NORMANDY INVASION

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 223, 17 June 1944, Page 6

NORMANDY INVASION

The Task Ahead ALIGNMENTS FOR BATTLE It is doubtful if there will be any definite moment when Allied leaders can say that the beach-head landings in Normandy have been completed. There will continue to be landings till the Allies gain possession of suitable ports. Nevertheless, there is to be discerned a definite change in the operations. The beachheads have been consolidated to a degree which makes possible more normal types of battle, as seen in the Italian campaign, and the last stages of the African operations. One might say that the storming of Normandy has almost ended and its conquest is about to be undertaken. It cannot be said that our beach-heads are entirely secure till Caen falls into our hands. Till that occurs the Germans have direct access by numerous roads to within 10 miles of the beaches in that area To the west the beaches are tolerably secure. Indeed, in all areas other than that of Caen the conquest of Normandy has started in earnest. Probably the most important task, for the Allies is to gain a port. The obvious port is Cherbourg. It is unlikely that the siege of Cherbourg will start in earnest till the Allied line closes the base of the peninsula. Even then the task is by no means simple. Between Cherbourg and the Americans there lies an area of high ground (about 500 feet or so) fronted by a jig-saw maze of woods, copses, and orchards. Advances in this type of country are slow because every feature must be captured and secured. Moreover, it is difficult to obtain early warning of possible counter-attacks. The siege of Cherbourg will require more troops than appear so far to have been devoted to operations in that area. It will be resisted strongly by the Germans, who appreciate as much as the Allies the significance of Cherbourg. Given good conditiqns, it is possible that Cherbourg will be taken within the next fortnight. The time factor depends on the priority which the Germans give to the Caen area as regards reinforcements. Allied Threat to Paris.

Operations in the Cherbourg peninsula may well assume the role of a battle within a battle. In the main area of Normandy south of the beaches the Allies will be confronted with the task of clearing the Germans out of the hilly country whose main mass lies 40 miles inland, due south from Bayeux and Caen. This hill mass is some 50 miles from west to east and about 30 miles from north to south. It rises to 1200 feet in the south-east near Alencon. Though the task is not nearly so formidable as that which the Allies set themselves in Italy, it is nevertheless a majot operation, involving a frontage nearly as great as the British line in Great War I in 1916. The task must be dissociated from the beach-head operations, with which it has no connexion. It is a task requiring not only a new tactical outlook but a new operational alignment. Beaches do not usually conform to the alignment which natural and other features compel an army to assume once it has got a sure footing. In this case the beach alignment is from east to west, whereas the lateral road alignment is from south-west to north-east, with communication roads at right-angles. Either purposely or unconsciously, it is usual for troops engaged in operational roles to line themselves up in conformity with natural or other features. In order to make best use of existing road communications. It is thus probable that Allied penetration will deepen south of the western beaches. In fact, the battle may swing diagonally across the area parallel to a line from Avranches in the southwest to the vicinity of Caen. Cherbourg when taken will then come into its own as the Allied port of Normandy, at the base of a fine network of feeder and lateral roads. The Allies would then be in possession of a triangular slice of Normandy. with sides of 60 miles. Two of these sides are coast and the third the land front. When that task, or other battle alignment has been completed the stage will be set for penetration deep into the mainland of France, including the high ground between Vire and Alencon; which becomes in danger of being by-passed. German reaction from now onward is likely to be strong, because they have lost the first round —the battle of the beaches. If they lose the next round —■ the conquest of Normandy—Paris becomes endangered. ■ The coast from Le Havre to Calais is already threatened by a huge ?rmy on its flank. This precarious German situation could be made even more precarious by possible large-scale landings elsewhere. Any effort of the Germans to bolster up the Bay of Biscay area would be jeopardized by flank threats from our northern armies. Brest and the submarine ports in its vicinity would then cease to play a useful role for the Germans. —E.A.A.