ANZIO Operation Shingle Jan. - May 1944
Anzio was unique. It was the only place in Europe which held an entire corps of infantry, a British division, all kinds of artillery and special units, and maintained an immense supply and administration setup without a rear echelon. As a matter of fact, there wasn t any rear; there was no place in the entire beachhead where enemy shells couldn t seek you out. Quartermasters buried their dead and amphibious duck drivers went down with their craft. Infantrymen, dug into the Mussolini Canal, had the canal pushed in on top of them by armor-piercing shells, and Jerry bombers circled as they directed glider bombs into LST s and Liberty ships. Wounded men got oak leaf clusters on their Purple Hearts when shell fragments riddled them as they lay on hospital beds. Nurses died. Planes crash-landed on the single air strip... You couldn t stand up in the swamps without being cut down, and you couldn t sleep if you sat down. Guys stayed in those swamps for days and weeks. Every hole had to be covered, because the popcorn man came over every night and shoveled hundreds of little butterfly bombs down on your head by the light of flares and exploding ack-ack. You d wake up in the morning and find your sandbags torn open and spilled on the ground.. You wondered how Jerry could see you and throw a shell at you every time you stuck your head up, until you climbed into the mountains after it was all over and were able to count every tree and every house in the area we had held... This wasn t a beachhead that was secured and enlarged until it eventually became a port for supplies coming in to supplement those being expended as the troops pushed inland. Everything was expended right here. It was a constant hellish nightmare, because when you weren t getting something you were expecting something, and it lasted for five months. A company of infantry sat on a mountain in Italy in mud, rain, snow, and freezing cold weather. They had inadequate clothing and they didn t get relief. They sat there for weeks, and the only men who came down that mountain were dead ones, badly wounded ones, and those who had trench foot from the icy mud. (164-168)
Landing - zero resistance
Maj. Gen. John Lucas Hesitates - 3 days
Germans take high ground
43,000 Allied casualties 7,000 killed 36,000 wounded or missing
Lesson learned?... Land and CHARGE!
D-DAY
June 6, 1944 Allied invasion of France at Normandy 160,000 troops land along 50 miles of beach 5,000 ships 13,000 planes
Objective: establish a beachhead from which to begin a ground war.
Step 1: Destroy coastal defenses
Step 2: Land ground troops
Step 3: Secure the area to land supplies.
Some obstacles to overcome:
1. Weather: Wind and waves make G.I.'s sick. Then bust up supply boats & equipment.
2. Allied troops expect: combat rejects, and an easy landing They find: S.S. Veterans, & Tiger Tanks
3. Airborne dropped to "win an open door" for infantry: 101st "Sticks" scattered; 82nd plans "busted."
Targets 4. Bombs miss some targets. Omaha Beach is bloody.
German Blunders...
1. German defenses focus on the north.
Germans in Normandy surprised.
2.. Tanks only moved on Hitler's order. Hitler sleeping
Casualties
9,000 Allied 6,000 wounded 3,000 dead
9,000 German (estimated)
Allies secure beaches in ONE DAY.
@#*! Hitler now has a TWO-front war.