Lost Battles?

I'd like to limit this to the ETO to keep it contained... A couple of other threads are near misses, but bring up the question of allied performance.

I'd like to solicit opinions on battles the allies lost in western Europe. Or, did we lose any at all?

Market Garden might be counted since the ground forces didn't gain the final objective, but on the other hand they didn't lose any of the ground they took - not counting Arnhem itself which the paras were only supposed to hold until 30 Corp reached them. Loss, tie?

Hurtgen Forest might be considered a loss, though the objective was finally reached after breakthroughs in other areas. Loss or not?

Anyone else have battles that should be mentioned or comments on the above fights?

 

I like to think of the Falaise Pocket as a "partial" loss, since if Ike had let Patton move north, instead of halting him to let Monty creep south to close the trap, More Germans would have been trapped, and very likely caused a total collapse in the west.

 

Does this count ?

Leros was a lost battle for the British in 1943

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodecanese_Campaign

 

" might be?" Market Garden was a loss .

Who is "we" (The US, the British, the Canadians, ther French, the Danes, the Norvegians?) Are you talking about the post D-Day only or

Other losses:

-The Battle of France (lost by five allied nations inclunding the French and the British) ,

-Operation Weserübung (lost by the Danes, the Norvegians, the French and the British) .

-The invasion of Saarland (abandonned by the French in 1939 while they could have entered Germany even further in 1939) .

 

I used the term ETO. ETO (in the US at least) means western Europe after the D-Day landings. We could spread it all over the globe and go back to 1939 or so - the Med, N. Africa, the Far East, but it would just get messy. It would be easier to just focus on those final campaigns.

 

Fort Driant during the Battle of Metz comes to mind. The fort was eventually bypassed after attempts to take it by the 5th Infantry Division failed.

 

I'm not so sure. Monty said it was a "90% success." OK, I know that was a face-saving statement, but it did liberate central Holland and flanked the Schelde which made opening the port of Antwerp less costly - a port that was desperately needed. I think that makes "win" or "loss" arguable. Ground taken is ground taken, people liberated are people liberated.

Not a battle I'm familiar with. I'll have to read up on that.

 

Small action near end of the war for an artillery unit that was serving as infantry all explained here
http://ww2talk.com/forums/topic/19926-infantry-assault-by-600-5th-battalion-duke-of-wellingtons-west-riding-regiment-15-april-1945/

briefly to quote a post by my mate Rob.

 

Oddly enough, I was going to post that when I saw this thread. Jubilee might have been a raid, but its scale and amount of forces involved suggests to me that it should be classed as a battle.

 

While Nordwind ended up an Allied victory it was clearly a hard fought campaign with the immediate issue being a stalement for near several months.. The ultimate goal of a break through to the rear of the US 3th Army creating a Kessel I do not think came close to happening but tough fighting by both sides and a large amount of troops involved.

Keith, my apologies , you ask for loses in the ETO and they are few from D-Day on so I am stretching.

Gaines

 

The British and Australians were pushed back in the Italian campaign, ships had to come back to pick up those they'd only just dropped off...I'd be also interested in the "small" battles won or lost...half a kilometre away one group is doing well whilst over the hill another group is being outclassed...there were any number of "personal battles" that didn't always reflect the overall outcome.
Kodiak has also alluded to an official win VS a tactical win or strategic win...

 

I also would count MARKET-GARDEN as a definite loss by the Allies. The forces engaged did not achieve their goal and a British airborne division was horribly mutilated.

The other loss was the Hurtgen Forest. The Germans were able to hold us off long enough that they were able to launch the Ardennes offensive and inflicted severe losses on some American units.

 

Market Garden was not a lost battle, just because the allies did not achieve their ultimate goal, nor because of the mutilation of one division.

If that is the standard, then Germany lost the Battle of Crete.

Crete was not the next stage in a long-term Mediterranean strategy. Instead the invasion proved costly in losses of manpower and airborne capability, nearly became Hitler’s first operational defeat, and tarnished Hitler’s opinion of airborne operations.

In terms of the German broad strategic plan and the expenditure of valuable finite German resources immediately prior to Barbarossa, it was a monumental disaster.

 

Well green slime, I cannot agree with you in any way! Operation M-G had an objective of crossing the Rhine and then punching into Germany and the Ruhr. Due to German counter-measures, they didn't get that done. Without the Rhine crossing the whole thing was rather pointless. So, if an enemy prevents you from achieving your main goal, how can that be called anything but a defeat. Of course the real losers in that battle were the residents of northern Holland who ended up going through a starvation winter with many deaths due to malnutrition.

As far as Crete goes, the German objective was to take Crete. They achieved this goal so they won. It could be easily argued that it was a phyrric victory, but it was a victory nevertheless. The monumental disaster for the Germans was the whole Greek/Balkans sideshow that caused a critical delay in Barbarossa, not just Crete.

 

When you stand on the lion's share of the battlefield, it is hardly a defeat. You can call it an operational failure due to the "bridge too far", but calling it a defeat is really going too far. The German "success" didn't change anything with regards to Nazi Germany's chances of survival, compared to no Market Garden at all.

By your standard, Pearl Harbour was a Japanese defeat.

WRT to Merkur, The German objective was to take Crete, and not suffer 90% casualties in their Fallschirmsjäger; had they known this, they wouldn't have even attempted to invade Crete. All done in order to prevent allied bombers from reaching Romanian oilfields. Which they later did anyway. The wider benefit of actually fighting over and conquering Crete was never realised by Germany. Crete specifically was a strategic failure, as it prevented the Germans from doing other, more important tasks with their scarce resources. Germans were far harder put for resources than the Western Allies, who quite frankly, at the time of Market-Garden, had more paratroopers, more transports, than they knew what to do with.

In other words, if the goal is pointless, that is, lacking meaning in a wider perspective, and causes irreplaceable losses, not only in the short term, but even medium- to long-term, then it is a significant defeat, even if, on the operational level, the battle itself was Pyrrhic victory.

The delay to Barbarossa wasn't critical, by the way.

 

Since M-G had a strategic objective, which was to end the war in '44, and due to German resistance that objective wasn't met, it's hard to say we won that battle. Yes we took some territory but it really didn't appreciably shorten the war, which was what we were after. The Germans won because they staved off an incipient strategic disaster.

Actually, one can argue that in a way, Pearl Harbor actually was a Japanese defeat. By concentrating on the BBs and ignoring the fuel tanks and dry docks, all the Japanese did in a strategic sense was really P.O. and energize the American people while inflicting damage that wasn't vital.

My view of airborne units is that of an elite force whose actions insure that a military operation succeeds. Heavy casualties should be accepted. However, as you pointed out, the hard losses were in Ju-52s which would have probably been lost later at Stalingrad anyway. On the other hand, Crete was never used as an airbase against Romania so it was a sort of success.

 

Gaines is right as he remember us operation Nordwind.


General Jacob L. Devers, commander of the 6th Army Group, acknowledged that the Battle of Hatten-Rittershoffen (which is part of the offensive NORDWIND) was one of the greatest defensive battles of World War II. But officially the US Army has never recognized that NORDWIND was an offensive or battle as such, but qualified this offense as a mere diversion that was within the framework of the offensive, more generally, the battle of the Bulge.
NORDWIND is behind the campaign of Alsace and forgotten battles (Reipertswiller / Wingen s / Moder, Hatten-Rittershoffen) whose outcome was the requirement for American troops in the north of Alsace, operate a significant decline, facing the enemy, to retreat several kilometers and maintain these new positions for many weeks until the operation undertone.

The American army entered Alsace late November 1944 and stayed there until March 1945. She stayed nearly four months by releasing 2 times the most Alsatians northeastern villages because of a major conter-offensive of the Germans (NORDWIND)

The cost of fighting and losses in men were huge.

How can we call this ? An attack to the enemy country, forcing US troops to a significant retreat and a take position for a while. A losing battle ?

Eric

 

Harolds, I have to agree with you on the Hurtgen Forest. Obviously it was not a true defeat as it was finally resolved in favor of the Allies but certainly few could declare it a glorious win. It may be the least written about major battle in the ETO. Even General Gavin declared it unnecessary, a horrible loss of soldiers, stagnant for several months, a slaughter on both sides. As it was finally a win at terrible cost it cannot be a loss but it is the definition of Pyrrhic victory. It is a win no one would do again.