Waffen-SS: Defeat in western Normandy, 1944

Background

As Montgomery's armoured divisions were feeling the power of I SS Panzer Corps' Panthers and Tigers east of Caen, the US Army was in the process of launching an offensive that would eventually destroy the German armies in Normandy. An ill-conceived Waffen-SS counterattack at Mortain would only add to the Germans' problems as their front in northern France collapsed.

The bocage terrain

The fighting in western Normandy was very different in nature from the open fields and villages around Caen. The constricted bocage terrain consisted of small fields lined with thick hedges and earthworks, as well as large areas of marshland that were impassable to tanks. It was a defender's paradise, so Rommel mainly deployed infantry divisions to contain the Americans.

A plethora of sunken roads, small woods and villages meant there was no room to manoeuvre large formations of tanks. The US Army quickly became bogged down in a series of small-scale engagements against dogged and expert German resistance. The so-called "Battle of the Hedgerows" would cost the Americans tens of thousands of casualties for little ground gained.

Heavy US losses

During June and into July 1944, the German defenders of the Seventh Army under Paul Hausser managed to inflict a steady stream of casualties on the "green" US Army units sent against them. Hausser's veteran units, such as II Parachute Corps and the 352nd Infantry Division, made Lieutenant-General Omar Bradley's First US Army pay for every inch of terrain it captured. In a series of disjointed divisional offensives, the Americans suffered some 50,000 casualties and hardly dented the German front. The two US Army divisions that took the town of St Lô in mid-July lost a combined total of 5000 casualties in bitter, house-to-house fighting. One division lost an incredible 150 percent of its officers and 100 percent of its soldiers in six weeks of action. US divisions maintained their combat power by constant infusions of so-called "battlefield replacements", which did nothing for their unit cohesion or the overall quality of their fighting expertise.

American firepower

It took the Americans a long time to master the terrain and their enemy. Their equipment, such as the Sherman tank, proved under-gunned and under-armoured compared with German Panthers and Tigers. One thing the Americans possessed in overwhelming quantities was firepower in the shape of heavy artillery and airpower. They unleashed it regularly against Hausser's troops, and eventually the cunning Waffen-SS general was unable to compensate for the overwhelming materiel superiority enjoyed by the Americans. By 24 July, the veteran Panzer Lehr Division, for example, could only put some 3000 men in the field and a few dozen tanks. Since the end of June, only a trickle of German reinforcements had reached Normandy to replace the 100,000 casualties sustained by Rommel's armies in the month after D-Day. The German front was approaching breaking point, and Hausser was running out of reserves to plug the gaps.

prev | next