What would you put D-Day's success down to?

Just wondering what your thoughts were on the reasons for the success of D-Day. With the exception of Omaha, the landings were relatively successful, but would you put this down to Allied planning (Operation Fortitude seems to have convinced Hitler that the the Normandy landings were a bluff and Patton's Army Group was coming across the channel at Calais at any time for example).

Or would you put it more down to Nazi mistakes? With Enigma compromised and a lack of a viable spy network in the UK meant that they were completely blind (the example of the newspaper crossword naming all the beach codenames is always a good example of how security was lax in some areas), Hitler's compromise on where to place the Panzers, so there was not enough strength on the beaches (as Rommel wanted), nor in reserve meant the Allies had a much better chance of securing the beach head.

As a historian I think I typically sit on the fence here, but would be interested in hearing your thoughts.

 

Having read a lot about Normandy, I would honestly say that my I believe success to have been due to the '6P principle' ( Perfect Planning Prevents P*** Poor Performance ).

Yes there were othe factors and a mixture of good luck/bad luck as in any Operation of war. But the Allies really did prepare as diligently as possible, taking lessons from other earlier disasters all the way from Dieppe back to Suvla Bay. The amount of preparative effort put in by all arms ( RAF, USAAF, Navies etc etc ) was extraordinary and much of this effort led the Germans to make errors.

And even with all that, it was quite a close-run thing......

 

Yes, I think that I would certainly agree with that. The level of Allied planning, both in terms of deception and logistics meant that the German High Command had very little idea as to what was happening, and even after the initial landings still could not see the full picture.

Worried about other landings in Norway and Calais, and the fact he got up late, meant that the German's were on a back foot from the very beginning.

The pure ingenuity and skill of those planning and executing the, from Hobart's 'Funnies' to the Mulberries meant that whole areas of risk were taken out of the landings (or certainly the British and Canadian).

 

It was a close thing. Had the Germans reacted sooner and had been better organized at the top, things may have turned out different.

 

But do you think the fact that the Germans' didn't react quickly and were disorganised at the top had a great deal to do with the Allied planning? The high command to some extent did not react quickly because they weren't convinced that this was the full attack - this was thanks to Fortitude suggesting attacks further up the French coast and/or Norway?

Obviously the disorganised nature of the German high command was to a great extent due to Hitler's paranoia and insistence of having a hand in all operational strategy - however, Allied led Resistance activity and some accurate bombing resulted in cut communications, this can't have helped either!

 

I would say yes to all of the above

 

I think, at least on some level, the real reason for D-Day's success was that the Germans were fighting a two front war, and so had the majority of their resources elsewhere. In the end, given the numbers, it would be always likely, if not inevitable, that the Germans could not hold off a substantial attack from the West. It was just a matter of time until the allied resources advantage won the day.

 

I think it was a mixture of all: good planning,good luck, Germans made mistakes, air supremacy etc.

However it is interesting to notice that despite the Allied air supremacy the Germans were able to launch powerful offensive punches at the Allied beacheads.

Also wonder what would have happened if both the Mulberry harbors had been destroyed by the storm mid-June.

 

You mean a three front war?

Russia, Italy, and the West Aerial and Naval battles leading up to D-Day itself.

 

It might be true that the Germans deployed more manpower in the East than the West, but the line in NW Europe is significantly shorter than CE Europe. The Germans did leave IIRC 40% of their armor guarding the West and the force to space ratio should have been much higher. Plus, the Germans had no equivalent of the Atlantic Wall in the East.

 

I feel that not only did the Allies spend countless months planning, building supply stores, and training men around the United States but also in Britain for the invasion, D-Day worked out great for both sides, yes there was lose of life on both sides but what if the tables were turned and the Airborne hit their targets, and the Germans had the beaches fortied with more troops. More lives on both sides would have been lost. There were mistakes on both sides but they did save countless lives in the process. The ture object of the invasion was to uproot the Nazi's out of France and get a foothold in Europe. And that was just what happened.

 

Well, maybe. But my overall point is that the Germans were greatly overstretched, and barring any major miracles, by 1944 German defeat on any and all fronts was more a matter of when, than if. Germany could have had Enigma secured, they could have seen through fortitude, they could have deployed their tanks however they wanted, they could have had everything perfect, and the best case scenario for them would only be a temporary and probably pyhrric victory. Certainly some things turned out well, but the numbers were on the Allies' side from the start.

 

1.) A very well run air campaign. It shaped the battlefield without giving away the probable location of the landing. It not only attrited some forces, it severly degraded the logistical infrastucture leading to the battlefield.
2.) Outstanding use of a misinformation campaign. They kept the Germans guessing so they could'nt mass their forces at the actual site.
3.) Massive resources.
4.) A sound operational plan.
5.) Dwight Eisenhower. He had the nerve to pull the trigger and once he did he was all in.
Karl von Clausewitz:
"After we have thought out everything carefully in advance and have sought and found without prejudice the most plausible plan, we must not be ready to abandon it at the slightest provocation. Should this certainty be lacking, we must tell ourselves that nothing is accomplished in warfare without daring; that the nature of war certainly does not let us see at all times where we are going; that what is probable will always be probable though at the moment it may not seem so; and finally, that we cannot be readily ruined by a single error, if we have made reasonable preparations."

6.)Three Airborne Divisions and the aircraft to deliver them. Troops behind your lines disrupting communications and support is never a good thing.
7.) The courage of the Brits, Canadians, Americans and all the other allied troops that made the landings. One side will lose heart first and break or fall back. When the going got rough, our guys had the most fortitude.
8.) The LST, invented by the Brits. Heavy equipment delivered to the beach is a good thing.
9.) US Marine Corps. Developed the LCVP, from an Andrew Higgins design. Convinced the Navy to adopt over major objections (at one point rejected it because it's 36' length would have required moving the davits on all ships to accomidate them). In the 20's and 30's they developed the techniques and doctrine necessary to make a large scale amphibious operation against a defended shore possible.
10.) We got inside their OODA loop.



Karl von ClausewitzKarl von Clausewitz

 

While nothing short of brilliant planning on behalf of the Allies, IMO, the ultimate reason for its success was the Eastern Front.

 

This was a major factor to the success. Russia kicked off a big offensive which helped knock the German command off its heels as to where to send resources and troops in the months that followed. I believe the success of Overlord was in the training everyman knew his job and in the case of special forces units they knew each others job. From the pathfinders to the air forces to the direcotor of naval fire and soldiers on the field. They all knew what the success of this operation meant even though mistakes happen no operation in history was ever so one sided for final and complete superiority in a war. Also keeping Patton's ghost army in England looking towards Calais probably did'nt hurt!

 

As an aside to this, but suplimenting the 6P principle it should be remembered that just the naval portion of the overall plan for the Overlord operation ran to 800 type written pages; a complete set of naval orders including maps weighed 300 pounds.

Since it contained detailed moves required of 4,000+ ships for the build up and move toward France on June 6th, the shear amount of planning and records/operational orders was daunting.

While it is true that no plan survives first contact, the very depth to which this operation had been planned and trained for surely contributed to its overall success.

 

Luck, air superiority, and Hitler. The Germans could very easily have turned D-day into an allied debacle, with a little more air (several hundred ME-262's fitted as bombers held in reserve for just this occasion) and a lot more armor (Hitler stupidly held the German armor at Calais, where it was useless, until the allies had achieved a solid beach-head. Hitler thought that the Normandy landings might just be a huge feint and the real invasion set for Calais).

Amphibious invasion by sea has always been a very difficult thing for any nation or group of nations to pull off sucessfully, even with air superiority. No nation, except the US, historically has had much experience or success with such invasions. There are so many things to go wrong, so many things that are unknown, and so many ways the enemy can respond (even in a land battle success isn't assured unless you have 3 to 1 odds or greater in your favor - look at the initial stages of Operation Barbarossa.) The defender almost always has the advantage in any battle - he knows the terrain, he has mined it, laid guns on it, and has any number of tricks up his sleeve to pull against whatever clever move you might choose to do and it is YOU who are coming to HIM to fight, usually under HIS conditions.

A few good German air attacks carried out with German jet aircraft, even with allied air superiority, could if launched at the right time have possibly caused an allied rout on D-day. All those ships and landing craft were slow moving targets, and if many had been destroyed, the allies could conveivably had been forced to disembark. In the long run, it wouldn't have mattered, since the allies would simply have tried again in 6 months - but the propaganda victory, and the blow to allied morale, might have delayed the end (but really, only long enough for the a-bomb to get dropped on Germany instead of Japan though - and one has to wonder how Hitler would have responded to that).

 

Airpower and hitler when you brake it down and german troops saying whole time "Where is the luftwaffe?".

 

O and plus their where NO TANKS IN NORMANDY.The germans were screwed thanks to yours truly.

 

That is simply not true matey, the Germans certainly did have tanks in the Battle of Normandy. What you are probably thinking of is that there were little to know tanks in the Contentin Peninsular area of Normandy except French R35's and the like. In Normandy there a few Panzer Divisions including the 12 SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend, the 21st Panzer Division held the British at Caen, as well as the 2nd Panzer Division to name a few.
Have you never heard of Micheal Wittman the German Panzer ace and his Tiger tank unit and there exploits in Normandy?

The tanks were held off for days by Hitler, as he feared a second Invasion and would need the tanks to counter any such threat, this is why it is often thought that there were no tanks in Normandy, but it is far from the truth.