Taiwan and Normandy

In any direct war with China (as opposed to a proxy war in, say, Africa), Taiwan will be the first objective of the Chinese.  They simply cannot allow a Western aligned country to exist that close to them, providing bases for surveillance and attack.  This is elementary war strategy (that the US has ignored multiple times to our detriment!).

 

In addition to the inevitability of a direct war, there is also the quite likely possibility that China may simply launch an assault on Taiwan outside the context of a general war – in other words, a focused campaign to reclaim Taiwan.  This should not be a surprising possibility as China has been saying exactly this for many years.  In their minds, they’re giving Taiwan time to come to their senses but China’s magnanimous patience will end at some point and China will take military action to reclaim their wayward territory.  Even the US military has recognized this likelihood and has set a ballpark time frame of the next several years, according to Adm. Philip Davidson.(1)

 

A Chinese assault on Taiwan will be most comparable to Normandy in WWII.  It will be a massive undertaking.  Taiwan has an active military of 275,000 plus a reserve of 2.8M and a paramilitary (whatever that means) of 1.9M equipped with reasonably modern weapons and systems.  For comparison, Germany had less than 50,000 troops available for the defense of Normandy.

 

Drawing on lessons from the Normandy assault, we can expect to see:

 

Speed – Whether as part of a general war or a narrowly focused Taiwan-only operation, it will be mandatory for China to accomplish its goals in a very short time frame.  In a general war, a short time frame would allow China to move on to its other objectives and free up massive forces for other operations.  Failure to do so would hamstring Chinese operations as the war progressed.  In a Taiwan-only operation, China would have to accomplish its objectives very quickly or risk the US having time to gear up and enter the conflict in support of Taiwan.  Failure to secure its objectives quickly would also open China to criticism from the world community to an even greater extent.  Thus, regardless of the scenario, China would make every effort to see the bulk of immediate objectives completed and ground forces substantially ashore within the first 24-48 hrs.

 

Scope – A Taiwan operation would require a substantial portion of China’s forces with hundreds of thousands of troops poured into the effort.  A staggeringly massive missile barrage would be required to render as many defenses inoperable as possible from the start.  The Chinese amphibious fleet would be hugely supplemented by civilian transport ships.  This would be quite doable and efficient since all Chinese merchant shipping is built with military conversion capabilities included in their design.  The West will be stunned at the amphibious resources China can bring to bear.  Air superiority operations will be truly massive and will be quickly followed by continuous air strikes and close air support.  The Chinese navy will be deployed on the eastern side of Taiwan to prevent US interference.

Normandy and Taiwan - Massive Scope

 Reinforcement –  At the invasion site, Germany had a window of only hours or a few days, at most, to make effective use of reinforcements.  As it happened, one of the major goals of the Allies was to cut off the movement of reinforcements to the Normandy area and they succeeded.  Germany was never able to effectively reinforce their defenses.  Longer term, Germany had all of Europe as well as the German homeland to assemble reinforcements and push the Allies back off of Europe but could not do it.  Of course, the Soviet front siphoned off huge numbers of troops and resources that could have otherwise been used against the Allied landing.

 

In the same vein, Taiwan has very limited reinforcements – none, for all practical purposes, since the limited geography assures that every unit will be fully committed right from the start.  Taiwan lacks any strategic depth wherein it can trade land for time to prepare counterattacks.  What they have immediately available is all they’ll ever have.  Conversely, China can draw on immense reserve forces although the aforementioned speed requirement suggests that the need for Chinese reinforcements would indicate a significant strategic, if not operational, failure by the Chinese.

 

Strategic Goals – The Allies goal was to seize ports to provide supplies for the subsequent march across Europe and they succeeded.  China’s strategic goals would be to eliminate Taiwan as a US base of operations and to conduct the assault so quickly that the US would be faced with a fait accompli that would discourage US intervention.  In essence, speed would be China’s method of interdicting US reinforcements. 

 

More broadly, the seizure of Taiwan would allow Chinese mainland based air defenses to be substantially transferred to Taiwan which would significantly expand China’s defensive perimeter and make any counter-actions or counterattacks by the US much more difficult.  Seizure of Taiwan would greatly expand China’s defensive cushion and eliminate a glaring salient that could, otherwise, be used against China.

 

If China conducts just an isolated assault rather than as part of a larger war, China will immediately announce to the world that it is an internal Chinese affair in an attempt to make the US seem like a meddling outsider on the world political stage.  By doing so, China would hope to blunt any attempt by the US to build an opposition coalition.  Quite likely, China would quickly offer to negotiate a final settlement which, of course, would never produce any result and would just serve to further erode any US justification for intervention while ensuring China’s continued occupation of Taiwan.

 

 

Conclusion

 

The key consideration is the size of Taiwan’s defensive force versus the speed with which China could secure the island.  The defensive force is, potentially, much greater than was available to the German’s at Normandy but the question is whether that defensive force could retain its combat effectiveness after the initial deluge of missiles, bombs, and shells.  Without question, the fixed defensive assets such as airfields, missile sites, AAW sites, etc. would be largely destroyed in the initial bombardment.  Armored forces and artillery would also, presumably, suffer significant initial losses.  Whether the remaining troops and mobile or protected assets would retain enough coherent command and control, mobility, and firepower to provide an effective, coordinated defensive force is an open question.  Unfortunately, the result of the initial bombardment will be to reduce Taiwan’s forces toward the light infantry end of the spectrum and they would be left to fight heavily armored forces supported by air power and artillery.  There is no doubt about the final outcome but there is a great deal of doubt about the speed with which China could achieve its goals.  If Taiwan could delay the ultimate outcome long enough, China will have failed, strategically, as noted above which opens the possibility of US intervention.

 

In short, the Allies at Normandy were able to push supplies and troops ashore faster than Germany could reinforce their defenses.  Whether China can push forces ashore faster than Taiwan can relocate and reinforce its defenses is an open question as is whether Taiwan’s forces can muster sufficient firepower to be effective.

 

 

 

 

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(1)Washington Examiner website, “Pacific Commander Warns China Could Move To Take Taiwan In The Next Five Years If US Doesn’t Increase Deterrence”, Jamie McIntyre, 5-Mar-2021,

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/pacific-commander-warns-china-could-move-to-take-taiwan-in-the-next-five-years-if-us-doesnt-increase-deterrence

Naval Bombardment Philosophy

Current US Navy gun support for amphibious landings has a capability gap – we have none!  The question is, is that due to a belief that naval bombardment as a vital element of an amphibious assault is not needed or is it due to mere neglect and stupidity?  In other words, is our utter lack of gun support due to philosophy or neglect?  One would be tempted to say that it must be due to neglect because the value of naval bombardment is so incontestable as to be self-evident.  However, historically, this has not always been the case.  Naval bombardment has not always been seen as necessary for the success of an amphibious assault.

The largest amphibious assault in history, Normandy, employed only brief and perfunctory pre-assault bombardment that was intended only to suppress the defenses, not destroy them. (2)  Contrast that to the Pacific assaults on Iwo Jima and Okinawa where the Navy conducted non-stop bombardments for weeks prior to the actual assault.  There you have the two extremes – nearly none and almost unlimited.  Which philosophy is right?  They can’t both be right, can they?  Let’s look a bit closer at the historical basis for the two different philosophies and, with that understanding, try to assess our current naval bombardment needs, if any.

As noted by historian and former naval amphibious planner, Christopher Yung, in his book “Gators of Neptune (1), which documented the naval amphibious planning for Normandy,

Another point of departure with Pacific amphibious doctrine was the Mediterranean view of the purpose, effectiveness, and duration of a naval bombardment of coastal defenses just before an amphibious assault.  Admiral Cunningham [Command in Chief, Mediterranean Fleet, First Sea Lord] … stated that, “the Americans in the Pacific placed a high value on naval bombardment in support of amphibious assaults, particularly by battleships, much higher than I thought was really justifiable.” (1, p.38)

However, Yung further notes that Admiral Cunningham changed his mind.

Following the war, Cunningham felt he should have given greater credence to the value of naval gunfire support for an amphibious landing … (1, p.38)

Based on their experience with various Mediterranean assaults, the US Army believed that pre-assault bombardment served only to alert the enemy and ruin the element of surprise. (1, p.38)  The Royal Navy’s RAdm. L.E.H. Maund seconded this philosophy but ascribed it to the British military’s deficient resources. (1, p.39)  We see in this thinking the belief, potentially correct, that if the attackers have less than overwhelming force that the element of surprise may be more important than pre-assault destruction.  Of course, one could ask why anyone would attempt an amphibious assault with less than overwhelming force but that’s a separate issue.

Supporting this minimal bombardment belief was British data on artillery effectiveness against hardened defenses which led the British to conclude that naval gunfire could, at best, provide suppressing fire which might temporarily neutralize the defenses but would be ineffective at destroying them. (1, p.39) It should be noted, however, that there is a world of difference between artillery fire and very larger caliber battleship and heavy cruiser fire with up to 16” guns.  The British did not appear to take that difference into consideration.

Yung notes, however, that this ‘Mediterranean’ minimal bombardment philosophy was not unanimous.  VAdm. Hewitt (commander US naval forces, Mediterranean) noted that pre-assault bombardment was an essential precursor for a successful assault. (1, p.39)

It is also noteworthy that the Mediterranean philosophy was derived from early war experience with less accurate and less lethal artillery and naval guns.  As the war went on, naval gunfire accuracy and lethality improved immensely

Eisenhower, himself, weighed in on the value of naval bombardment, stating that,

Pre-assault and support naval gunfire on beach defenses and pre-arranged targets was so devastating in its effectiveness as to dispose finally of any doubts that naval guns are suitable for shore bombardment. (1, p.39)

His thoughts did not, however, wind up dictating the extent of the Normandy pre-assault bombardment which was, by Pacific standards, minimal, at best.

RAdm. Hall (Commander, 11^th PHIBFOR, Force Omaha), expressed his dissatisfaction with the pre-assault bombardment after the Normandy operation was over.

It is believed that the time available for pre-landing bombardment was not sufficient.  German defensive positions were well camouflaged and strong.  It is considered that these positions should be destroyed by slow aimed fire from close range prior to the landing.  Something more than temporary neutralization is required when troops face beach mines, wire, anti-tank ditches and similar obstacles after landing. (1, p.208)

Note Hall’s call for close range naval fire (enhanced accuracy) as opposed to standoff fire (reduced accuracy).  As it happened, there were instances of individual destroyer Captains, on their own initiative and in violation of planning, moving their ships very close in to provide effective and critical point-blank gunfire.  This illustrates the element of risk in effective naval bombardment and the acceptance of that risk in order to achieve objectives.  Contrast this with today’s exceedingly risk averse Navy culture!

In contrast to Hall’s deprecating view of the bombardment effort, Adm. Ramsay (Allied Naval Commander, Expeditionary Force) thought the minimal pre-bombardment was adequate and justified.

That naval gunfire neutralizes rather than destroys is still considered to be true … the policy of beach drenching [ed. short term suppressive fire] has been fully justified. (1, p.208)

Ramsay, then, believed it preferable to momentarily neutralize (suppress) enemy defenses rather than put any great effort into destroying them.

In the actual event, post-assault observation and analysis indicated that relatively few fortifications, gun housings, and casemates were outright destroyed.  This should come as no surprise given the inaccuracy of fire control at that time and the minimal amount of time the bombardments were conducted.  Pacific experience differed greatly.

The use of high velocity guns at [Kwajalein] showed, at least according to the US Navy, that this weaponry could be effective at smashing concrete pillboxes. (1, p.77)

As the Army noted, pre-assault bombardment does, indeed, notify the enemy of the coming assault.  At that point, it becomes a race between the attackers getting sufficient force ashore to achieve their objectives and the defenders getting sufficient reinforcements to the area to ward off the assault.  For Normandy, where the potential pool of reinforcement was vast, it was feared that a prolonged pre-assault bombardment might have allowed the Germans time to reinforce beyond the point that the assault force could overcome.  In contrast, in the Pacific, the Japanese forces on a given island had no source of reinforcement.  Hence, losing the element of surprise was irrelevant – the defenders couldn’t reinforce and couldn’t leave.  They were fixed and isolated and every additional hour of bombardment meant fewer and less effective defenders and defenses.

Naval Bombardment

While the concept of minimizing pre-assault bombardment in order to minimize the enemy’s time for reaction and reinforcement has some surface appeal and, indeed, logic behind it, the larger driving force of overwhelming force ought to negate the concept.  If one has overwhelming force (and if you don’t, why are you attempting the assault?) then the enemy’s reinforcement efforts can be interdicted with air power, airborne infantry, and long range battleship gunfire.  This presents the best of all worlds: extensive pre-assault bombardment reduces the immediate enemy defenses and the overwhelming force interdicts the reinforcement effort.  Thus, both the immediate defenses and the reinforcements are attrited before the actual landing occurs.  To a large extent, interdiction of reinforcements actually occurred at Normandy, thanks to overwhelming force, although the interdiction was divorced from an extensive pre-assault bombardment.

The British view that the element of surprise was necessary to make up for a lack of resources – meaning, a less than overwhelming assault force – was not an issue for the Americans in the Pacific as every US assault did involve overwhelming force.  Thus, surprise was, again, irrelevant.

In contrast to the Mediterranean view that bombardment was ineffective at destroying defenses, Pacific bombardments did achieve the objective of forcing the Japanese to concede the actual landing and retreat to inland prepared defenses in the form of caves, tunnels, and other fortifications that could be hidden from easy observation and protected from heavy bombardment.  Shore defenses were, in fact, found to be susceptible to prolonged bombardment, hence, the relocation of the defending assets to inland locations.

From the preceding discussion we see, then, the tension between the two conflicting philosophies:

• The desire to maintain the element of surprise
• The desire to inflict as much pre-assault destruction on the enemy as possible

While both philosophies offer seemingly valid arguments and rationales, it appears that the Mediterranean philosophy of minimal bombardment is largely based on assault force shortcomings and failings such as the lack of overwhelming force, limited resources, and doctrinally ineffective application of naval gunfire.  Thus, for a properly resourced amphibious assault the Pacific practice of prolonged pre-bombardment would appear to be the correct choice.

Having examined the issue of pre-assault bombardment, it is important to note that the discussion has nothing to do with bombardment support during and immediately after the assault landing.  Regardless of whether the assault used minimal or maximum pre-assault bombardment there is an undisputed need for naval gun support during the actual landing and immediately after, until the landing force can get their own artillery ashore and operating.

How does all this impact our views on naval gunfire today?  As you might expect, the exact same considerations and conclusions about pre-assault bombardment still apply.  However, technology has introduced some modifications into the methodology:

Range – Today’s defenders can use cruise and ballistic missiles with ranges of hundreds or thousands of miles.  Even modern artillery and rocket launchers have ranges of many dozens of miles.  Thus, bombardment must not be limited to the immediate landing area but must take into account defending ‘batteries’ located hundreds of miles away.  These remote targets may need to be serviced by air power rather than naval guns but, regardless, they must be accounted for.

Interestingly, the potential remote range of defenses might, in some cases, mean that there are relatively fewer defenses/defenders at the actual landing site as compared to the WWII scenarios of highly concentrated, localized defenses and defenders.  If this is the case, the need for local bombardment may be reduced. 

The effect of range, then, results in a modification of the definition of bombardment to include not just naval guns but also missiles and aircraft/bombs.

Interdiction – The ability to defend from hundreds or thousands of miles away means that the concept of interdiction has to be greatly expanded.  Interdiction may have to occur hundreds or thousands of miles away.  This also leads to the possibility that there may be no interdiction in the strictest sense of the word since the enemy may have no need to physically move reinforcements to the landing site.  Still, there will almost certainly be some movement of enemy defenses toward the assault site and that movement, however far away, must be interdicted.

Precision Guidance – Many observers mistakenly believe that massive bombardments are no longer necessary thanks to precision guidance.  However, the reality is that precision guidance is a very limited capability in a peer defended assault scenario. 

For example, laser guided rounds are useless in bombardment because there will be no assets available to laser designate.  In a peer defended assault scenario, aircraft laser designators will be unable to loiter over the battlefield providing target designation and ground forces won’t even be available until well after the initial landing and will be too busy surviving to calmly and casually laser spot targets.  Further, the ground forces will be too localized and ‘compacted’ to designate targets more than a hundred feet in front of them even if they were willing to lift their heads above cover long enough to do so. 

Ships can, if so equipped, provide their own laser designation but that would be valid only for visible, line of sight targets and a smart enemy is not going to provide many of those.

GPS guided rounds would be effective but only against known, fixed, visible targets.  The reality is that a smart enemy will not provide many fixed, visible targets.

The reality is that unguided area bombardment is the only generally effective method.

Conclusions  

• For a properly resourced amphibious assault, prolonged and heavy pre-assault bombardment is clearly the preferred action and is essential to ensure a successful landing.
• Post-assault gun support is always required.
• In order for bombardment to be effective and worth the effort, naval gunfire must employ large caliber, heavy guns of 8” or greater size.  As demonstrated by WWII experience, 5” guns simply don’t have the power to effectively destroy hardened fortifications. 
• The area of bombardment on today’s battlefield will likely have to be greatly expanded although the bombardment may take the form of aircraft or missiles in order to achieve the required range.
• Precision guidance is only marginally useful in an amphibious assault.  Old fashioned area bombardment is still required.

Today’s US Navy utterly lacks the capability to provide amphibious pre-assault bombardment or supporting fires during the landing.  If we continue to insist that we want and have this capability, we need to procure bombardment capability.  The Marines long ago gave up their battleship gun support in exchange for a handful of magic beans and promises by the Navy that never came to fruition and they are now left with no naval gun support, whatsoever. 

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(1)“Gators of Neptune”, Christopher Yung, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, 2006, ISBN 1-59114-997-5

(2)Ibid. p.80-81,

From the Overlord Outline Plan: “As preliminary bombardment compromises surprise, it should be confined to the shortest possible duration consistent with the achievement of the required degree of neutralization.”

What If - D-Day In Reverse

It’s time for the big ‘what if’!

We just discussed the ‘what if’ idea of how Germany might have been able to stop the Allied D-Day invasion.  In addition to what we talked about, there was one other possibility to stop the invasion and that would have been for Germany to invade England, first.  In fact, Germany formulated plans for exactly that operation, calling it Sea Lion.  Most post-war analysts and historians do not believe the plan could have succeeded and, indeed, Hitler’s own military leaders expressed little support for the idea.  Still, could it have worked?  Sounds like another ‘what if’!

As it happened, the invasion was war gamed in 1974 at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.  Wiki has a good write up on the event and it makes for fascinating reading. (1)  Let’s examine Sea Lion as a ‘what if’ and take a look at how the war game played out.

Let’s start by looking at the war game results.  To put it succinctly, the game demonstrated that the initial invasion wave was readily able to cross the channel and land.  However, the follow on waves were decimated and the invasion died due to lack of supplies.  The German forces in England were defeated and surrendered.  As I said, Wiki has a nice description of the game and I won’t make any great effort to repeat it but there are a few items that are noteworthy.

The game was heavily biased against the German effort and in favor of the English.  This started with the initial inclusion of a map of the landing area which instantly triggered a massive surge of units straight to the area as opposed to maintaining the landing site uncertainty that would have accompanied a real invasion.  We saw the negative impact that site and timing uncertainty had on German defenses and there is no reason to believe that the same uncertainties wouldn’t have negatively impacted English defenses.

The German cross-channel transport vessels were severely underrepresented in the game, leading to limited troop and supply transport.  From the Wiki article,

The Germans had only converted river barges available as transport ships. Not a great deal was known about the invasion fleet at the time of the wargame. This represented a gross simplification relative to shipping plans discovered later, which involved nearly 4,000 vessels, including 150 merchant ships and 237 light or auxiliary close escorts, in four invasion fleets.

The invasion fleet naval assets were limited to some E Boats, U-Boats, and destroyers.

The British Home Fleet was sent south to interdict the invasion force contrary to historical intent.  From Wiki,

In real life, both Admiral Charles Forbes, commander of the Home Fleet, and Admiral Dudley Pound, First Sea Lord, said they would not send capital ships into the Channel unless the Germans did so, too.

The first two days of the game included weather conditions which prevented the German invasion fleet from launching.  Nonetheless, the previously mentioned map issue which revealed the landing site enabled the English to spend two days surging ground forces to the future landing site secure in the absolute knowledge of the site’s location.  Thus, the English had a two day start on the game.

The initial assault wave was able to land relatively unimpeded and managed to advance 12 miles inland and captured the ports of Folkestone and Newhaven.

German minefields shielded the invasion force.

The Luftwaffe conducted bombing attacks on London instead of directly supporting the assault forces.

The game was decided when the German’s second assault wave was intercepted and destroyed by a Royal Navy (RN) force of 17 cruisers and 57 destroyers.

Clearly, the game was heavily slanted towards the British.  Despite this, the initial assault wave made it ashore in good order and achieved some degree of success.

Now, let’s ‘what if’ the concept the right way and see if it could have succeeded.  Of course, being a ‘what if’, we wouldn’t invade Russia, thus doubling our available resources!

We need to start with defining the goals of an invasion and there would be two main goals. 

1.  To seize a port for follow on unloading of troops, supplies, and equipment.  Only a functioning port can provide the volumetric throughput of supplies necessary to support a large scale invasion.  Depending on a detailed study of available resources, seizure of a second port would be a desirable goal, as well.

2.  To seize an area suitable for an airfield.  This could be an existing airfield or just an open flat area that could be quickly converted to an airfield.  The purpose of such a field would be to allow critical supplies to be flown in and to allow local staging of the Luftwaffe rather than having to sortie from mainland Europe.  Local staging would enhance fighter cover and allow effective close air support by enabling aircraft to launch, attack, and land to refuel and rearm in short cycles.  Additional fields would be developed as the invasion progressed.

To accomplish this, our version of ‘what if’ starts out with many of the aspects discussed in the previous post and include:

• Refocusing the U-boat effort on sealing the northern approach to the English Channel, hunting British cruisers and destroyers, and bottling up the Home Fleet.
• Extensive laying of minefields at both ends of the channel and in lanes protecting the invasion fleet’s approach routes.
• Use of the Luftwaffe to destroy bridges, railways, and roads that would be used to move British reinforcements to the landing area.
• Use of the Luftwaffe to hunt British cruisers and destroyers.
• Co-ordinated use of the German battleships and heavy cruisers to screen the invasion fleet from British cruisers and destroyers.
• Use of E Boats to screen the German naval force.

With those measures in place, the actual assault would consist of the following operational steps,

• Airborne assault to secure the selected port.
• Airborne assault to secure the selected airfield.
• Amphibious assault to support the port seizure and isolate/screen the port from counterattack.
• Amphibious assault to support the airfield seizure.

Students of history will note the similarity between this operational plan and the Allies D-Day plan.  Many people think the D-Day assault was all about pushing troops across the beach and then straight on to Germany but the real purpose was to seize ports for the critical follow on supply effort which was the only way the subsequent large scale European combat could be supported.  The actual D-Day landing was all about seizing the ports.

Having laid out the goals, plan, and methods, we are now led to ask, would it have succeeded?

The wargame, even heavily slanted towards the British, demonstrated that the initial assault wave would have successfully landed and moved inland.  In our ‘what if’, we’ve enhanced the chance of success with more numerous, more substantial, and specific measures aimed at isolating and screening the invasion fleet.  Thus, there is every reason to believe that the initial assault would be quite successful.

Recall that the Allied D-Day assault landed in the teeth of extensive fortifications at the beach.  England had no such defenses, never believed an invasion was a real threat, and had no plans to fortify beaches.  There is every reason to believe the assaulting forces would have been able to land and move inland with only minimal resistance.

Airborne forces always enjoy initial success in terms of landing.  The question becomes whether they can assemble and organize once on the ground to the extent necessary to enable them to become combat effective and achieve their objectives.  As seen by the Allies’ D-Day efforts, the airborne element did succeed, though at a cost.  The Allied airborne effort was hampered by landing dispersed in somewhat featureless and difficult terrain which made assembly and subsequent effective combat problematic.  I would submit that landing an airborne force in and around a port city would be far more practical and easy.  Orientation of the forces, once on the ground, would be easier because a city is full of recognizable landmarks and the confusion factor for the defenders is immense.  I would aim a portion of the airborne landings directly on the port facilities and the remainder in and around the city to screen the port.

In the game, a port was seized.  Thus, there is every reason to believe that the initial port seizure objective could be accomplished quickly and easily.

The same reasoning applies to seizure of an airfield area.  Being, presumably, out in the country and isolated, an airborne landing and follow up support from amphibious troops would almost certainly ensure the successful seizure and establishment of a functioning airfield.  Thus, the assault would benefit immensely from the rapid establishment of a local airfield for fighter cover and close air support.

Where the game failed for the Germans was the second wave was intercepted by British cruisers and destroyers and completely destroyed.  This resulted in the initial force being ‘starved’ of supplies and the invasion died out.  It is no great surprise that the entire assault hinges on the follow on effort.  This is the logistics portion of war that ultimately determines military success or failure.  The measures we’ve outlined here should have been sufficient to ensure the success of the follow on supply effort.  That being the case, the entire assault would have had a fair chance of success. 

The importance in this ‘what if’ of Germany not attacking Russia cannot be overstated.  Being able to double the resources available to be brought to bear against England would have been incalculably beneficial.

We see, then, that the concept of an invasion of England was feasible and would have had a fair chance of success.  However, it would have been necessary to gear the entire German war effort toward this goal.  From the beginning, the Germans would have had to have been working toward this goal by not squandering U-boats and their surface ships, not attacking Russia, working to lay minefields and isolate the English channel, etc.  In other words, they would have needed a strategy on day one of the war that had this goal in mind. 

The importance of a coherent strategy cannot be overstated and offers a lesson for us, today.  What is our strategy towards Russia, China, Iran, and NKorea?  We haven’t got one.  How can we expect success, then?  But, I digress …

Had Germany been able to successfully invade England, how would the war have progressed beyond that point?  Would the US have prosecuted a war against Germany without England as a base of operations or would the US have attempted to negotiate a peace settlement of some sort?  If the US had opted to continue the war, would Africa have become the base of operations?  What role would Russia (not having been attacked by Germany) have played, subsequently?

What if?

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(1)Wikipedia, “Operation Sea Lion (wargame)”, retrieved 11-Mar-2019,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Sea_Lion_(wargame)

What If - Stopping D-Day

It’s time for an invigorating round of historical ‘what if’.  The discussion portion of our recent post on Chinese amphibious capabilities took an inexplicable detour (as post discussions often do!) to debating what Germany could have done differently to defeat or prevent the Allied D-Day invasion.  The usual list of suspects was discussed including unified command and control, air superiority, better intel, etc. 

ComNavOps, always believing that the best defense is a good offense, suggested that, rather than waiting on the defensive and then trying to stop the assault, the Germans would have been better served to go after the buildup of troops, supplies, and equipment in England and stop the invasion at its source, before it ever started.  This is analogous to conducting ASW not by fighting subs out in the open ocean but by attacking the factories that produce the subs and the ports where they are serviced.  It’s easier to destroy the source of submarines and their support facilities than to battle them one-on-one at sea.

Had Germany been able to significantly impact the buildup, the invasion would have been indefinitely delayed.  Of course, this is easier said than done.  Let’s kick around some ideas and see if it could have been done.

D-Day - Could This Have Been Prevented?

First, it is necessary to understand that the Germans would not have had to destroy 100% of the men and materiel – an on-going destruction of, perhaps, 20% would likely have been sufficient to disrupt the training and buildup to the point of causing perpetual delays in the assault timing, thereby accomplishing the goal of ‘defeating’ the invasion before it ever began.

So, understanding the fairly limited scope of the task, what methods could the Germans have used to accomplish this task?

Strategic Bombing – Instead of focusing on bombing London, the Luftwaffe could have focused on troop, supply, and equipment concentrations.  Yes, men and material were dispersed across England but it’s impossible to prepare a D-Day size invasion and not have significant concentrations of men and materiel.  In fact, the very dispersal that was used, to the extent it was, would have worked against the RAF’s defensive efforts since they would have had to disperse their defending aircraft as well.

Recognizing that, ultimately, an amphibious assault depends on transport ships, the bombing should also have focused on the transport ships.  These would have been relatively known, fixed point locations and easy targets (neglecting, of course, the surrounding anti-aircraft (AA) defenses and RAF!).

It is also worth wondering if, instead of massed bombing attacks, the Germans should have engaged in smaller, low level, nighttime aircraft raids.  Launched against known depots, troop concentrations, and transport vessels, such raids ought to have been difficult to detect, nearly impossible to predict the targets, difficult to defend against, and fairly effective since total destruction would not have been the goal – 20% overall destruction should have been fairly easily achievable.

German Bombers Attacking Depots, Troop Concentrations, and Transport Ships

Commando Raids – The very short distance across the English Channel and North Sea (ranging from 60 miles at the SW end to a narrow point of around 20 miles at the Calais-Dover area and back out to 100 miles between Belgium/Netherlands and England across the North Sea) lends itself to undetected transport of small raiding units across the Channel.  Raids from Company down to squad size units would have been undetectable and difficult to defend against.  E Boats were able to routinely operate undetected in the Channel and nighttime, small transports would have been very difficult to detect and interdict.  Again, total destruction would not have been the raider’s goal.  Constant disruption would have sufficed to indefinitely delay the planned invasion.

German Brandenburg Commandos Attacking Allied Supply Depot

U-Boats and Mining – The Germans might have been better off concentrating a portion of their U-Boats not to direct sinking of ships in convoys in the mid-Atlantic but to continual clandestine laying/re-laying of mines at each port.  It doesn’t matter how many ships arrived from the US if they couldn’t get into a port to unload.  This would also have had the effect of avoiding direct combat with the Royal Navy (RN), thereby preserving U-Boats.  Of course the RN would have heavily patrolled the port approaches but without the U-Boats ‘announcing’ their presence in the form of revealing attacks, detection would have been much more difficult.  Extensive mining would also have taken a toll on the RN destroyers and rendered their defensive efforts much more difficult and dangerous.

Type TMB Mine Being Loaded Aboard U-Boat To Seal The English Ports

E Boats (Schnellboot) – German E Boats should have focused on finding and destroying landing vessels more so than merchant vessels or warships.  Sneaking near or into ports and sinking transports would have definitely caused invasion plans to be postponed.

E Boat Attacking Transport Vessels

Naval Bombardment – The time frame in question, here, is 1940-1944.  Especially during the early years, Germany had the use of Bismarck (later Tirpitz) and several heavy cruisers.  With co-ordinated support from the Luftwaffe, dedicated Luftwaffe anti-torpedo plane screens (English torpedo planes of the time were barely advanced beyond WWI levels and should have been easy prey for German fighters), E Boat screening, and U-Boat support and mining to prevent the British Home Fleet from approaching, bombardment raids aimed at the Allies transport vessels could have been conducted with a reasonable chance of success. 

Bismarck Attacking Transport Vessels

Shore Artillery – Though not capable of direct attacks on Allied men and materiel in England, shore artillery at the Calais-Dover chokepoint could have sealed the northeast entry to the Channel from RN naval forces.  The fact that such artillery was fielded and produced very little success wouldn’t have changed the thinking at the time that the RN couldn’t risk that approach.  Combined with mining, the northeast approach would have been secured from Allied naval intrusion thereby facilitating the above listed methods.

Calais-Dover Shore Artillery

Summation and Lessons for Today - With some effort and refocusing of priorities, the Germans could have turned the English Channel into an A2/AD zone and a fairly secure base from which to indefinitely disrupt the Allied buildup for the Normandy invasion. 

The major lesson to be gleaned from this is that defense, ultimately, seldom succeeds.  The best defense is a good offense.  This is relevant today for the US Navy.  Our entire fleet is heavily slanted towards defense (Aegis, AMDR, BMD).  Our carriers with their shrinking and short ranged air wings have almost reached the point of existing merely to protect themselves.  We have produced no offensive ship or weapon in decades.  Navy leadership has recently publicly acknowledged exactly this and now claims to be focusing on offensive operations – yeah, we’ll see.

Another major lesson is strategic thinking.  The German military’s strategic thinking was dominated by Hitler, personally, both in his explicit orders and the stifling effect he had on his military leadership.  No one ever accused Hitler of being a strategic genius.  Had Hitler not elected to attack Russia in June 1941, Germany would have had double the men and materiel to oppose the Allied invasion and would have been in a far stronger position to carry out the actions listed above.  Today, our military and Navy suffer from the same complete lack of intelligent strategic thinking.  Witness our absolutely floundering and nearly non-existent response to the Chinese annexation of the South China Sea.  Witness our complete lack of a military strategy for war with China.  We need to begin serious offensive strategic thinking and wargaming.

Mine warfare is another obvious lesson for us, today.  The power of mines has been demonstrated time and again throughout history and yet, for practical purposes, the Navy has no offensive mine warfare capability.  We need new, more capable mines and multiple ways to deliver them.  We need to integrate mine warfare into our operational planning (you know, whenever we get any operational planning).

This kind of ‘what if’ thought exercise is not only enjoyable but it offers insights and lessons applicable to our situations today.

D-Day Conclusions and Lessons

This is a wrap up of the previous posts based on the book, D-Day June 6, 1944: The Climatic Batle of World War II, by Stephen Ambrose. 

Here are some overall conclusions and lessons from the D-Day assault.  Note that these are my own interpretations of the book’s lessons.  The author did not present an itemized list, as such.  Also, these are not meant to be all-encompassing.  These are just some of the lessons emphasized by the readings in the book.

Conclusions:

·        Almost nothing went right.

·        Naval gunfire from destroyers was instrumental in aiding initial infantry progress.

·        Numbers were our biggest advantage and, ultimately, ensured success.

·        The Germans failed to pick the right defensive strategy.

·        The Germans failed to pick a single defensive strategy and wound up distributing their assets among multiple commanders with multiple strategies for defense, thus diluting their capabilities.

·        Mines were devastating.

·        Airborne assault troops were effective only by staying within physical proximity of the main assault force, thereby able to link up within 24 hours, and accomplished their missions, to the degree they did, through sheer, overwhelming numbers.

·        The US lack of specialized engineering vehicles proved costly.

·        The lack of tanks in the initial assault waves proved costly.

Unsurprisingly, the conclusions and lessons mirror each other.

Lessons:

·        Mines are a devastatingly effective weapon against an amphibious assault.  We need to vastly increase our MCM capability and our offensive mine warfare (mine laying) capability.

·        Naval gunfire is mandatory.  Naval guns will be the only source of high explosive available during initial phases of an assault.  The Navy’s doctrine of standing off 25-50 miles, out of range of the few 5” guns we have, is unsatisfactory and will leave the Marines without support.

·        Numbers matter and are the most important factor in the success of an assault. 

·        Everything will go wrong.  Our arrogance regarding our faith in complex networks of data, communications, shared sensors, GPS, etc. is breathtaking.  None of those will work and we need to train for loss of the electromagnetic spectrum and we need to develop many more old-fashioned weapons that work without external input and communications.

·        Inland airborne assault forces are unsustainable beyond 24 hours and will become combat ineffective after that period if not relieved.

·        We will need orders of magnitude more supplies and equipment than are currently allocated for an assault

The overwhelming conclusion from an examination of D-Day is that the US military is totally incapable of conducting an assault anywhere near this scale today.  That’s not necessarily surprising or even disappointing – it took the Allies a couple of years to build up the strength to conduct the assault.  What is disappointing is that we have lost the ability to conduct even a small scale assault against a peer defender. 

Consider just the mine aspect of an assault.  The Allies used hundreds of minesweepers for one operation.  The Navy has 11 minesweepers and some helos available today.  A relative handful of mines can absolutely paralyze and negate our assault options.

Reading the book conveys a stunning appreciation for the tonnage of supplies and equipment that were thrown at the assault.  Tons were destroyed before they could get a hundred feet beyond the shore and yet untold tons more kept coming.  Today, we have an utterly unrealistic view about the amount of weapons and supplies needed to conduct high end combat.  We have neither the tonnage of supplies nor the means to transport them to support and sustain even a minor assault involving high end combat.

D-Day saw the use of over 5,000 vessels including over 1,000 warships.  Today, the entire Navy consists of only 280 ships.  The Navy has nowhere near the numbers or types (LCT, LST, LSM, LCVP, MCM, etc.) of ships to support an assault.

While the technology has changed, the lessons involving amphibious assault have not.  We’ve lost the institutional memory of those lessons but that does not mean that the lessons do not still apply.  They do and we will relearn those lessons when the time comes and will pay in blood to do so.

(4)Second Line of Defense, “Closing the US Navy’s Mine Warfare Gap”, Scott Truver, 20-Jun-2015

http://www.sldinfo.com/closing-the-us-navys-mine-warfare-gap/

D-Day, Part 3

This is a continuation of the previous D-Day lessons post based on the book, D-Day June 6, 1944: The Climatic Batle of World War II, by Stephen Ambrose. 

Here are some more tidbits from the book that offer lessons relevant to today’s amphibious assault concerns.

Communications were a key target.

“Communications was a factor in the German failure.  The American paratroopers had been told that if they could not do anything else, they could at least cut communication lines.  The Germans in Normandy had been using secure telephone and cable lines for years and consequently had become complacent about their system.”

Does this sound familiar?  The Navy has become complacent about its electromagnetic emissions, communications, GPS, etc.  We assume that everything will work just as well in combat as it does in peacetime and against third world countries or terrorists.  Unfortunately, the reality is that combat against a peer or near-peer will see the entire electromagnetic spectrum contested and our communications, data transfers, networks, etc. will be severely compromised.  We must begin designing equipment and training for degraded electromagnetic enviroments.

Allied airpower was counted on to deliver vast quantities of explosives, destroy many targets, and otherwise prepare the battlefield for the infantry.  In the event, little of this happened.  Weather and a fear of dropping on friendly forces resulted in the aerial bombardment being almost totally wasted with the bomb loads landing far from their intended targets.

“For the B-17 crews, flying mainly at 20,000 feet, … such bombing was clearly inappropriate to its purpose. … Eisenhower learned the lesson that the B-17 was not a suitable weapon for tactical ground support.”

This discussion continues today with advocates of bombers claiming their ability to provide precise close air support.  Certainly, the advent of laser guidance offers the possibility, under the right circumstances, of providing a limited and haphazard degree of support.  However, in an assault, there will be no one to provide the laser spotting.  The troops will not be calm, cool, well equipped, well trained, and ready with all necessary gear for precise direction of air support.  Instead, they will be panicked, disorganized, and lucky to have hung on to their rifles.  B-1/2/52 bombers will be of no use trying to provide direct, close support.

The effectiveness of naval gunfire was discussed.

“From the point of view of the soldiers going ashore, the great naval bombardment was as ineffective as the great air bombardment.  According to Admiral Morison, the reason was ‘not enough time was allowed,’ and the fault was the Army’s, not the Navy’s, because the Army did not wish the bombardment to start before daylight.”

So, dozens of battleships and cruisers, all with their big guns, failed to provide the necessary degree of destruction due, in part, to a lack of time and also to the physical strength of the German emplacements, many of which shrugged off major caliber hits.  What does this tell us, today?  It tells us that our non-existent naval gunfire and meager airpower will not significantly degrade an enemy’s defenses.  We need to drastically rethink our view of the delivery of large quantities of high explosives, in general, and naval gun support, in particular.  A handful of Tomahawk missiles will not suffice.

The failure of plans in the face of enemy contact was a notable feature of D-Day.  No operation before or, arguably, since, had been so carefully and meticulously planned, trained, and rehearsed as the D-Day assault.  Every minute aspect was accounted for several times over.  Unfortunately, the plan completely fell apart even before the first soldier landed.  The simplest and most fundamental aspect of the plan was to simply “drive” the troops straight ashore to their designated landing spots.  However, as demonstrated at Omaha beach,

“With the exception of Company A 116th, no unit landed where it was supposed to.”

Weather, tides, German defensive barriers, sand bars, defensive fire, and general confusion combined to scatter the troops widely.  Units were intermingled and too far away from their specific objectives to act effectively.  If the simple act of landing can’t be counted on to happen as planned, what can?  The answer is nothing.  If anything does go right, we should consider it a blessing but not something we can count on.  Our modern tendency to allocate just the bare minimum assets to an objective with the assumption that all will go reasonably well is a recipe for disaster. 

The actions of naval destroyers was noteworthy.  Often in defiance of orders and doctrine, they moved right up to the beach and engaged in duels with German emplacements to good effect.  Lt. Joe Smith, Navy beachmaster, said,

“… the destroyers come right into the beach firing into the cliff.  You could see the trenches, guns, and men blowing up where they would hit.  They aimed right below the edge of the cliffs where the trenches were dug in.  There is no question in my mind that the few Navy destroyers that we had there saved the invasion.”

Contrast this use of destroyers with the Navy’s current doctrine of standing 25-50 miles off shore.  The infantry will be left without any heavy gun support (to the extent that a 5” gun can be considered heavy) during the critical initial phase of an assault.

We see, then, that the historical example of D-Day offers many lessons that are still relevant today.  Yes, technology may have altered a few of the lessons but the alterations are more a matter of degree than obsolescence. 

I’ll post a concluding piece on this book, shortly.  D-Day and its lessons are too important to leave in the dustbin of history.