Comments by "Bullet-Tooth Tony" (@Bullet-Tooth-Tony-) on "TIKhistory"
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Three prominent German commanders all thought the same, it was the wrong strategy.
First is Field Marshall Von Runstedt
“the best course of the Allies would have been to concentrate a really strong striking force with which to break through past Aachen to the Ruhr area. Strategically and politically, Berlin was the target. Germany’s strength is in the north. He who holds northern Germany holds Germany. Such a break-through, coupled with air domination, would have torn in pieces the weak German front and ended the war. Berlin and Prague would have been occupied ahead of the Russians. There were no German forces behind the Rhine, and at the end of August our front was wide open.There was the possibility of an operational break-through in the Aachen area, in early September. This would have facilitated a rapid conquest of the Ruhr and a quicker advance on Berlin. By turning the forces from the Aachen area sharply northward, the German 15th and 1st parachute Armies could have been pinned against the estuaries of the Maas and the Rhine. They could not have escaped eastwards into Germany.”
Second is Hasso Von Mantueffel, commander of the 5th Panzer Army.
“I am in full agreement with Montgomery. I believe General Eisenhower’s insistence on spreading the Allied force’s out for a broader advance was wrong.The acceptance of Montgomery’s plan would have shortened the war considerably. Above all, tens of thousands of lives- on both sides- would have been saved.”
Lastly, Gunther Blumentritt, one of the key planners of the German invasion of Poland and France.
"After the war, Blumentritt disagreed with the Allies' strategy in the west at this time, noting the precarious nature of the German position with only one armoured division against the twelve of the Allies. He stated that had Montgomery's Anglo-Canadian 21st Army Group been unleashed earlier for a concentrated armoured assault (as Montgomery had wished) rather than fighting on a broad front, "Such a breakthrough ... would have torn the weak German front to pieces and ended the war in the winter of 1944."
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@lyndoncmp5751 Even Horrocks himself thought it was a mistake to not advance further.
"On the 4th of September, we were ordered to halt our advance as we were out-running our supplies particularly petrol, which was still being brought up from the beachhead a turn-round of some six hundred miles for the lorries. This was a tragedy, as the only troops between us and the Rhine, stretched out in a thin line, was one German division, the 719th, composed mainly of elderly gentlemen who hitherto had been guarding the north coast of Holland and had never heard a shot fired in anger, plus one battalion of Dutch SS, and a few Luftwaffer detachments. Had we been allowed to advance we could have brushed this meagre force aside, bounced the crossing over the Rhine, and probably gone right through to the Zyder Zee. A further advance like this would, of course, have entailed a certain risk, but we already had one hundred kilometres of petrol within reach, and another one hundred twenty-four hours away; moreover, we had captured Brussels Airport, so -surely additional supplies could have been flown in if we had got into trouble. I have always felt that this was a risk worth taking"
"the 11th Armoured Division could have advanced 18 Miles further North to the base of the South Beveland Peninsular, thereby preventing German movement to and from the Peninsular. As it was, no such order was given and consequently Von Zangen was able to extract the remnants of his Fifteenth Army from the pocket around Brekens by ferrying them across the Schelde, mostly by night and then moving along the South Beveland Peninsular and from there into Holland."
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