Was it a giant waste of resources? What mobile forces and material could have been built in its place?
You didn't see the allies come ashore at Calis did you? Although I would like to have a concrete panther. M, could you build me one?
Tik has a point. Both sides paid a heavy price because of the Atlantic Wall. It tied up German resources of which not all were high grade. It forced the Allies into spending huge amount of resources in the planning for the invasion as well as the blood paid on the beaches. Did it succeed. In part yes. A fortress is no longer defensible. It will fall at some point. It did hold up the invasion and gave the Germans enough time to organize a defensive strategy that could have succeeded had not the Eastern Front drained all of its resources.
German armament factories were always short of laborers- the 1.4 million Todt organization could be put into use there rather than create a bunch of easily defeated obstacles.
How then would the Germans defend mainland France from a D-day type invasion? Without the Atlantic Wall the Germans literally letting the Allies just walk in, that would not be good for morale or the possible outcome of the battle. Had the Atlantic wall worked the allies would have been thrown back into the sea. Although they would certainly plan and attack again in time, they would lose alot of men and equipment on that beach. I think in the end had it worked, then the Russians would be the sole rulers of Germany and perhaps the cold war could have ended differently.
Were the obstacles a continued annoyance during the Normandy battles? At least at the break in area, the obstacles were defeated in short order on D-day with minor losses. The bulk of the German defense rested on the dozen motorized Panzer/Panzergrenadier/Fallschirmjager divisions.
This was touched upon in this "What If?" http://www.ww2f.com/what-if/24689-engineers-atlantic-wall-went-different-design.html
So here we have a discussion of was the Atlantic Wall worth it. What contribution would have been better for the resources it consumed. I stand by the fact that there is not one. Had the Atlantic wall been finished to Rommels specs the landing would have had to take place else where. All of the beaches that had been finished by the Germans were considered too heavily fortified to invade. Even with more people working they could not have changed the outcome more then the wall did. At the end of the war there was a surplus of small arms and airplanes. Also there were tanks still rolling off the lines. The Germans were out of fuel and men. the labores were not people that were eligiable for service or they were already in the service. Either way I say that the wall was the best investment for the resources it used.
