen, örtliche Einbrüche in harten Kämpfen abgeriegelt.

Ein britischer Bomberverband führte in der vergangenen Nacht einen Terrorangriff gegen Kiel. Einzelne Flugzeuge griffen außerdem das Gebiet der Reichshauptstadt an.

547

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 24, 1944)

Communiqué No. 97

Sharp local engagements took place south of the river SÈVES, in the area north of the ESQUAY and on the river ORNE south of MALTOT. Our forward positions remain substantially unchanged.

Enemy supply system and airfields northeast of PARIS were attacked by our air forces during yesterday. In addition, close support was given to the land forces in NORMANDY.

Medium bombers attacked a railway bridge north of the SEINE at MIRVILLE and a railway crossing at the RISLE southwest of ROUEN, and the CHARENTONNE at SERQUIGNY. Other targets were fuel dumps in the FORÊT DE CONCHES and a railway yard near MONTFORT.

Direct hits were registered by our fighter-bombers on two double span highway bridges crossing the SEINE River at COUTANCES.

Other fighter-bombers, patrolling southward below the valley of the LOIRE, severed rail lines in many places and damaged numerous railroad cars and locomotives.

Last night, heavy bombers attacked oil storage depots at DONGES, near SAINT-NAZAIRE.

Communiqué No. 98

Early today, Allied light bombers harried enemy troops and attacked rail movements in a broad belt behind the enemy line from east of the SEINE to the battle area. A supply dump in the FORÊT DE CINGLAIS was bombed. Two of our aircraft are missing.

Enemy coastal craft were intercepted and engaged off CAP D’ANTIFER by our naval patrols early yesterday. Three enemy R-boats were severely damaged and one was set on fire.

There is nothing to report from our ground forces.

548

The Pittsburgh Press (July 24, 1944)

Lull in Normandy; Allies mass men

Yanks pushed back by counterattack
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer

SHAEF, London, England –
Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery was massing and shifting his Allied armies today for a new attack on the Normandy front, which was in a state of almost dead calm as activity fell off to its lowest point since D-Day.

How soon Gen. Montgomery’s new offensive will come and what part of the battle line will erupt cannot even be hinted at. German broadcasts, agreeing with Allied headquarters reports of preparations for another Allied blow, said the attack might be launched at any time.

Supplies built up

The Navy reported that good weather in recent days had made it possible to increase the pace at which manpower and supplies are being built up in Normandy. The weather turned bad again today, however, after a favorable start, cutting air activity to scattered sorties.

Earlier headquarters reports revealed that a German counterattack wiped out an American bridgehead across the Sèves River before Périers, and that Gen. Sepp Dietrich, old-line Nazi, who took part in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch, had taken over command of the SS Panzer Corps in Normandy.

Small gains near Caen

The British 1st Army hammered out small gains below Caen, capturing a forest a few hundred yards south of Etavaux, in the only gains reported by Allied headquarters as clearing weather promised a break in the three-day stalemate caused by a drenching downpour.

The appointment of Dietrich was seen at headquarters as another indication that the German Army command in France was being converted into a Nazi clique directly under Hitler and Gestapo chief Heinrich Himmler as more and more SS Elite Guards and officers poured in and the showdown battle on the road to Paris shaped up.

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s 97th communiqué said:

Sharp local engagements took place south of the river Sèves in the area north of Esquay and on the river Orne south of Maltot. Our forward positions remain substantially unchanged.

A day after reporting that Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s troops had cross the Sèves River, capturing the village of the same name, in a push within two miles of Périers, headquarters disclosed that the Germans had retaken the pocket and the village.

The British gains were scored west of Maltot, five miles below Caen, and west of the Orne River. There was no word from the breakthrough area southeast of Caen along the road to Paris.

50,549 prisoners taken

Dispatches to Gen. Bradley’s headquarters said the Americans had taken 50,549 prisoners so fat in the Normandy campaign, and had buried 8,094 German dead.

Allied planes battering the communication network behind the German front yesterday, cut rail lines in at least 40 places and damaged 135 freight cars and locomotives. They also hit German airfields northeast of Paris.

Observers speculated on the possibility that the influx of German SS units and the shift of the SS panzer command to Dietrich tied in with the German crisis and perhaps reflected efforts to put in key positions officers and men faithful to the Nazi Party since its early days.

Charged with atrocities

Gen. Dietrich is listed by the Russians as one of the generals responsible for wholesale atrocities on the Eastern Front, where he once held a command in addition to other posts in Poland, the Balkans and France.

Dietrich organized the Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler – the Nazi chieftain’s bodyguard, which expanded until finally it became the SS Panzer Corps. In the last war, he was a sergeant major of infantry. As Germany rearmed, he spent some time working with panzer units, but his chief concern was with building up the ruthless SS units. Later, they were welded into an army which has now achieved considerable size and power.

549

Prisoners’ views on revolt vary

Young Nazis, plain soldiers differ
By B. J. McQuaid

With U.S. forces in Normandy, France –
Reactions among captured Germans to reports on the attempt on Hitler’s life and of revolutionary developments inside Germany fall into three main classifications:

  • Dyed-in-the-wool young Nazis of the SS {Elite Guard) stamp. They discredit and minimize the reports much the same as official German propagandists.

  • Plain soldiers of the Wehrmacht. They have a philosophy of war in some prospects not unlike that of the average American G.I.’s, namely, to “get this thing over and let’s all go home.” They are noncommittal, often falling back on the familiar theme that as “the little men” of Germany they never had a voice in shaping their country’s politics, and hence accept no responsibility for what happens from now on nor for what has happened.

  • Large numbers of impressed foreigners in Germany’s ragtag, bobtail Normandy armies, as well as Austrians and Germans from sections like Bavaria which have never been more than superficially loyal to Hitler. In most cases they go further than the most optimistic speculations outside Germany concerning the extent of the seriousness of the revolt and declare that the whole Nazi applecart is about to tip over.

It is reassuring to find little disposition on the part of our military leaders in France to put any great faith in the reports, from the point of view of easing their own task. There was a brief wave of high optimism among troops in some sectors, but this quickly gave way to renewal of that cold determination to beat the hedgerows and that realism which accepts the great probability that in addition to whatever turmoil threatens within, Germany will require more stout blows from without before the war can be considered “in the bag.”

550

Völkischer Beobachter (July 25, 1944)

Schwere Enttäuschung im Feindlager –
Normandie-Offensive zusammengebrochen

Verlegenes Ausredegeschwätz der Anglo-Amerikaner

ka. Stockholm, 24. Juli –
Die zu Anfang der vergangenen Woche mit einem ungeheuren Aufwand an Material begonnene Offensive Montgomerys in der Normandie, die zu einem entscheidenden Durchbruch durch die deutschen Stellungen führen und den Engländern und Amerikanern endlich den Weg nach Paris öffnen sollte, ist restlos zusammengebrochen. Dies ist das Fazit über die Kämpfe der letzten Tage, das man heute in London zu ziehen gezwungen ist.

Die Offensive, so meldet der Kriegskorrespondent des Daily Express, begann am Dienstag, wurde am Mittwoch und Donnerstag immer matter und wurde am Freitag völlig gestoppt. Es sei ein peinlicher Überraschungsschluss für eine spannende Woche gewesen. Welches Gewicht man dabei auf die Offensive gelegt hatte, geht daraus hervor, daß sie, wie Stockholms Tidningen berichtet, mit dem furchtbarsten Luftbombardement eingeleitet wurde, das die Militärgeschichte je gesehen hat, und daß zu ihrem Beginn ein Sonderkommuniqué andeutete, daß es jetzt den großen Schlag gegen Rommel gelte. In dem erwähnten Bericht des Daily Express wird betont, daß niemals eine Offensive mit einer vollkommeneren Zusammenarbeit zwischen Luftwaffe, Artillerie, Panzern und Infanterie eingeleitet worden sei. Innerhalb der ersten zehn Kilometer sei alles mustergültig verlaufen, aber dann sei die Offensive ins Stocken geraten. Das Überraschungsmoment sei verbraucht gewesen, Rommel habe seine Kräfte umgruppiert und man habe kein Dorf mehr erobert, während die Deutschen sich in neuen Stellungen eingegraben hätten.

Der Kriegskorrespondent des Daily Express hat nach diesem offensichtlichen Fiasko das begreifliche Bedürfnis gehabt, eine Erklärung für den Zusammenbruch der Offensive zu bekommen, und sich an einen höheren Offizier gewandt. Der gab ihm auf seine Frage die verblüffende Antwort, das Ziel dieser Offensive sei nicht gewesen, Gelände zu gewinnen, sondern Deutsche zu töten. Wenn einmal die deutschen Armeen in der Normandie vernichtet seien, sei es verhältnismäßig leicht, Frankreich zu erobern – So sieht also die Trostpille aus, die man jetzt den Unzufriedenen im Lande reicht, nachdem der Misserfolg nicht mehr zu verheimlichen ist. Es bleibt nur die Frage, ob man nicht durch die Folge von blutigen und vergeblichen Offensiven die eigenen Armeen vernichtet, statt diejenigen der Deutschen.

Auch auf amerikanischer Seite hat man das Bedürfnis, das immer deutlicher zutage tretende Fiasko vor der Öffentlichkeit zu entschuldigen, wobei man aber gleichzeitig eingestehen muß, daß die festgesetzte Zeittabelle längst über den Haufen geworfen ist. Höhere amerikanische Offiziere sind in Äußerungen gegenüber dem Reuters-Korrespondenten deutlich von der in England und Amerika herrschenden Einstellung abgerückt, daß das offenherzige Eingeständnis der Alliierten, hinter der ursprünglichen Zeittabelle zurück zu sein, ein Zeichen für unzufriedenstellende Fortschritte in Frankreich sei. Sie gäben zwar zu, daß die amerikanischen Truppen keineswegs so weit gekommen sind, wie es nach den Invasionsplänen der Fall sein müsste, erklären aber diese Pläne nachträglich für reine Theorie. Man habe eben nicht wissen können, was die Deutschen alles täten, um der Invasion zu begegnen. Wenn sich die Deutschen dazu entschlossen hätten, sich zurückzuziehen und weiter innen im Lande zu kämpfen, dann wäre auch das Vorrücken der Amerikaner schneller vor sich gegangen.

Diese strategische Weisheit verdient wirklich festgehalten zu werden. Sie umfasst ein solches Eingeständnis der eigenen Unfähigkeit und der Abhängigkeit von den Maßnahmen der deutschen Heeresführung, daß es darüber hinaus keines Wortes mehr bedarf, um darzulegen, wer Herr der Lage in der Normandie geblieben ist.