St Nazaire - Futile Heroism?

[Tom Canning]

Surely no battle is futile - nothwithstanding the cost - should it deprive the enemy of a primary asset- who knows what MIGHT have happened with a nutter in charge !
Cheers

[WotNoChad?]

No it's not correct, it's hindsight driven and quite lazy I think.

If you follow this line where does it end? Hitler in the bunker in '45? Ranting away, quite mad, insisting that the Germans deserved to be destroyed. Well lucky he didn't have much of an army, navy or airforce left, and all those efforts taken in destroying those forces quite futile, eh?

Don't get me wrong on this, there's a number of operations both regular and commando which didn't have the required result. Despite the propaganda value of these operations the fact remains that they worry the enemy on all levels from command to civilian, and stir the allies to a similar degree.

The Dambusters raids are a good example, although modernly dismissed by some as unsuccessful it does show how where there's a will there's a way. Despite all of Goebbels protestations, if this allied force chose to do what they did there was very little the Germans could do to stop it.

[Warlord]

I couldn´t agree more with two facts mentioned in this thread:

1. Commando style raids, no matter what their objective was, were basically conceived as a way to take the war to the enemy, keep him on his toes, constantly seeing shadows around every corner, with no rest and no sleep whatsoever, a sort of "offensive defense" in a time when the Allies were just beginning to get ready to march back against the Axis. If you add to that the definite intention of denying the enemy a very valuable asset, you just have to accept that Chariot was well worth it in any respect, although sadly it just didn´t go as planned, great deal of casualties included.

2. Who could know, back in ´42, that the Kriegsmarine didn´t intend to take the Tirpitz on a Bismarck style tour? Memories of 1940 sure were still haunting the men of the Admiralty, and given the strategic limitations the RAF still had in those days (remember the Mad Channel Dash by the Gneisenau and Scharnhorst), the right way to go initially was to try and take out the only place onto which the big ship could go if in need of repairs, should it break out into the Atlantic.

No way all those lives were wasted!

[Tom Canning]

If we are to look for futile battles then Montecassino must rank very high on any list - three head on battles with casualties in the region of that of San Nazaire - but on a daily basis for weeks on end

Monty's idea of creeping up the East coast to Pescara then over the mountains to Rome from the East might have had more merit - but then there was no actual plan - that was the real tragedy of Cassino and the 100,000 casualties.

[Warlord]

And even if they kept on going with the idea of taking Cassino, french general Juin´s plan was far better in all aspects than the one Allied commanders eventually used.

[Tom Canning]

Warlord -

I keep hearing about this plan of Gen Juin - but I have never fully understood which one it was - can you enlighten me ?

All I know about him was that he was severely critical about everthing and felt - rightly - that we had too many vehicles as opposed to foot sloggers - and that we should be doing this instead of that -

So US Gen Mark Clark put him to the test by swinging him to the East of the monastery towards Altina where he made good progress and might have cut Highway six - but then he was recalled to assist the US 34th Div which was in trouble closer to the Monastery - that was battle No 1 in Jan '44

His next Battle was No 4 - May '44 when starting from the bridgehead over the Garigliano - he went storming over the Aurunci Mountains - all the time complaining that 8th Army - were as always too slow to catch up which was the general Mark Clark line - but then he was French ! and so he was first at the top of the Liri valley

What is seldom talked about was that 8th Army and in particular the two Canadian Divisions -plus 25th and 21st Tank Bdes - 78th Division- 6th Armoured Div - 10 Indian Div- 4th British Div as well as the Polish Corps were hammering away at the toughest defences and killing grounds we had seen - wheras the French were runnng amok over virtually undefended mountains ! US 2nd corps staying close to the West coast

There is a great deal of difference in running through an open door - and trying to unlock a barred and very secure door - which the great French General failed to point out - at any time - then they disappaeraed to take part in the relatively undefended again - South OF France landings !!!
Cheers

[DaveW53]

Hmm this thread seems to have moved a thousand miles or so from St. Nazaire to Monte Cassino. Still I am with you on this one Tom. When other options were available, the allies became fixated on Cassino and that resulted in thousands of wasted lives/casualties.

I came across an interesting article on the 'net from historian James Holland who has written books about the campaigns in Malta, North Africa and more recently Italy. The link is below. Although focusing on the build up to bombing Cassino, the article mentions the alternative attack proposals by Major-General Francis Tuker, commander of the 4th Indian Division. Tuker also spent time discussing the possibilities of mountain warfare with General Juin, commander of the French Expeditionary Corps. Tuker's idea was to attack elsewhere and isolate the Germans at Monte Cassino.

http://www.secondworldwarforum.com/2...monte-cassino/

The article is critical of General Bernard Freyberg, commander of the New Zealand Corps but the whole sorry episode is confirmation of what can go wrong will go wrong.

Dave

[Tom Canning]

Dave W53 -
would agree with most of that article except for a few little niggles such as it was 1st Armoured Div at the left hook towards El Hamma when Horrocks was dispatched along with 201 Guards bde to take over the battle from Freyberg - Tuker was in the same league as Monty re the establishment and he learned his moutain carft at the Keren Heights of Ethiopia - but he did push for the Monastery to be bombed....Juin might have cut Highway six had he not been pulled back when he was in striking distance of Altina....Tuker finally went down with jaundice which took him away for good ....The plan to finish off the North African camapign was not Tukers - but Monty's in a meeting with Alex he outlined the set up and gave Jorrocks the job - " Jorrocks - he's your man to finish it off " thus Jorrocks took 4th Indian - 7th Armoured and 201 Guards to join 1st Army 6th Armoured - 4th British and the two Tank Bdes from Medjez , Tunis and Cap Bon

[Warlord]

Originally Posted by Tom Canning

Warlord -

I keep hearing about this plan of Gen Juin - but I have never fully understood which one it was - can you enlighten me ?

All I know about him was that he was severely critical about everthing and felt - rightly - that we had too many vehicles as opposed to foot sloggers - and that we should be doing this instead of that -

So US Gen Mark Clark put him to the test by swinging him to the East of the monastery towards Altina where he made good progress and might have cut Highway six - but then he was recalled to assist the US 34th Div which was in trouble closer to the Monastery - that was battle No 1 in Jan '44

His next Battle was No 4 - May '44 when starting from the bridgehead over the Garigliano - he went storming over the Aurunci Mountains - all the time complaining that 8th Army - were as always too slow to catch up which was the general Mark Clark line - but then he was French ! and so he was first at the top of the Liri valley

What is seldom talked about was that 8th Army and in particular the two Canadian Divisions -plus 25th and 21st Tank Bdes - 78th Division- 6th Armoured Div - 10 Indian Div- 4th British Div as well as the Polish Corps were hammering away at the toughest defences and killing grounds we had seen - wheras the French were runnng amok over virtually undefended mountains ! US 2nd corps staying close to the West coast

There is a great deal of difference in running through an open door - and trying to unlock a barred and very secure door - which the great French General failed to point out - at any time - then they disappaeraed to take part in the relatively undefended again - South OF France landings !!!
Cheers

Well, you basically hit it right on the nose, because what Juin proposed was a flanking attack well around Monastery Hill, in order to come back upon its rear, isolate it and take it without having to face the murderous fire Jerry was raining upon the allied forces that tried to go up its forward slopes.

The whole idea was, as you already pointed out, to break free of the stalemate, by attacking over almost defenseless high ground (in fact, a door left open) that the French-African troops with their mules had already proved most capable of handling, at least better than motorized unis with lots of vehicles, stuck under heavy shelling in the middle of roadless mountains.

[Tom Canning]

Warlord -
That plan would have made a lot of sense had it been adopted - however that initial attack was thwarted by Clark as his 34th Div ran into difficulty in trying to get too close to the Monastery so it might have worked especially with the other Mountain Troops in 4th Div - BUT - and there is always one of them - the raping and looting by the French African troops upset a lot of people and they were banished very quickly from what was eventually 8th Army territory - Clark was fixated then about his Anzio debacle and thought that Kesselring would bring more reserves away from the Liri valley to hold them - he was wrong lots of times !
Cheers