The Steel Wave (2 page)

As the German military commanders prepare for their powerful surge across the English Channel, Hitler suddenly vacillates. To the enormous frustration of his key generals, nearly all of whom believe an invasion of England will succeed, Hitler’s order never comes. Instead, he orders his Luftwaffe to bomb British cities, killing civilians at random. Hitler believes this assault on civilian morale will bring the British to their knees. His generals can only watch as thousands of German bombers are confronted by a thin defensive line of British fighter planes. In 1940, in what becomes known as the Battle of Britain, British pilots engage the Luftwaffe with extraordinary gallantry and effectiveness. Hundreds of German aircraft are shot from the sky, and Hitler’s dreams for an easy conquest of England go down with them. Strategically and militarily, it is Hitler’s first catastrophic mistake.

In June 1941, Hitler makes his second huge miscalculation. Though he has signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union, Hitler surprises the Russians by launching a massive invasion that nearly succeeds in conquering that enormous land and its vast resources. But like Napoleon before him, Hitler finds his army cannot maintain an offensive through the brutal Russian winter, which proves as challenging an adversary as the enormous Russian army. Though German troops close on Stalingrad and reach the gates of Moscow, they cannot finish the job. For the remainder of the war, the Russian campaign will become an enormously costly drain on German manpower and resources. Hitler’s most capable field generals begin to wonder whether their Führer’s fanatical ambitions can succeed.

While German forces obliterate their opposition on the European mainland, in the Pacific, Hitler’s ally the Japanese share similar success, wiping American defenders from the Philippines and occupying nearly every chain of islands in the South Pacific. Though Pearl Harbor is a devastating strike at the U.S. Pacific Fleet, an enormous rebuilding effort begins, with some of the damaged ships from Pearl Harbor made seaworthy in a matter of months. The nation is now energized for war. American forces under General Douglas MacArthur swell in number and effectiveness and begin to push back at the Japanese. With fierce determination, American naval and air defenses hold the line in the central Pacific at the island of Midway, and American and British forces stem the Japanese tide that threatens to wash over Australia and India. As the war progresses, the Japanese military leaders learn that they are not quite as invincible as their emperor has told them. In Europe, that is a lesson Hitler’s generals learn as well. But like Emperor Hirohito, Hitler sees neither his own flaws nor the flaws of those sycophantic military planners around him who shelter him from reality.

Despite the increasing irrationality of their Führer, the German generals are for the most part the finest military minds of the war, and German commanders in the field understand what they must do to win their campaigns. But Hitler makes another monumental mistake, one he repeats often; he thwarts his most talented commanders by appointing himself Germany’s chief strategist. Yet Hitler never visits frontline positions, never sees for himself what his decisions and his meddling are costing his army.

I
n 1941, in North Africa, a German campaign to support Hitler’s ally Italian dictator Benito Mussolini becomes a theater of war all its own. The British, based in Egypt, engage in furious battles to prevent conquest of the Suez Canal and the oil fields of the Middle East. Their adversary is Erwin Rommel, a German commander whose energy and audacity have made him a legend. But Rommel’s reputation alone cannot bring a German victory. After enormous success against variously inept British commanders, Rommel is finally stopped. Early in November 1942, his army suffers a major defeat in western Egypt at a village called El Alamein. His British adversary, newly in command, is Bernard Law Montgomery. Monty is a brash and disagreeable man who is no one’s first choice for the job. But when his predeccesor is killed unexpectedly in a plane crash, Winston Churchill reluctantly approves Montgomery for the command. Montgomery’s stunning defeat of Rommel gives the British a much-needed hero and launches Montgomery into the spotlight as England’s most accomplished field commander. Rommel is unimpressed with Montgomery, believing him too slow and methodical. As Rommel retreats westward across Libya, land he had once taken from the British, he is painfully aware that had Hitler responded to his general’s repeated cries for supplies and manpower, guns and gasoline, the Germans would never have been turned back. It is a bitter pill for Rommel, who continues to plague the German High Command with incessant calls for support. As the British bolster Montgomery with a steady flow of crucial supplies, Rommel’s army is increasingly ill fed and ill equipped. Instead of opening Hitler’s eyes to the importance of the North Africa campaign, Rommel has become a pariah, seen by Hitler’s henchmen as a bothersome defeatist.

D
uring most of 1942, as the British wage their seesaw war back and forth against the tanks of Rommel’s formidable Afrika Korps, the American military pours into Britain with the energy and resources to launch their own ground campaign against Hitler’s Fortress Europe. George Marshall vigorously insists that the British agree to an American plan to attack straight across the English Channel, an invasion onto the coast of France. But the British are skeptical. They have already suffered humiliating and costly defeats and have endured far more casualties than the British people can accept. Memories of the First World War are too vivid, and Winston Churchill and his chief of staff, Sir Alan Brooke, are in no hurry to repeat that kind of disaster. The British insist that Hitler’s fortifications on the French coast are far too formidable to breach and the cost of such an invasion is far too high. Marshall and the Americans, helpless against British intransigence, know they cannot wage war against Hitler alone. Churchill convinces the Americans instead to join the British in a new strike into North Africa, finally to destroy Rommel’s army and begin a campaign to clear the Germans out of the Mediterranean. After much rancor and debate, the Americans agree to put off their plans for an invasion of France. With the British supplying most of the sea and air power for the North African assault, the Americans will provide the vast majority of the ground forces. After much political wrangling, the decision is made to place an American in overall command. The man chosen for the job is General Dwight David Eisenhower.

Eisenhower comes to command after long years in service as an exceptional administrator, a man known for a sharp organizational mind. To the field generals who have faced the enemy, however, Eisenhower is a complete unknown, and there are grave doubts about his abilities on both sides of the Atlantic. But George Marshall has known Eisenhower for many years, considers him far more than just a capable subordinate, and convinces Roosevelt that “Ike” is the man for the job. In the late spring of 1942, Eisenhower arrives in England, where he faces the daunting challenge of uniting the armies, navies, and air forces of two separate countries into one cohesive and cooperative fighting force. Eisenhower faces another challenge as well. He is only a major general, and thus he is outranked by every one of his key British subordinates.

On November 8, 1942, as Montgomery slowly pursues Rommel’s bloodied army, the Allies launch Operation Torch, the largest amphibious landing ever attempted. It will become America’s first land-based operation of the war and results in a relatively easy conquest of ports and territories in Morocco and Algeria, which are defended mostly by weak Hitler-dominated French forces. The victory emboldens the Americans, who begin to believe that the war will be a rapid affair, brought to a close by their superior arms and cocky enthusiasm. To Rommel, the successful invasion means that he is now squeezed between pressure from Montgomery, to the east, and the hard thrust from American and British troops closing on him from the west. With characteristic speed, Rommel reassembles his army from their lengthy retreat and strikes at the Americans, who he believes are not yet prepared for a serious fight. The Americans first meet Rommel at Kasserine Pass, Tunisia, where inept and unprepared American commanders discover that Rommel’s reputation is well earned. Kasserine Pass is an American disaster, and panicked troops and their commanders fall back to safe havens in Algeria. Despite his success, Rommel is virtually ignored by the German High Command. Though he has become a hero to the German populace, Rommel cannot convince Hitler of how inadequately his army is being supplied. As he tours the battlefield, he ruefully observes the enormity of the raw materials and tools of war the Americans have brought to the fight. No matter how often and how successfully he strikes at the enemy closing around him, defeat in North Africa is inevitable.

By the spring of 1943, his pessimism strikes one too many nerves in Berlin, and Rommel is recalled from North Africa. Eisenhower makes a purge of his own, removing several Allied commanders who are not up to the task. As he scrambles to put the best army he can into line against the experienced German opposition, capable U.S. officers begin to emerge. To bolster the sagging spirits and ineffectiveness of the American infantry, Eisenhower names George S. Patton to command the American ground forces. Patton is a fiery and profane man, who shows every indication that he will go only forward on a battlefield. Under Patton, Eisenhower assigns command to another rising star, a West Point classmate whom Eisenhower knows well. His name is Omar Bradley.

Within weeks, Montgomery’s forces are united with Eisenhower’s, and the Germans in Tunisia are utterly defeated. Their presence in North Africa is eliminated entirely.

But Eisenhower does not rest on his laurels. Immediately, the Allies plan for their next assault, to strike directly into Europe. Still thwarted by the stubbornness of Winston Churchill, the Americans agree to a plan for the invasion of Sicily, to confront the powerful German armor and Italian infantry that have made the island a fascist stronghold. If successful, the conquest of Sicily will open the door for the Allies to invade the Italian mainland.

In July 1943, the invasion is launched: the British under Montgomery, the Americans now led by Patton. Within weeks, Sicily falls, though Patton and Montgomery clash repeatedly over tactics and matters of ego—a feud that will plague Eisenhower for the rest of the war.

With Sicily secure, the Americans continue to accept Winston Churchill’s philosophy that the best way to defeat Hitler is to strike hard at his “soft underbelly.” In September 1943, the British, again led by Montgomery, and the Americans, led by General Mark W. Clark, invade the Italian mainland. Though the invasion succeeds in driving Mussolini from power, there is no clear military victory. The Italian campaign will drag on for nearly two more years.

Having satisfied Winston Churchill’s inflexible insistence on attacking Hitler from below, the Americans begin again to promote their concept of a cross-channel invasion of France. Despite Churchill’s stubbornness and the power of his personality, the British realize that if there is to be a victory in Europe, it is American productivity and American manpower that will enable the Allies to continue the fight. Across the Atlantic, American factories are pouring out aircraft, tanks, and military vehicles at an astonishing rate, equipment that is flowing mostly into England. The German U-boat war has been blunted significantly by the use of Allied convoys, enormous numbers of merchant ships traveling in clusters, protected by numerous submarine-destroying ships and planes. There are technological advances as well, such as radar and sonar. As the number of German U-boats declines, the amount of aid and matériel flowing into England dramatically increases. The British have become enormously dependent on American industrial and agricultural production. Finally, despite his misgivings, Churchill accepts the American strategy. There will be an invasion of France.

Throughout the summer and fall of 1943, staff officers in England labor in obscurity, executing the logistical and tactical preparations required for what will be a massive operation. Command of the planning is given to the British general Frederick Morgan. Morgan’s title, Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander, provides the name now given this stage of the operation: COSSAC. In the winter of 1943, Morgan’s plan is presented and is amended considerably by those who will carry it out, notably, Bernard Montgomery, who will command the Allied ground forces. But the basics of the plan remain. It is Morgan who suggests that any invasion of France should avoid the Pas de Calais, which is the logical and most predictable place for the invasion to occur. Calais is the closest point to Britain on the French coast, and the Germans have fortified that region to the extreme. Morgan assumes that if the Allies see Calais as the likeliest invasion point, the Germans will do so as well. Morgan chooses instead the less-well-fortified beaches on the northern coast of Normandy.

In early 1944, Morgan’s job is complete and COSSAC ceases to exist, replaced by a far larger and more complex command system. The operation is controlled and organized from a vast infrastructure of offices, named Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force, or SHAEF. The invasion plan is given a name: Operation Overlord.

In Washington, General Marshall and President Roosevelt discuss the leadership options for such an enormous and dangerous undertaking. Though Marshall puts his own name up for consideration, Roosevelt realizes that his chief of staff is far too valuable in his current position. Though disappointed, Marshall turns again to the only man who has yet demonstrated the ability to manage such a large-scale organizational nightmare: Dwight Eisenhower. Despite more grumblings from the British, notably Alan Brooke, Winston Churchill begins to champion Eisenhower as the only logical choice to command Overlord. In January 1944, Ike leaves his command in the Mediterranean and returns to London.

H
aving made too many enemies in the German High Command, Erwin Rommel sits in bored obscurity in a meaningless post in northern Italy, hoping that Hitler will once again come to rely on him for some significant duty in the field. Instead, in late 1943, Rommel receives word that he is being assigned the position of inspector for Army Group West, under the thumb of one of Germany’s grand old soldiers, Gerd von Rundstedt, headquartered in Paris. A dismayed Rommel is appointed commander of Army Group B, with the responsibility to fortify and protect the French coastline. Rommel views the position with disgust, believing, with most other German officers, that he has been placed in a backwater of the war. But he attacks his job with the same fervor he has shown throughout his long career and begins to light fires under the complacent commanders who are staring idly out to sea. Despite no indication of an impending invasion, he recognizes that such an attack is inevitable and begins his inspections along the coast, examining what Berlin has labeled Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. Rommel is deeply disheartened at what he finds. Should the Allies come, he knows the German defenses are woefully inadequate. He observes firsthand that the defenses along much of the French coast are more fantasy than fact and that the fortresslike barriers exist only in Hitler’s mind. Since Rommel has been given a job to do, he decides to do it correctly. If Hitler insists on an impregnable defense along the coast of France, Rommel will do all he can to provide it.