History of the Second World War (91 page)

Galled at the repulse, Hitler ordered a fresh offensive, opening on February 28, with diversionary attacks and the main thrust, by four divisions, down the Cisterna road. But this was held in check without difficulty by the American 3rd Division, and when, after the first three days, the low cloud cleared, the Allied air forces pulverised the attacking troops. On March 4 Mackensen was compelled, by his losses, to stop the offensive. Five German divisions were left to hold the ring, while the others were withdrawn to rest.

The Allies now embarked on still another attack on Cassino, in order to clear the way for their spring offensive. This time the attack was even more direct than before. The New Zealand Division was to push through the town, and then the 4th Indian was to take over the assault on Monastery Hill. A very heavy bombardment from the ground and the air — 190,000 shells and 1,000 tons of bombs — was used with the aim of paralysing the German troops in the town.

This bombardment was delivered on March 15, when the weather was clear enough. But the defenders of the sector, a regiment (three battalions) of the elite 1st Parachute Division, not only endured the dual bombardment without flinching but survived it well enough to check the follow-up of the assaulting infantry. They were helped by the mass of rubble created by the bombardment, which blocked the way for the Allied tanks. Although Castle Hill was captured, the 4th Indian Division’s further advance up the height was hampered by torrential rain that came down in a deluge to the aid of the defenders. A company of Gurkhas got as far as Hangman’s Hill, below the Monastery, but was there isolated. Meanwhile fierce fighting continued in the town. Fresh efforts by both sides proved abortive on the 19th, and next day Alexander decided that if success was not achieved within thirty-six hours the operation should be abandoned, for losses were becoming heavy. On the 23rd it was definitely broken off, with Freyberg’s agreement. So the Third Battle of Cassino ended in disappointment. After that the New Zealand Corps was disbanded, its units being given a rest and then dispersed to other corps, while the Cassino sector was taken over by the British 78th Division and the 1st Guards Brigade of the 6th Armoured Division.

Alexander had proposed on February 22 that ‘Operation Diadem’ should be delivered up the Liri valley in conjunction with a break-out and converging thrust from the Anzio bridgehead. It would be broadly similar in pattern to the January offensive, but better planned and co-ordinated, and was to be launched about three weeks before ‘Overlord’, the cross-Channel attack from England into Normandy, so that it might draw German divisions from France.

The plan devised by Alexander’s Chief of Staff, John Harding, concentrated extra punch into the blow by leaving only one corps on the Adriatic side of Italy, and sidestepping the rest of the Eighth Army westward, to take over the Cassino-Liri valley sector. The Fifth Army, including the French, would be in charge not only of the Garigliano sector on the left flank but of the Anzio bridgehead. An accompanying proposal was that ‘Operation Anvil’, the South of France landing, should be abandoned.

While the British Chiefs agreed to the plan, rather naturally, the American Chiefs of Staff opposed it, as they considered that a landing in the South of France would be a better diversion to help the Normandy invasion. Eisenhower then proposed a compromise, by which the Italian offensive should be given priority, but planning for ‘Anvil’ be continued. If, by March 20, it was clear that a major amphibious operation could not be mounted, most of the shipping in Italian waters should be withdrawn to aid ‘Overlord’. The compromise was agreed by the Combined Chiefs of Staff on February 25.

As the date for a decision approached, General Maitland Wilson — who had been given the new post of Supreme Commander, Mediterranean — heard from Alexander that the spring offensive in Italy could not be mounted before May, and it was emphasised that no troops should be withdrawn for ‘Anvil’ before the main forces facing the Gustav Line had broken through and linked up with the Anzio force. This meant that, allowing ten weeks for regrouping and preparation, ‘Anvil’ could not take place before the end of July — nearly two months after the Normandy landing, instead of being a preliminary diversion to help it. So Maitland Wilson and Alexander felt that the circumstances set them free to drop ‘Anvil’ and concentrate on an effort to complete the Italian campaign decisively. That view accorded with the preference of Churchill and the British Chiefs of Staff. Eisenhower tended to agree with them, if on the somewhat different ground that most of the Mediterranean shipping could now be transferred to ‘Overlord’. But the American Chiefs of Staff, while reluctantly accepting a delay in launching ‘Anvil’ until July, were opposed to its abandonment, and doubted the value of pursuing the offensive in Italy beyond the limits already set. They also doubted its effect in drawing off German divisions from Normandy — in which respect they were soon proved right. A prolonged wrangle ensued, being carried on and up in an interchange of lengthy telegraphic arguments between Mr Churchill and President Roosevelt.

Meanwhile, in Italy, preparations for the spring offensive went forward — this being in the British sphere of command. The move and redeployment of the Eighth Army along with other factors, including shipping shortages, delayed the launching of the offensive until May 11. The Eighth Army’s task was to break through at Cassino while the Fifth Army was to assist it, on the left flank, by thrusting across the Garigliano, and by a break-out from the Anzio bridgehead towards Valmontone on Route 6. At Anzio there were now six Allied divisions facing five German — with four more German divisions in reserve around Rome. On the Gustav Line sixteen Allied divisions (of which four lay close up in readiness for the exploitation) were assembled against six German divisions (with one in reserve). Much the larger part of the Allied strength on this front was concentrated on the stretch from Cassino to the mouth of the Garigliano — a total of twelve divisions (two American, four French, four British and two Polish) for the break-in, with four more close behind to exploit this by a thrust up the Liri valley, in the hope of piercing the Hitler Line, some six miles in the rear, before the Germans could rally on it and build it up.

The nine divisions of the Eighth Army were supported by over 1,000 guns, and they benefited still more by a spell of dry weather which enabled their tanks and other motor vehicles to follow up the advance — in contrast to the mud-bound conditions prevailing in the winter offensive. So the three armoured divisions (the 6th British, 5th Canadian and 6th South African) had better prospects of suitable action than ever before.

In the attack, the Polish Corps (of two divisions) was to tackle Cassino, while the British 13th Corps (of four divisions) advanced on its left, towards St Angelo.

The Allied offensive as a whole on the main front was to be supported by over 2,000 guns, while the Allied air forces in this theatre co-operated by heavy and widespread attacks on the enemy’s rail and road network, before turning on to battlefield targets in the final stage. (This ‘Operation Strangle’, however, did not seriously affect the German communications and supply system, as had been hoped.) Extensive sabotage activities were also mounted, but had disappointing results. As a deception, Allied troops openly rehearsed amphibious landings in the hope of making Kesselring believe that they were to come — particularly near Civitavecchia just north of Rome — but he was already so strongly convinced that the Allies ought to use their seaborne advantage in such a way that these attempts at deception seem to have had no marked effect.

The offensive opened at 11 p.m. on the night of May 11 with a massive artillery bombardment, promptly followed up by the advance of the infantry. But for the first three days the attack made little progress against stiff resistance on most sectors, The Polish Corps under General Anders suffered heavily in its assault at Cassino despite great determination and skill in using less direct routes of approach. The British 13th Corps also made slow progress, and would have suffered heavy losses but for the way the Poles focused the enemy’s attention. The U.S. 2nd Corps on the coast sector likewise gained little ground. But the French Corps, under Juin, which lay between these two, found only one division opposing its four, and made relatively fast progress through the mountainous region beyond the Garigliano, where the Germans had not expected a serious thrust. On the 14th the French broke into the Ausente valley, and the German 71st Division began falling back fast before them. That helped the American 2nd Corps which now began to push faster along the coast-road against the German 94th Division. Moreover these two German divisions were now on lines of retreat split by the almost roadless Aurunci Mountains. Juin, seizing the opportunity, sent his mountain-bred Moroccan Goums — a force of divisional strength under Guillaume — into the gap and across the mountains to pierce the rearward Hitler Line in the Liri valley before it could be properly manned.

The German right flank, or western wing, was now collapsing, and its prospects of rallying were all the worse because Senger, its able commander, was away on a course when the Allied offensive was launched. Moreover Kesselring, this time, was slow to send reserves southward until he saw how the situation in the north developed, and it was not until the 13th that one division was moved south, to the Liri valley. Although three more soon followed they were sucked into what soon became a whirlpool battle, and arrived too late to stabilise the front. The Germans in the Cassino sector continued to hold on for several days more, although the Canadian Corps was thrown in on the 15th for the exploitation, but on the night of the 17th these indomitable German paratroops at last withdrew — and the Poles entered the long-sought ruins of the monastery next morning, having lost nearly 4,000 men in their gallant efforts.

As most of the scanty German reserves had at last been drawn southward, the time was ripe for the planned break-out from the Anzio bridgehead — which was now reinforced by another American division, the 36th. Ordering this break-out attack for the 23rd, Alexander hoped there would be a strong and rapid thrust to Valmontone, to cut Route 6 — the main inland road — and thus cut off most of the German 10th Army that had been holding the Gustav Line. If that was achieved Rome should fall like a ripe apple. But the prospects were marred by Mark Clark’s differing views, and his eagerness that the troops of the Fifth Army should be the first to enter Rome. The U.S. 1st Armored and 3rd Infantry Divisions reached Cori, just beyond the coastal Route 7 — but well short of Route 6 — by the 25th, after a twelve-mile advance, and had linked up with the 2nd Corps that was driving north-ward along Route 7. Kesselring’s one remaining mobile division, the Hermann Goring, was rushing to the scene to stop this thrust — and being badly harassed by Allied air attacks. But at this stage Mark Clark swung his drive direct towards Rome, with four divisions, while only one was allowed to continue towards Valmontone — and this was held up three miles short of Route 6 by the larger part of three German divisions.

Alexander’s appeals to Churchill did not succeed in changing the direction of Mark Clark’s thrust, and that was slowed down by the Germans’ resistance in the ‘Caesar Line’ defences just south of Rome. Moreover the Eighth Army’s armoured divisions had found that their exploiting drive up the Liri valley was not as easy as had been hoped and they failed to pin the retreating German 10th Army against the mountain-spine formed by the Apennines. Instead the Germans were able to slip away to safety by roads running through the mountains, while their escape was helped by the absence of intervention from the Allied forces at Anzio.

Indeed, for a few days the Germans seemed to have a chance of establishing themselves and stabilising their front on the Caesar Line because of the tough resistance put up, under Senger’s direction, on the Arce-Ceprano sector along Route 6, coupled with the size and cumbrousness of the transport tail of the armoured divisions which was striving to drive up that overcrowded road.

But the gloomy prospect of another deadlock was annulled by the success of the U.S. 36th Division on May 30 in capturing Velletri on Route 7, in the Alban Hills, and piercing the Caesar Line. Exploiting the opportunity, Mark Clark ordered a general offensive by the Fifth Army, in which his 2nd Corps took Valmontone and thrust on up Route 6 towards Rome while the bulk of his 6th Corps backed the thrust up Route 7. Under pressure from eleven divisions the comparatively small German forces holding the approaches were forced to give way, and the Americans entered Rome on June 4. The bridges were found intact, as Kesselring had declared it an ‘open city’ rather than risk the Holy City s destruction in prolonged fighting.

On June 6, two days later, the Allies’ invasion of Normandy opened — and the campaign in Italy receded into the background. Their spring offensive in Italy, ‘Operation Diadem’, had cost the Americans 18,000 casualties, the British 14,000, and the French 10,000 by the time it was crowned by the capture of Rome. The German loss was about 10,000 in killed and wounded, but about 20,000 more were taken prisoner in the successive actions.

In comparative absorption of strength — thirty Allied divisions in this theatre against twenty-two German, and about two to one in actual troops — the continuation of the Allied offensive in Italy had not proved a good strategic investment. Nor did it make possible the invasion of Normandy by drawing the German forces away from there. Indeed, it ‘did not succeed in preventing the enemy from reinforcing north-west Europe’.* Their strength in the northern part of France (north of the Loire) and in the Low Countries was increased from thirty-five divisions at the beginning of 1944 to forty-one when the Allied cross-Channel invasion was launched in June.

*Ehrman:
Grand Strategy,
Vol. V, p. 279.

The claim that can more justly be made for the strategic effect of the Italian campaign, as an aid to the success of the Normandy landing, is that without its pressure the German strength on the Channel front could have been increased even more. The scale of the assault and immediate follow-up forces there were limited by the number of landing craft available, so that the Allied forces employed in Italy could not have added to the weight of the Normandy landing during its crucial opening phase. On the other hand, the use in Normandy of the German forces detained in Italy might have been fatal to the prospects of the landing. This is a valid claim which, strangely, many of its British advocates have failed to make in trying to claim too much. But even this claim is subject to a doubt whether a large movement of troops to Normandy would have been possible in face of the Allied interdiction bombing of the railways.