Beginning on August 18, 1944, the soldiers of Task Force (TF) Butler made a bold attempt to cut off the retreating German Nineteenth Army in Southern France. Many historians have written about the famous Buffalo Soldiers of the all-Black 92nd Infantry Division, who fought with distinction during World War II. History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol. The 7th Army attempted to cut off the German 19th Army near Montlimar. This is the order of battle of Allied and German forces during Operation Dragoon in August 1944 in the South of France. The Germans suffered 2,100 battle casualties plus 8,000 POWs, while the Americans had 1,575 casualties. Admiral Hewitt's naval support for the operation included the American battleships Nevada, Texas,[24] and Arkansas, the British battleship Ramillies, and the French battleship Lorraine, with 20 cruisers for gunfire support and naval aircraft from 9 escort carriers assembled as Task Force88.[25]. OPERATION DRAGOON Airborne phase of the Operation Dragoon of the 15 August 1944 in Southern France between Le Muy and Draguignan 'CHAMPAGNE CAMPAIGN' The pursuit on the east to the french-italian broder to protest the east flank of the 7th Army and VI Corps WALL OF REMEMBRANCE Remembrance wall to remember the soldier of the 1st Airborne Task Force. Operation Dragoon was the Al . Digne was liberated on 18August. The 3rd Infantry Division landed on the left at Alpha Beach (Cavalaire-sur-Mer), the 45th Infantry Division landed in the centre at Delta Beach (Le Muy, Saint-Tropez) and the 36th Infantry Division landed on the right at Camel Beach (Saint-Raphal). The landings would be undertaken by the U.S. Bombing was nearly continuous until 07:30, when battleships and cruisers launched spotting aircraft and began firing on specific targets detected by aerial surveillance. The Wehrmacht was not able to defend on a broad front and soon crumbled into numerous isolated strongpoints. This was a deception plan, aimed to confuse the German defenders with fake landings and paratroopers, to disperse them from the actual landing zones.[33][34]. Instead, it was the draw of units from Army Group G to the Normandy front that allowed for the quick Allied exploitation of the landings in southern France. Concurrently, the High Command of the French Liberation Army pushed for a revival of the operation that would include large numbers of French troops. To seize this opportunity, Taskforce Butler was ordered to advance in this direction, paralleling the German evacuation effort and ultimately cutting them off further north. Rent or Buy Operation Dragoon : Operation Dragoon Order of Battle, Operation Dragoon, Days of Glory, Operation Romeo, 1st Airborne Task Force, Task Force 88 - 9781155831497 by for as low as $8.15 at eCampus.com. When darkness fell, German guns on the French mainland at Cap Benat shelled Port-Cros. The Panther was a formidable opponent superior to . It would take place in the South of France, between Cannes and Toulon in August 1944. The 11th Panzer division was Blaskowitzs only mobile unit, and he kept it in reserve. [27], The Allied ground and naval forces were supported by a large aerial fleet of 3470 planes. They were two important port cities that would increase Allied supply capacity on the French mainland. "[77], Despite these successes, criticism of Dragoon was made by some Allied generals and contemporary commentators such as Bernard Montgomery, Arthur R. Wilson and Chester Wilmot in the aftermath, mostly because of its geostrategic implications. The next day, Lyon was liberated and 2,000 Germans were captured, but the rest had already continued their retreat north. In the aftermath of the Battle of Kasserine Pass, US II Corps passed to the command of General Harold Alexanders 18th Army Group. Order of Battle First Airborne Task Force Operation Dragoon 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment Commanding Officer : Colonel Rupert D. Grave Assistant Regimental Commander : Maj. George R. "Ike" Walton1 Regimental S-1 : Capt. [21], Although the Germans expected another Allied landing in the Mediterranean, the advancing Red Army and the Allied landings in Normandy placed great strains on German resources, so little was done to improve the condition of Army Group G, occupying southern France. On 21August, the French pressed into Toulon, and heavy fighting ensued. To the west, French commandos succeeded in eliminating the batteries on Cap Ngre. Attached 22 August 1944 to replace the British 2nd Parachute brigade; later assigned. "World War II: Operation Dragoon." [64] As the 36thDivision was seemingly making no progress, an angry Truscott arrived at Dahlquist's headquarters on 26August to relieve him of command. As a first countermeasure, Wietersheim's 11thPanzer Division was called in. American strategists and leaders carried the day. The Germans withdrew to the north through the Rhne valley, to establish a stable defense line at Dijon. Allied mobile units were able to overtake the Germans and partially block their route at the town of Montlimar. Immediate follow-on convoys (D-day + 1) were to sail from Naples and Taranto. The Normandy ports had insufficient capacity to handle Allied supply needs and French generals under Charles de Gaulle pressed for a direct attack on southern France with participation of French troops. The only potent unit inside Army Group G was the 11th Panzer Division, which was commanded by Wend von Wietersheim. The original idea of invading southern France had come in 1942 from General George Marshall, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff. In discussions with Franklin D. Roosevelt, Stalin advocated for the operation as an inherent part of Overlord, preferring to have the Allies in the far west instead of at an alternative landing in the Balkans, which he considered to be in his zone of influence. Further delays ensued after the difficult amphibious landings at Anzio in January 1944. Allied paratroopers interrupted his communication lines and trapped his headquarters in the city. The fighting ultimately came to a stop at the Vosges mountains, where Army GroupG was finally able to establish a stable defense line. The main ground force for the operation was the US Seventh Army commanded by Alexander Patch. Since the 442nd became available while the 552nd was in training and took very little time to train on the British 6lb. Already badly outnumbered as Allied troops had been streaming ashore since the previous day, this force was nearly cut off and fell back that night. During the Second World War, Operation Clipper was an Allied offensive by the British XXX Corps (which included the American 84th Infantry Division) to reduce the Geilenkirchen salient in mid-November 1944. However, the 45thDivision was able to bypass the German forces, taking the town of Meximieux on 1September. Operation Dragoon (initially Operation Anvil) was the code name for the landing operation of the Allied invasion of Provence (Southern France) on 15August 1944. After securing the town, the airborne was tasked with preventing German counterattacks against the beaches. [43][44] On 17 August, off La Ciotat, a force of two German warships encountered a force of PT boats and gunboats staging a diversionary attack. U.S. Army Campaigns of World War II: Southern France (CMH Pub 72-31). Operation Dragoon: Senior Allied officers on the bridge of USS Catoctin (AGC-5), the operation flagship, taken while en route to the invasion area on "D-minus-1," 14 August 1944. As a result, the squadron was almost annihilated, and the German escape route was again open. On 19 August, U.S. Navy F6F Hellcats and Royal Navy Seafires, on an armed reconnaissance mission, shot down five enemy bombers near Toulouse, to the west of the Dragoon landing areas. Given the precarious situation, Adolf Hitler moved away from his "no step backwards" agenda and agreed to an OKW plan for the complete withdrawal of Army GroupsG and B. At this point, the Overlord follow-on operations in northern France were going so well that any dispersal and disruption of German forces that would have been brought about by an earlier Anvil/Dragoon were no longer essential. The Allied invasion fleet off the coast of Southern France near San Tropez Bay on September 9, 1944. The Allies struck back and retook the hills north of Montlimar, and were able to establish a temporary roadblock on the German escape route. The largest land, sea, and air invasion ever attempted was years in the making. In the spring of 1940, German leader Adolph Hitler staged successful . It is an operation that almost did not happen. The consensus surrounding Anvil quickly vanished. The task force also includeda number of French and Polish combatants. The Americans then attempted to seize the town that evening but were repelled. Instead, the German reprisals had the opposite effect and encouraged the French population to engage in partisan fighting. The Allies were unsure of German intentions, and Truscott decided to try to trap the Germans with a right flank movement whilst pursuing them with his three divisions from VICorps. operation dragoon order of battle. The Allies were privy to the German plan through Ultra interception. The Allied units in this sector were able to secure a beachhead and quickly linked up with the paratroopers, capturing Saint-Tropez and LeMuy. Its aim was to push the Americans from the hills north of Montlimar and to force the American artillery to move back out of range. (Numerous supporting units were also involved in the . Instead, he favored an invasion of the oil-producing regions of the Balkans. The first of 1,300 Allied bombers from Italy, Sardinia, and Corsica began aerial bombardment shortly before 06:00. Churchill worked to cancel the operation. A preliminary air campaign was planned to isolate the battlefield and cut the Germans off from reinforcement by destroying several key bridges. The men of the First Special Service Force gained the upper hand and discovered that the "coastal defense battery" the Allied naval forces were worried about was actually several well-camouflaged dummy weapons. "World War II: Operation Dragoon." They recognized the open German flank to the east of the Rhne at Grenoble due to the retreat of the 157th Infantry Division towards the Alps. The British forces captured La Havre on September 12 . Along the coast, about 75 coastal guns of heavy and medium caliber were placed. Originally called Operation Anvil, these landings had been intended to take place at the same time as the Normandy landings of Operation Overlord, commonly called D-Day, but were postponed because the necessary shipping was committed to the Normandy operation. Operation Dragoon summary: This was the name given to the southern France invasion of Allied forces on 8.15.1944 in World War II. In October, 524,894 tons of supplies were unloaded, which was more than one-third of the Allied cargo shipped to the Western front. It enabled them to liberate most of Southern France in just four weeks while inflicting heavy casualties on the German forces, although a substantial part of the best German units were able to escape. On Levant, the 2nd and 3rd Regiments of the First Special Service Force faced sporadic resistance that became more intense when the German garrison forces came together in the area of the port. Operation Dragoon order of battle. It was supported by Joseph Stalin at the Tehran Conference in late 1943. The Germans were not able to hold Dijon and ordered a complete withdrawal from Southern France. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1957. U.S. Army in World War II: European Theater of OperationsRiviera to the Rhine. Hickman, Kennedy. Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight D. Eisenhower, with Roosevelts backing, supported an invasion of southern France. Meanwhile, the Germans also struggled to bring the 11thPanzer Division through the chaos of the evacuation into position in the town. [18], The chief objectives of Operation Dragoon were the important French ports of Marseille and Toulon, considered essential to supply the growing Allied forces in France. All of these resulted in the postponing of Anvil by the Allies. Although nominally an army group, Army Group G had at the time of the invasion only one army under its command: the 19th Army, led by Friedrich Wiese. Though highly supported by Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the operation was bitterly opposed by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Despite its effectively forcing the German Army Group G to fall back and leave Southern France because of the constant attacks by allied troops it isn't very well known. The proximity of the landing area to Corsica (recaptured from the Germans in September 1943) was also advantageous, since additional tactical air-support assets were based there. The first invasion convoy to get underway, primarily composed of LCTs, departed Naples on 9 August. Wiese, as commander of the 19th Army, was also unable to contact Blaskowitz's Army GroupG headquarters, but implemented a plan to push the Allied forces in the LeMuy Saint-Raphal region back into the sea unilaterally. A dual landing was soon recognized as impossible to conduct with the forces available. [38][39] French troops had been pouring ashore since 16August, passing to the left of the American troops with the objective of Toulon and Marseille. Courtesy Naval History and Heritage Command. Again, this Allied success also did not last long, as another attack led by Wietersheim reopened the passage at midnight. USS Samuel Chase (APA-26) off the southern France invasion beaches after discharging her embarked troops, 15 August 1944. The consensus was that the best way to support Overlord would be an accompanying operation in southern France. Gus Widhelm of Scouting Eight. As the Allies advanced into France, the Resistance evolved from a guerilla fighting force to a semiorganized army called French Forces of the Interior (FFI). The battle for Toulon cost the French 2,700 casualties, but they captured all remaining German forces, which lost their entire garrison of 18,000 men. Read full overview. He has appeared on The History Channel as a featured expert. Eisenhower, supported by Roosevelt, who (with his 1944 election campaign four months away) opposed diverting large forces to the Balkans, stood firm on the agreed plan despite long harangues from Churchill on 5 and 9 August. The Allies had not anticipated the speed of their own advance, so could not adequately provide supplies and logistics to the leading Allied units. Dragoon was supposed to be a secondary attack that drew German forces away from the fight in Normandy. World War II: Operation Dragoon. It was part of the Allied campaigns that occupied 1944. The British landings, codenamed Operation Rugby consisted of 2nd Parachute Brigade. Sledgehammer became Operation Overlord, and Anvil became Operation Dragoon. U.S. Navy and Royal Navy carrier aircraft provided air cover and support to the troops on the beaches. Marking the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, The National WWII Museum connects two instances of remorse for Nazi criminality by leading German politicians. [28], Opposing the Allies was the German Army Group G (HeeresgruppeG). To delay the Allies, he pulled together a mobile battle group. Operation Dragoon: Senior Allied officers on the bridge of USSCatoctin, the flagship of Operation Dragoon, while en route to the invasion area on August 14, 1944. Finally, on 2 Julynearly a month after the Normandy landingsafter much consultation between the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and British Combined Chiefs of Staff, Anvil was approved and set for 15 August. The initial plan was to capture the ports in succession, but the unexpected Allied advance allowed the French commander de Lattre de Tassigny to attack both ports almost simultaneously. At the same time, the Germans also reinforced their fighting force. The 117thCavalry Squadron had more success, bypassing Bourg-en-Bresse and taking Montreval and Marboz north of Bourg-en-Bresse, instead. While the Germans were retreating, the French managed to capture the important ports of Marseille and Toulon, soon putting them into operation. The US Army's VI Corps, commanded by Major General Lucian Truscott, would carry out the initial landing and be followed by the French Army B under command of Gnral Jean de Lattre de Tassigny. This town lay directly on the German escape route. With almost no mobile reserves to react against the beach landings, he ordered the commander of the 189th Infantry Division, Richard von Schwerin, to establish an ad hoc battle group (Kampfgruppe) from all nearby units to counterattack the Allied beachheads in this area. This included the 340 millimetres (13in) guns taken from the dismantled French battleship Provence. Much of the Western Naval Task Force itself was assembled and loaded in various port facilities surrounding the Bay of Naples, although the French armored formations sailed from Oran, Algeria. The Naval Forces detailed order of battle for operation Anvil Dragoon, the southern France landings. Looking ahead to the postwar world, Churchill wished to conduct offensives that would slow the progress of the Soviet Red Army while also hurting the German war effort. German field commanders were not able to communicate with Army GroupG's headquarters. It called for an American and French army to land just east of Marseille and Toulon and capture them. Courtesy Naval History and Heritage Command. After preliminary commando operations, the US VI Corps landed on the beaches of the Cte d'Azur under the shield of a large naval task force, followed by several divisions of the French Army B. The strategic bombing started well before the landing, and targeted airports, traffic hubs, railroads, coastal defenses, and communication lines. Over the course of the summer, Oberbefehlshaber West(OB West) commander Field Marshal Gnther von Kluge had steadily withdrawn forces from Blaskowitzs command to support the German forces in Normandy attempting to keep the allies at bay there. operation dragoon autopsy of a battle the allied. This is the order of battle of Allied and German forces during Operation Dragoon in 1944. [36], The landings were overwhelmingly successful. After heavy fighting around Hyres, which temporarily stopped the advance, French forces approached Toulon on 19August. In Memoriam; Veterans; Histoire; Waco CG4A parts; Muse virtuel; History. The conclusion of the operation was not the end of the debate surrounding it. Chief of Naval Operations Aerology Section, The Invasion of Southern France: Aerology and Amphibious Warfare (NAVAER 50-30T-8). Washington, DC, January 1945. Still, the American general in charge of planning for Anvil, General Jacob Devers, continued preparations despite the operations cancellation. The Kriegsmarine had some 25 surface ships (mostly torpedo boats and smaller) though the main anti-invasion force, 10th Torpedo Boat Flotilla based at Genoa, had just four torpedo boats fit for service during Dragoon and this force took no action against the invasion fleet. Advancing inland, Allied troops relieved the airborne at Le Muy the next day. Following six weeks of aerial bombardment, the infantry, armor, airborne, and commando forces of Maj. Gen. Lucian Truscott's VI Corps assaulted German positions along a 45-mile stretch of French coastline from St. Raphal to St. Tropez. HMS Ramillies took aim at the fort where the Germans were barricaded. He frequently wrote and complained to anyone who would listen that Anvil was folly. The plan for Anvil was nearly complete. Churchill, still opposed to the operation, vehemently dissented to both Eisenhower and Roosevelt, but to no avail. Home; Blog/News. LCIs leading the first wave of landing craft fired rockets to explode land mines on the beaches to be used by following troops. World War II: Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, World War II: Operation Market-Garden Overview, World War II Europe: Fighting in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy, World War II: Field Marshal Sir Harold Alexander, M.S., Information and Library Science, Drexel University, B.A., History and Political Science, Pennsylvania State University, 85,000-100,000 in the attack area, 285,000-300,000 in region, US Army Center for Military History: Campaigns in Southern France. Operation Dragoon field order no. On Delta and Alpha beaches, German resistance was low. The 2nd (Independent) Brigade parachuted into Southern France in August 1944 as part of Operation DRAGOON and occupied Athens in the autumn and winter of 1944-5, before returning to Italy. Australian forces, backed by American artillery, assaulted Japanese positions on Bobdubi Ridge in one of World War IIs bitterest campaigns. However, it was originally planned to coincide with Operation Overlord in Normandy in order to create a "hammer and anvil" campaign against the Axis forces in France. General William H. Simpson, commander of Ninth Army, has received little attention in the historiography of World War II. This decision would prove to be fatal for the Germans, as it left a large gap in the eastern flank of the retreating Army GroupG. Blaskowitz now decided to sacrifice the 242nd Infantry Division in Toulon, as well as the 244th Infantry Division in Marseille, to buy time for the rest of Army GroupG to retreat through the Rhne Valley, while the 11th Panzer Division and the 198th Infantry Division would shield the retreat in several defense lines. Albin Dearing2 Regimental S-3 : Maj. Forest S. Paxton3 Brest, where the U.S. Navy had air and naval bases during World War I, was liberated on September 18 after four weeks from the initial seize. This success was, however, short-lived, and the Germans were soon pushed back. [71], Atrocities continued during the German retreat from southern France as German soldiers plundered and burned down towns. They decided to avoid Camel Red and land only at the sectors of Camel Blue and Camel Green, which was successful. Then on 4 August, Churchill proposed that Dragoon (less than two weeks away) should be switched to the coast of Brittany. Voted #1 site for Buying Textbooks. They were opposed by the scattered forces of the German Army Group G, which had been weakened by the relocation of its divisions to other fronts and the replacement of its soldiers with third-rate Ostlegionen outfitted with obsolete equipment. Taskforce Butler the Allied mechanized component of the landings was pushing north of Draguignan. The first, Operation Overlord, in Normandy, was the D-Day so familiar to the world. German units also worked together with French collaborators to subdue partisans, for example against the partisan base at the Vercors massif, but with little lasting result. The British disagreed with the American stance due to the weak political impact and lack of movement in Italy. In Toulon, heavy German resistance was encountered, but overcome by 26 August. U.S. When Alexander took command on February 20, 1943, one of his first tasks was to assess II Corps combat readiness after its setbacks during its early engagements around Kasserine Pass. On 27August, most of the city was liberated, with only a few small strongpoints remaining, and on 28August, German troops issued the official surrender.
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