Comments by "Big Woody" (@bigwoody4704) on "Who's to blame for the Battle of Anzio 1944? | Patreon Q&A 8" video.
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D-Day,The Battle for Normandy by Antony Beevor,p183-84* Any thought of pivoting on Caen as Montgomery had claimed,had become impossible in the 1st few days a pattern of attrition had been established. *Monty had to change his approach,although he refused to admit this later*On June 11 after a meeting with Bradley Monty wrote DeGuingand that his objective "was to pull the germans on to 2nd Army so that the US 1st Army could extend & expand. *this rather more modest assessment was hardly in keeping with his earlier pugnacious declarations! "Inaction and a defensive mentality are criminal in any officer - however Senior He had told this to senior Officers 2 months before the invasion and "Every officer & man must be enthusiastic for the fight and have the light of battle in his eyes
The problem was that Montgomery,partly for reasons of morale partly for pride could not admit that any of his plans had gone wrong.He created resentment among his colleages by claiming that he always intended to pull the bulk of the Panzer Divisions on to his front,to give the Americans the great chance of a break out. IT was not of course Montgomery who determined this state of affairs but the Germans who sent their Panzer Divisions
From D-Day,The Battle for Normandy,p229 Eisenhower was fuming with impatience,yet Monty refused to be hurried and said to Dempsey on several occasions "there's no need to tell IKE" Monty liked to keep his objectives vague,so that if there was a break out he could claim credit for it.And if the operation ran into the sand he could simply say that they'd been tying down the German Forces to help the Americans
Page 331 Ike & Monty by Norman Gelb Apparently the Russians shared the doubts others had about Montgomery in Normandy.Their advancing troops were reported to have put up a road sign near Minsk saying - 1,924 kilometers to Caen
From D-Day,The Battle for Normandy,page 263 The slowness of Monty's attack in Normandy was one of Ike's chief concerns Eisenhower even had spoken to Churchill about it while the battle was in full swing. Air Chief Marshall Tedder and Air Marshall Coningham even discussed the possibility of having Montgomery relieved .Coningham who commanded the Tactical Air Force supporting 21st Army Group,had loathed Montgomery since the North African camaign.He had never been able to forgive Montgomery's compulsion to take all the credit Now they were infuriated by Mongomery's pretence that his strategy was proceeding according to plan when he had manifestly failed to take the ground needed for airfields.
Overlord,by Max Hastings,page 236* Monty announced during the Caen offensive that he was well pleased with the results.He wired Brooke in London "operations a complete success...he told the press his Armies had broken through the German front.Headlines the next day reflected Montgomery's enthusiasm for the battle: *"Second Army breaks through...British Army in full cry...Wide corridor through German front...."
From Churchill and Montgomery Myth,by R.W.Thompson,page 170 None of it was true - when it became obvious a few days later,the news papers were scurrying to correct themselves Montgomery's exaggerations did not surprise experienced British Journalists;he had destroyed the German 90th Division so many times in N.Africa it had become a joke
Page 326, Ike & Monty by Norman Gelb Apart from having secured the beachhead,little else Monty was doing was working .No one forgot his promise about how quickly Caen would fall to him - over a month would pass before he took it or how he would advance steadily to places by anything like the dates he predicted. Or some could not help wondering what was going on when they were told first one thing and then something completely different *Lord Carver commanding an armored brigade in Normandy said,"one was so often being told that the coming battle would be the break thru.Then the whole thing would come to a grinding halt
Like Monty Villa lies alot.
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Eisenhower & Montgomery at the Falaise Gap,by William Weidner,page 301 Dr Forrest C.Pogue,interviews,US Army Military Institute,1947 On the evening of August 12 Gen.Bradley called Gen. Montgomery's HQ requesting to send Gen Haislips XV Corps north to the boundary at Argentan toward Falaise. Bradley's request was denied Montgomery's staff officer Brigadier E.T.Williams said he was in Freddie DeGuingand's truck near Bayreaux when Bradley's call went through; Monty said tell Bradley they ought to get back.Bradley was indignant.We were indignant on Bradley's behalf...Monty missed closing the sack Bradley,Deguingand and Williams argued in favor of the Americans moving north to Argentan to close the gap, but Monty would not change his mind
https://www.nytimes.com/1984/01/22/books/mistake-in-the-master-plan.html By Drew Middleton
-MONTGOMERY - how small a man, how large his shadow in history. It is now nearly 40 years after D-day and the Normandy campaign, but the man and the shadow will not rest. The normal reaction to a new book on Montgomery and the battle for Normandy is to think, ''Enough already - not another book on Ike and Bradley and Monty.'' In this case, that reaction would be wrong. ''Decision in Normandy'' is not just another book about the great military campaign of 1944. It is the best-researched, best-reasoned, best-written account of that campaign I have read.
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The book is an indictment of Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery. Carlo D'Este's charge is that in his dispatches, news conferences and memoirs, he gave a false picture of his strategy in battles he directed as the commander of the Allied land forces in this crucial phase of World War II. Specifically, Mr. D'Este asserts,Montgomery was faking when he later claimed all had gone according to his ''master plan''in Normandy and he had always intended to attract and pin the German panzer divisions on the left flank of the Allied line,thus enabling Gen. Omar Bradley's American troops to break out on the right flank
-In fact, as the author demonstrates from battlefield reports,interviews with participants and war histories,Montgomery's plan was to seize the city of Caen and then spill out onto the plains leading to Paris I was a correspondent attached to Allied headquarters at the time, and I should add that that scenario was the one most people accepted for British operations in the campaign
From Carlo D'Este, "Decision in Normandy," p. 441 (Stafford Diary)Air Vice Marshal Stephen C. Strafford was SHAEF's Chief of Air Operations and Plans. He was a British Officer with no ax to grind. He also kept a diary and on 14 August 1944, he recorded this statement from General Bradley at a meeting: "He [Bradley] states that the American forces had little opposition between ALENCON and ARGENTAN and had started toward FALAISE, but had been instructed by the C-in-C, 21st Army Group [Montgomery] to halt on the inter-army group boundary
Ralph Ingersoll, Top Secret, p. 190 "Montgomery, who was still nominally in charge of all ground forces, now chose to exercise his authority and ordered Patton back to his side of the ... boundary line." George Patton and others said the same thing. He was guessing that the reason Montgomery halted the Americans was a combination of jealousy and ignorance of the situation As it turned out, it was a pretty accurate guess. Continued movement by Patton would have violated the boundary between Bradley's 12th Army Group and Montgomery's 21st Army Group.
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