Quote Originally Posted by Watchman
The imprtance of Overlord is probably overplayed - by the time the Soviets had already broken the back of the East Front at the major campaign around Kursk (which was about the last major offensive operation the Germans mounted in Russia - after that they mostly conducted a fighting retreat).
I must disagree. How many divisions did the Germans keep in France to guard against the expected invasion? I forget the exact number, but I think its between 20 & 30 and included in this were many high quality, experienced, well equipped divisions. If the allies had been flung back into the sea then they would not have been able to mount another invasion for another year, or more likely 2 years (most historians agree on 2 years). Those divisions could have been transferred to the Eastern Front where they would have made a difference. Enough to start driving the Soviets back? Probably not, bur certainly enough to force a stalemate enabling Hitler to negoiate a truce with Stalin, perhaps along 1941 boundaries.

On the other hand, it did further overextend the already harried German military
agreed

(which had gotten booted out of Africa
agreed

and was getting its ass kicked in Italy
You are kidding me right? A small number of German troops were able to hold down a much larger force of Allied troops, and inflict heavy casualties upon them, whilst maintaining a pretty static front line. It wasn't until the spring of 45 that German resistance in Italy collapsed and they were forced into some serious retreating.

and the East Front
Again, I wouldn't say the Germans were getting their "ass kicked" by the Russians. Yes, they were being driven back, yes they were taking heavy casualties, but they never collapsed. In Russia, as elsewhere and pretty much throughout the war, the German Army showed just how good it was. IMO no other army in WW2 was good enough to take on the odds the Germans did and hold out for as long as they did, and make their enemies pay as heavy a price as they did. German soldiers were real, real good.


Incidentally, I've gotten the impression an important reason the Americans got mauled so badly on Omaha Beach was that they declined to use any of the so-called "Hobarts' Funnies" save for the amphibious version of the Sherman. The "Funnies" were specially equipped conversions of standard Allied tanks devised by one Major (or something similar) Hobart of the British Army for the express purpose of the landing, and included such generally useful creations as the "Crab" minesweeper version of the Sherman, the "Crocodile" (a flamethrower-armed Cromwell, if memory serves) and the "Flying Dustbin" (a Cromwell(?) with a 200+mm mortar for bunker-busting; the nickname is derived from the appereance of the grenade...), bridge- and mesh-mat layers for crossing holes and mudflats and more.
Thats definately part of the reason. The forces on Omaha also had to contest with the roughest weather of any of the beaches, some units were landed in the wrong place - up to 2 miles from their target. Vital equipment such as radios didn't work or were lost, key units such as engineers struggled to remove beach obstacles in the heavy seas and heavy German opposition. After the 1st wave was decimated, each successive wave landed into a scene of total chaos & death & destruction so that each thing that went wrong contributed to something else going wrong. Finally, they had landed slap bang on top of a veteran German division recently transferred from the Eastern Front, whereas other beaches had to contend with little more than a few Russian slave labourers. At one point it was considered actually evacuating the beach, kudos must go to those Americans who had the presence of mind, and the courage (not to mention the luck to have lived that long) to organise the rag tag groups of survivors and fight their way off the beach.