Falaise: The Flawed Victory - The Destruction of Panzergruppe West, August 1944

Like a punch-drunk boxer the Germans for the next two months would successfully block the blows of the Allies without being able to hit back effectively. British and Canadian efforts to barge past Caen would come to nought in the face of the massed panzers, but when the Americans attacked in the west after securing Cherbourg, a weak panzer counterattack simply hastened the unravelling of the Germans’ weakening defences.

Strategic ground

At the Wolf’s Lair, Rastenburg, East Prussia, Adolf Hitler was convinced that Normandy was not the main invasion. He was aided in this delusion by the Allies’ major deception plans, the bombing of Calais and the ongoing disruption of the northern French rail system. The bogus activities of Lieutenant General George S Patton’s fictitious forces convinced the Germans that he was going to land north of the Seine and as a result numerous German divisions, especially armoured, remained beyond the river for up to a week after D-Day. The Germans were only to have eight panzer divisions engaged during the first six weeks of the battle, whereas the Allies were expecting at least twice as many.

Following the D-Day landings both the Allies and the Germans knew the strategic ground lay in the east, where the British 2nd Army was fighting around the city of Caen. Just to the southeast lay the open tank country that could facilitate an Allied break-out. Rommel and Schweppenburg appreciated only too well that the strategic ground lay in the Caen–Falaise area.

The geography on the left wing of Panzergruppe West consisted of the restrictive Normandy hedgerow terrain known as the bocage. East of the Orne in the Caen–Falaise sector it was largely open and therefore more suited to fluid tank operations. Rommel understood the Allies had to be stopped from reaching this ground at all costs. A series of prominent geographical features south of Caen provided the Germans with an ideal stop line, here the panzers could make a stand.

While the German Navy was in no position to contest control of the English Channel and the Luftwaffe was distracted by the Eastern Front and defence of the Reich, Hitler’s panzer forces constituted a very real threat to the mainly-inexperienced American Army and the weary British Army once they were ashore. The smug benefit of hindsight has made the Battle for Normandy appear ultimately a one-sided affair – with the Allies numerical dominance of land, air and sea, how could they possibly lose?

In 1944 no one really knew how things would play out, or indeed could anticipate the unforeseen consequences of the Allied victory at Falaise. In the first few crucial weeks following D-Day the German generals had every reason to believe they could drive the Allies back into the sea if they acted swiftly and decisively.

Qualitative edge

The one major advantage Panzergruppe West had over the Allies was the qualitative edge of its panzers. The Germans realised they could never match the Allied numbers but they ensured that they could outshoot them. The Germans were to deploy in total ten panzer divisions and one panzergrenadier division, numbering approximately160,000 men equipped with just over 1,800 panzers, in Normandy. In addition to this there were another dozen or so General Headquarters Panzer Formations, mainly of battalion strength with about 460 panzers. This gave an accumulated strength for 7th Army, Panzergruppe West and the various Panzer Corps commands of around 2,260 tanks.

The Americans, British, French, Canadians and Poles were to commit thirteen armoured divisions and numerous independent armoured brigades to the battle. Their accumulated total for the campaign amounted to almost 8,700 tanks. On D-Day alone nearly 1,500 Allied tanks were put ashore. By the time of Operation Goodwood on 18 July, Allied tank strength stood at almost 5,900 and continued to rise, reaching almost 6,760 a week later when Operation Cobra was launched. By the time the Germans commenced their Avranches/Mortain counterattack against the Americans in early August, the American Army could muster almost 4,000 tanks.

On the whole the German armour deployed in Northern France was vastly superior to that of the Allies and easily outgunned their tanks. While the Allies sought to counter the German technological lead on land, sea and air at every single stage of the war, their failure to develop a war-winning battle tank was a glaring omission that even the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, sought to hide from the general public lest it affect morale.

The most common type of panzer in Normandy, totalling 748 tanks, was the PzKpfw IV Ausf H and Ausf J, which went into production in 1943 and 1944 respectively. With frontal armour of 80mm and a 7.5cm KwK 40 L/48 anti-tank gun, this provided the backbone of the German panzer divisions. Its gun had a twenty per cent greater muzzle velocity than that of the American-built M4 Sherman’s 75mm gun, meaning it could punch through 92mm of armour at 500 yards, while the Sherman could only manage 68mm. Normally the Panzer IV was allocated to the 2nd battalion or II Abteilung of a panzer regiment, although there were a number of exceptions. The I Abteilung of the 9th Panzer Division’s Panzer Regiment 33 was equipped with Panzer IVs and both abteilungen of 21st Panzer’s Panzer Regiment 22 were equipped with it.

The PzKpfw V, or Panther, represented the pinnacle of German tank production, mounting the even more powerful 7.5cm KwK 42 L/70 gun that could penetrate 120mm of armour at 1,094 yards. On the Eastern Front it had proved itself superior to the Soviet T-34, though mechanical teething problems initially rendered it unreliable. The main models deployed in Normandy were the Ausf A and Ausf G. Theoretically each I Abteilung of a panzer regiment was equipped with this tank.

While the PzKpfw VI Tiger I was a formidable weapon with 100mm frontal armour and 8.8cm KwK L/56 gun, only three battalions were deployed in Normandy, with about 126 tanks. The Tiger’s technological excellence meant it took twice as long to build as the Panther; however, its gun could easily deal with every single type of Allied tank. The Tiger could tear a Sherman apart, while the latter could not cope with the Tiger’s frontal armour. The American 75mm gun could only penetrate the Tiger at close range and while the British 17-pounder gun was much more effective it was not available in significant numbers. Even those Shermans armed with a 76mm gun had to close to 300 yards. The Allied response to a Tiger was to overwhelm it or sneak up behind it!

The Tiger II, or King Tiger/Royal Tiger, was brand new in June 1944, but only equipped one company, totalling about a dozen tanks, in Normandy. In many ways its high fuel consumption, limited operational range, fragile steering and slow turret traverse nullified its powerful main armament, the 8.8cm KwK43 L/71 and very thick armour.

Another common armoured fighting vehicle in Normandy was the Sturmgeschütz or StuG III assault gun, armed with the 7.5cm StuK40 L/48, and to a lesser extent the StuG IV equipped with the same weapon, which was used to equip the tank destroyer battalions of the panzer divisions and in some cases substituted for the Panzer IV. They also equipped the independent Sturmgeschiütz Brigades, a number of which were deployed throughout France. Lacking a turret, this assault gun was a very good defensive weapon and ultimately ideally suited for the Normandy countryside.

The Jagdpanzer IV, mounting the same gun as the Panther, was intended as a StuG replacement but was never built in sufficient numbers. It appeared in 1944 and began to replace the Marder self-propelled gun in the panzer divisions’ tank destroyer battalions. Only about sixty were deployed in Normandy. Similarly the Jagdpanther, based on the Panther chassis and armed with the 8.8cm Pak 43, were few in number in Normandy, about a dozen at the most.

The main self-propelled anti-tank weapon was the Marder armed with a 7.5cm Pak 40/3, with limited numbers of the Pak 43-armed Hornisse. The principal self-propelled artillery in Normandy comprised the Hummel self-propelled 15cm howitzer based on the Panzer IV chassis, and the Wespe based on the Panzer II, armed with a 10.5cm gun. The Germans also deployed a range of hybrid self-propelled guns based on French tank and ammunition tractor chassis.

The most common Allied tank to fight in Normandy was the American M4 and M4A1 (with cast hull) Sherman. Mechanically reliable, it was handicapped by thin armour and a gun lacking sufficient punch. Its good cross country speed and higher rate of fire could not make up for these two key short comings. Tank crew survival was paramount as tanks could be replaced relatively easily but not experienced crews; the Sherman, however, had a nasty habit of burning when hit and if this happened the crew only had a fifty per cent chance of survival.

Despite extensive combat experience with the American and British armies in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, by 1944, for a variety of reasons, the Americans had failed to develop a worthy successor to the Sherman, meaning the Allies had to rely on numbers rather than quality. This crucial failure was to be a key factor in the Germans being able to hold on for so long in Normandy.

The Americans developed tank destroyers based on the Sherman that could penetrate at least 80mm of armour at 1,000 yards, notably the M10 Wolverine armed with a 3-inch gun and the M36 armed with a 90mm gun, though these were not available in sufficient quantities. The 3-inch gun was intended to tackle the Tiger, but being only able to penetrate the frontal armour at 50 yards rendered it all but ineffective against this panzer. Similarly, the M18 Hellcat armed with a powerful 76mm was too few in number.

Two thirds of the tanks used by British, Canadian and Polish armoured units in Normandy were Shermans, the rest being mainly British-built Cromwell and Churchill tanks. The Cromwell cruiser tank was numerically and qualitatively the most significant British tank and, along with the Sherman, formed the main strength of the British armoured divisions. However, even armed with a 75mm gun it was inferior to the late model Panzer IVs and the Panther. Although fast, the narrowness of the hull made up-gunning it very difficult. Similarly, the British Churchill infantry tank, though heavily armoured, could not take any gun larger than the 75mm.

The heaviest British weapon, the 17-pounder (76.2mm), could open up 120mm of armour at 500 yards and was either towed or mounted in limited numbers of Shermans designated the Firefly VC. Later it was also mounted in the Valentine chassis, creating the unwieldy Archer self-propelled gun, and in the M10 to create the Achilles; these, though, did not enter service until well after the Normandy campaign. The Sherman Firefly was the only Allied tank capable of taking on the Panther and the Tiger on equal terms, but due to the shortage of guns it was only issued one per troop. The net result of all this was that the Allies’ tanks were in for a severe mauling at the hands of the panzers.

It is vitally important to remember that at the time the Battle for Normandy was far from a foregone conclusion. The Dieppe failure loomed large in everyone’s minds and despite the Allies’ considerable planning and preparation there was a very real fear that D-Day might go the same way. The successful landings in North Africa had been against ill-equipped French forces that were in a state of political disarray, while those on Sicily and the Italian mainland had been against the Italian Army which was largely a spent force. Striking Hitler’s Festung Europa was an entirely different matter, even if the German forces were in some cases second rate, reconstituting or recuperating.

The eastern flank

After the Germans had successfully blunted Montgomery’s initial advances, rather than fight a bloody frontal battle for Caen, he decided 2nd Army would launch its main effort to the west, towards Villers-Bocage and Evrecy, then southeast towards Falaise. He committed two veteran divisions, the 51st (Highland) and 7th Armoured (‘Desert Rats’), for two main flank attacks. The 51st were to attack through the 6th Airborne Division, east of Orne and the 7th Armoured would attack to the southwest.

The 5lst’s attack on 11 June was crushed and two days later the assault petered out. The 7th Armoured Division’s advance was slow, but a hole in the German line between Villers-Bocage and Caumont was detected. Greeted by joyful locals, the advance elements of 7th Armoured entered Villers-Bocage on 13 June. The scene was set for the Villers-Bocage debacle in which the British spearhead was mauled by a handful of German Tiger tanks and an opportunity to turn the German line thrown away.

Hitler hurried to the HQ in Soissons on 17 June, ironically built to oversee the invasion of Britain, to confer with Rommel and von Rundstedt. His generals wanted their troops withdrawn out of range of the Allied naval guns which were providing devastating fire support against their panzers. Hitler refused, insisting they be concentrated for a counterattack on the junction of the British and American armies.

Fortunately for Hitler, the Allies’ momentum faltered as the weather began to deteriorate and on the 19th a violent storm halted all shipping in the English Channel for three days. The Allies’ military build-up virtually ground to a halt, delaying 20,000 vehicles and 140,000 tons of stores. In the meantime, distracting Hitler’s attention back to the Eastern Front, on 22 June the Russians launched Operation Bagration, which would ultimately smash Army Group Centre in spectacular fashion.

Due to the bad weather the Germans were granted a vital breathing space during which they were able to reorganise their forces and move without Allied air strikes. Some felt that prior to D-Day Schweppenburg overdid night training, but he was in fact exercising great foresight. Allied firepower was greatly curtailing German freedom of movement during daylight hours. The deterioration in the weather would have been an ideal time to launch a counterattack, but the opportunity was lost.

The Allies still had the initiative and if they could maintain it the Germans would remain off balance. Montgomery declared he would tie the panzers down on the eastern flank in the Caen-Caumont sector, destroying them in a series of offensives that would look like an attempted break-out toward Paris, while the Americans mopped up the German forces in the Cotentin Peninsula and took the port of Cherbourg prior to their own break-out attempt.

The Americans knew they were not facing the Germans’ top panzers. What tanks the German forces could muster on their western lank were mainly Czech or French models, such as the French-equipped training unit Panzer Ersatz und Ausbildungs Abteilung 100 and Panzer Abteilung 206, which could scrape together about seventy tanks of indifferent quality. Only Panzerjäger Abteilung 243 was equipped with any notable armour, totalling twenty-four self-propelled guns and assault guns. The main garrison units were the 243rd and 709th Infantry Divisions, which had been reinforced by the 3rd Parachute Division and the 77th Infantry Division moved up from Brittany.

Once the Americans reached Barneville-sur-Mer on the west coast of the Cotentin Peninsula on 18 June they set about pushing north and securing Cherbourg. They opened their attack four days later, the defenders resisted until the 26th before surrendering, although pockets of resistance continued for a further two days. By the end of the month the Americans had captured over 39,000 German prisoners and were now ready to strike southward. Both Panzer Abteilung 100 and 206 ceased to exist.

The week-long British Epsom offensive, west of Caen toward Evrecy and Esquay southwest of the city, launched on 25/26 June was intended as a preemptive strike to tie up German armour reinforcements. Barely a week later, the British and Canadians conducted Operation Charnwood, a frontal attempt on Caen, though they only succeeded in taking the northern half of the city.

By late June there were almost eight panzer divisions between Caen and Caumont on a 20 mile (32km) front facing the British 2nd Army. In particular the 2nd, 12th SS, 21st Panzer, Panzer Lehr and the 716th Infantry Divisions were all tied up in the immediate Caen area. Facing the British were approximately 725 German tanks, while on the American front there were only 140. Caen became the bloody fulcrum of the whole battle; here the cream of Panzergruppe West would be ground down in a series of unrelenting British attacks culminating in Operation Goodwood.

The desperately needed German infantry divisions that should have freed up the panzers for a counterstroke remained north of the Seine. Hitler held them back presumably because he still feared an attack across the Pas de Calais. By the end of June it was evident that von Rundstedt’s ‘crust-cushion-hammer’ tactics had failed despite the slowly increasing number of panzer divisions; tied down in the face of Allied firepower and attacks, the panzers could do little more than fire-fight as the situation developed. To make matters worse, by the beginning of July the unrelenting operational commitment of the panzers was taking its toll, 58 per cent of the Panthers and 42 per cent of the Panzer IVs were in the maintenance depots.

General Dollmann, 7th Army’s commander, died at his field HQ on 28 June; it is unclear if he had a heart attack or committed suicide, but SS-Obergruppenführer Paul Hausser from the II SS Panzer Corps assumed command. SS-Obergruppenführer Wilhelm ‘Willi’ Bittrich who had fought in Poland and France, subsequently commanding the 2nd SS and 9th SS Panzer Divisions took charge of the II SS Panzer Corps.

At this point Rommel and von Rundstedt drove the 600 miles (960km) to Berchtesgaden to see Hitler. They tried to prevail upon him to permit their forces to withdraw behind the Seine. In addition, Rommel wanted to strengthen the weakened Panzergruppe West and 7th Army with 15th Army’s reserves and those forces tied up with Army Group G, way to the south. To their dismay, Hitler steadfastly refused; instead of heeding the advice of his two highly-experienced generals, he chose to do what he always did when anyone stood up to him.

Lacking friends at court, Rundstedt’s days as C-in-C West were numbered. On 3 July Hitler accepted von Rundstedt’s offer to stand down on health grounds and on the same day the hapless Schweppenburg was removed as commander of Panzergruppe West. Rundstedt held Hitler’s Chief of Staff, Field Marshal Keitel, partly responsible for this state of affairs; indeed Rundstedt was contemptuous of Keitel’s skills as a military coordinator. Removing two such senior generals at a critical moment seemed madness and can have done little to reassure Rommel of his future.

At the beginning of July Panzergruppe West’s Chief of Staff informed Rommel: ‘The morale of the troops is good, but one can’t beat the materiel of the enemy with courage alone’. They were outnumbered four to one in tanks in the British sector; in the American sector it was worse, eight to one.

Günther von Kluge was summoned from the Eastern Front to replace von Rundstedt, but he was no more able to stabilise the situation than his predecessor. He did not last long following the failure of the Mortain counter-offensive in mid-August; summoned to Berlin he shot himself. Walter Model was then recalled from the Eastern Front to oversee the final defeat in Normandy.

General Heinrich Eberbach was appointed in Schweppenburg’s place. He had commanded Panzer Regiment 35 within the 4th Panzer Division and fought well in Poland, Belgium, France and Russia. At Baranovitch he had gone to the aid of the 3rd Panzer Division and, despite securing victory, for a short time faced charges of disobeying orders. Whilst on the Eastern Front Eberbach had been wounded a number of times and suffered with continuing kidney problems; nonetheless, in August 1943 he was promoted to General der Panzertruppen. By December he was recuperating in Germany, but had then returned to Russia.

In Normandy one of Eberbach’s first actions was to see the newly-appointed von Kluge and then Rommel to get appraised of the current situation facing Army Group B, Panzergruppe West and 7th Army. The fighting had so far cost the Germans 87,000 casualties, as well as 417 irreplaceable panzers and assault guns. Afterwards he visited the 12th SS Panzer Division defending Caen on 7 July and ordered elements of the 21st Panzer Division to support the beleaguered 16th Luftwaffe Field Division.

By the first week of July, elements of the 2nd SS Panzer Division were making their presence felt on the American front, supporting elements of the 17th SS Panzergrenadier Division, which had been their since early June. By mid-July the 1st SS, 21st Panzer and Panzer Lehr Panzer Divisions had been withdrawn into reserve, but Montgomery’s Operation Goodwood prevented everything except Panzer Lehr from shifting west.

In the meantime, the American Army fought to broaden its bridgehead. Twelve divisions were committed to a series of frontal assaults, culminating in the capture of St Lô on the 18th, despite dogged resistance from Panzer Lehr and II Parachute Corps. By then the Americans had suffered over 62,000 casualties struggling through the bocage. Hausser though was forced to keep his two armoured divisions committed and was unable to withdraw his panzers into reserve.

Shortly afterwards Eberbach demonstrated his tactical and strategic abilities with Panzergruppe West by thwarting Montgomery’s Operation Goodwood, launched east of Caen on the 18th. Three British armoured divisions were stopped dead in their tracks, quite literally. The Germans inflicted 5,500 casualties and destroyed over 400 tanks for the loss of over 100 panzers.

Then, to compound the Germans’ woes after losing Dollmann, Rundstedt and Schweppenburg, they lost Rommel on 17 July when he was wounded after RAF Typhoons strafed his car on the open road. Rommel was hospitalised with serious head injuries and returned home in August. Implicated in the 20 July Bomb Plot against Hitler, Rommel poisoned himself on 14 October and was buried with full military honours. One can only speculate how things would have progressed in Normandy if he had stayed in charge.

By the 20th Eberbach’s command was suffering a serious manpower drain, the Panzergruppe to date had suffered 40,000 casualties but only received 2,300 replacements. Four days later the Americans commenced Operation Cobra on the Germans weak western lank.

The break-out

General Günther Blumentritt, Chief of Staff OB West, later recalled:

This shift in opinion was too late. Rommel may be partly to blame; his experiences fighting Montgomery in North Africa meant that Army Group B would naturally place emphasis on the British Army as a known quantity. The Americans’ initial lacklustre performance in Tunisia had also helped to cloud German perceptions of their fighting abilities.

In early July Panzer Lehr had transferred out of Panzergruppe West’s area of responsibility to 7th Army’s and joined General Dietrich von Choltitz’s LXXXIV Corps west of St Lô. On its left flank were the 17th SS Panzergrenadier Division and the 2nd SS Panzer Division respectively, covering the area east of Périers. Beyond them were three infantry divisions. South of St Lô lay the weakened II Parachute Corps consisting of the 3rd Parachute Division and the 352nd Infantry Division, the latter having few of its complement of self-propelled guns and assault guns combat ready. Hausser’s 7th Army numbered less than 35,000 men and about eighty armoured vehicles.

By late July, OB West, Army Group B and Panzergruppe West continued to assess a British breakthrough at Caen with a thrust toward Paris as the greatest threat. The Germans reorganised and the panzer divisions of Panzergruppe West were gathered in the Caen area as the key defensive sector. The Allies’ airpower negated most German daytime movements and in turn prevented any large-scale counteroffensives. This effectively meant that the Panzergruppe’s mission remained a defensive one designed to prevent a British breakthrough in the direction of Falaise and Paris.

Of the three Panzer Corps, I SS, II SS and XLVII, the latter two were to be relieved by the LXXIV Infantry Corps which was in Brittany. The plan was that Panzergruppe West would have two panzer corps, with the two panzer divisions acting as strategic reserves. Predictably things did not go according to plan. To try and free up the panzers, a total of five additional infantry divisions were attached to the Panzergruppe, but, frustratingly, the panzers were only ever able to achieve local offensive success.

After nearly two months of almost continuous combat the 21st and 12th SS Panzer Divisions had been seriously mauled. Although the 1st SS, 9th SS, 10th SS and 2nd Panzer Divisions had suffered losses they still retained about 75 per cent of their fighting power and the 116th remained fresh. Only the 21st, 1st SS, 10th SS and 12th SS remained committed, with the 2nd, 116th and 9th SS held in reserve, the 116th having only just completed its reorganisation. Similarly the 2nd and 9th SS had been pulled out to complete this process.

The fighting power of Panzergruppe West comprised about six panzer divisions and four infantry divisions, while three other infantry divisions (the 89th, 271st and 272nd) were in the process of being transferred over. The 271st and 272nd Infantry Divisions were supposed to relieve the 10th SS and the 21st Panzer, respectively, on the left wing of the LXXXVI Infantry Corps. Both these infantry formations, though, were held up by Allied air attack, especially crossing the Seine, and only their leading elements had reached the front by 24 July. The process was not completed until the end of the month. In addition, on the 28th the 331st Infantry Division was ordered to join Panzergruppe West and by 11 August a kampfgruppe was operating in the L’Aigle-Gracé area about 12–30 miles (20–50kms) east of Argentan.

On their western flank the Germans were now roughly outnumbered in tanks by a ratio of ten-to-one. General Omar N Bradley’s US 1st Army, at the start of Operation Cobra, mustered 1,269 M4 Shermans and 694 M5A1 light tanks, supported by 324 M10 and M18 tank destroyers. Eventually launched on the 25th, Cobra signalled the beginning of the end for 7th Army and Panzergruppe West. General Bradley threw six divisions, numbering about 70,000 men, over 660 tanks, 3,000 aircraft and forty-three battalions of artillery, at the Germans.

The Americans had good intelligence on LXXXIV Corps’ and II Parachute Corps’ main components, though over estimated their reserves. In fact LXXXIV Corps’ reserve consisted of one infantry division supported by a single battalion of armour; II Parachute Corps had none and Hausser’s only reserve was part of an infantry division behind LXXXIV Corps. In contrast, Hausser’s intelligence on the American order of battle was faulty and underestimated the Americans’ strength, in particular Major General J Lawton Collins’ VII Corps.

On the Germans eastern flank, the Canadians launched a simultaneous attack to assist the American momentum by slowing the redeployment of I and II SS Panzer Corps. Conducted from 24–27 July, Operation Spring was designed to capture the strategic Bourguébus and Verrières Ridges south of Caen and open up the Falaise road. The 1st SS, 9th SS, 12th SS and 21st Panzer Divisions easily killed the Canadian offensive, but LVIII Panzer Corps had to be despatched from Toulouse so that 2nd and 116th Panzer of XLVII Panzer Corps could shift from the British sector to help counter Cobra.

To the west things began to unravel very quickly. The very day that Spring came to a stop, German troops, lacking reserves, began to withdraw in the face of the American onslaught. In the meantime the British maintained the unrelenting pressure round Caen by drawing in German forces and capturing Mont Pinçon with Operation Bluecoat, which ran from 30 July to 7 August.

The arrival of 116th Panzer Division on the 30th slowed the American advance eastward, but did nothing to arrest their progress south. Similarly 2nd Panzer was unable to stop the Americans crossing the Vire. Within a week and a half the Americans had broken through and, having overrun Coutances and Avranches, were sweeping west into Brittany and east toward Vire and Mortain. Elements of Panzer Lehr, 2nd Panzer, 2nd SS and 17th SS were swept away. Hausser lost 20,000 men captured and LXXXIV Corps and II Parachute Corps were effectively destroyed.

Hausser was reduced to plugging holes by 1 August, with whatever units were available. Facing the American forces were the 2nd, 2nd SS, 17th SS and 116th, along with the remains of Panzer Lehr. All that remained of the local infantry divisions were the 243rd and 353rd. West of Caen, 21st Panzer had been moved south of Caumont, the junction between the British 2nd Army and the US 1st Army. The 1st SS, 9th SS, 10th SS and 12th SS Panzer Divisions, along with the 271st, 272nd, 277th and 346th Infantry Divisions, were deployed south of Caen, fending off the British and Canadians.

Mortain: the panzers strike back

Panzergruppe West was renamed 5th Panzer Army on 5 August, with responsibility for 7th Army’s right flank. Inauspiciously, in its first incarnation 5th Panzer Army fought in North Africa as a part of Army Group Afrika, surrendering on 9 May1943 in Tunisia. In early August, Eberbach was visited by Lieutenant Generals Walter Warlimont and Buhle from OKW acting as Hitler’s eyes and ears. They were far from pleased with Eberbach’s prognosis; he advocated an orderly withdrawal covered by the exhausted panzer divisions. This was not what Warlimont wanted to hear and he questioned Eberbach on the proposed counterattack toward Avranches.

Eberbach considered this a hopeless cause; their forces were too weak; Allied air power too strong; any success would be short-lived as it would be impossible to fend off the Americans once they caught their breath. In addition, supplying the four panzer divisions earmarked for the attack would have to be conducted at night. Warlimont accused Eberbach of being a pessimist, but if anyone appreciated the reality of the situation it was Eberbach. The attack on Avranches would ultimately sound the death knell of 5th Panzer Army.

For this operation, conducted between 6 and 11 August, 2nd, 116th, 1st SS and 2nd SS (including a kampfgruppe from 17th SS Panzergrenadier Divisions) Panzer Divisions were committed. Although the Germans captured Mortain, RAF Typhoons pounced on some 300 armoured vehicles, destroying eight, and other squadrons followed up to take their share of the kills. On 8 August at 2115, 7th Army received orders from von Kluge to postpone the attack, following a British breakthrough south of Caen which had shaken 5th Panzer Army.

Hitler demanded the counterattack in the American sector be renewed and instructed Eberbach to assume command of the newly-activated Panzergruppe Eberbach on 10 August, while Sepp Dietrich took command of 5th Panzer Army. Eberbach saw this for what it was, a demotion, perhaps prompted by the failed assassination attempt on Hitler. The message was clear: replaced by an SS Officer and subordinated to an SS Officer. Despite these musical chairs with the senior German commanders in Normandy, time was rapidly running out. The Allied pressure on both the American and British sectors was such that, despite the panzers best efforts, the dam was about to burst in a very spectacular fashion. Eberbach recalls:

Captain Harry C Butcher, USNR, Naval Aide to General Dwight D Eisenhower, Allied Supreme Commander, recalled that the renewal of the Germans’ Avranches/Mortain attack was anticipated with glee, observing on 11 August:

There was, though, some concern that the panzers might find one of the weak spots in Patton’s extended US 3rd Army. The following day Butcher noted: ‘I mentioned to Ike last night that the Germans had about 500 tanks against us in the Mortain area, and he said, “We’ve got 3,500; what are we scared of?”’

In reality, for the renewed attack Eberbach could only gather 124 tanks, seventy-seven Panzer Mark IVs and forty-seven Panthers, roughly the same inadequate numbers that had been launched in the initial attack. His efforts, though, were stillborn once the Americans were south of Argentan. All thoughts of counterattack were abandoned in favour of trying to extricate as many units as possible from the American, British, Canadian and Polish pincer movement now coming to fruition.

Eberbach blamed the failure of the German attack on Avranches squarely on the German High Command. Referring to the transfer of Panzergruppe West’s armour to 7th Army for the operation, he commented:

After Avranches, Panzergruppe West became responsible for the supply of 7th Army, which controlled the 12th SS Panzer and 17th SS Panzergrenadier Divisions, a role it was singularly ill-suited to do.

The British, Canadian and Polish armour attacked along the Caen-Falaise Road on 7–13 August in Operation Totalise, an effort to capture Falaise. This then developed into Operation Tractable, designed to close the neck of the Falaise salient containing 5th Panzer Army, Panzergruppe Eberbach and 7th Army.

The German position in Normandy became completely untenable on 15 August when 94,000 Allied troops landed in the South of France in Operation Dragoon. Winston Churchill had wanted the operation launched into Brittany, which would have piled the pressure on the Germans in Northern France, but there was a lack of satisfactory ports as the Germans resolutely clung onto them. Churchill even threatened to resign but Eisenhower and the American Chiefs of Staff would not be moved.

In strategic terms Dragoon was largely nugatory, as it had not been conducted in parallel with Overlord due to shortages of amphibious transport. Moreover, if Overlord succeeded, Army Group G would be forced to withdraw from southern France to avoid being cut off. Additionally the Germans had very few panzers remaining in Southern France. All of Army Group G’s panzer divisions, 2nd SS, 9th and 17th SS Panzergrenadier along with elements of the 271st, 272nd, 276th and 708th Infantry Divisions had already been drawn north to the fighting in Normandy. Only 11th Panzer remained in the south, which was refitting after being mauled on the Eastern Front.

By the end of the month, Free French Forces had liberated Toulon and Marseilles, driving Blaskowitz’s dazed Army Group G northeastward. It was only a matter of days before Germans were facing final defeat in Normandy in the Falaise pocket. The fate of the panzer divisions was to vary greatly-but the ultimate outcome after all the bloodletting was to have very serious consequences for the Allies.