January 22, 1944. The sun is shining, and there is a quiet wind blowing across the beach of Anzio. The quiet unsettling for it is the silence before the storm. In the following couple of days the aforementioned beach will be covered by upwards of 30,000 allied troops. This beach will also see some of the bloodiest fighting of the entire war in the next few months. The final months along the Gustav Line had come to a stalemate because Albert Kesselring, the German commander, was stopping any attempts by the Allies to advance at Cassino, causing a stalemate between the two factions. This is what set off the series of events at Anzio. Anzio is often not the first name that is synonymous with the thought of WWII. Despite its obscurity Anzio was a turning point that allowed the allies to breach the Gustav Line allowing the capture of Rome. The battle of Anzio in its entirety can be seen as a escalation of flaws from operation shingle, then the invasion, finally corrected in the breakout.
Trapped in a deadlock with the Germans on the Gustav Line, Sir Alexander, the commander in charge of the allied forces on the Gustav Line, needed a diversion. It was then that the Allies devised the strategy called Operation Shingle which was “one of the most ill-conceived operations of the war.”(Battle of Anzio). The operation was named shingle because it would peel away the Germans like removing the shingles of roof. The concept was that a large attack in the south, where Anzio is located, would draw the diminishing German forces away from the Gustav Line. This would allow Sir Alexander to break through the line to Rome. From Alexander’s perspective, if he could capture the Alban Hills which lie northeast of Anzio, This strategy would stop the Ger...
... middle of paper ...
....
“ANZIO: 1944." MILITARY INFORMATION HQ. Web. 04 Apr. 2010. .
"Anzio and the Road to Rome." Home Of Heroes Home Page. Web. 03 Apr. 2010. .
"Battle of Anzio” History.com Articles, Video, Pictures and Facts." The History Channel Home Page. Web. 03 Apr. 2010. .
"The National World War II MuseumStalemate at Anzio." The National World War II
MuseumJune 6, 2010 â?? Museum Marks Tenth Anniversary, Commemorates D-
Day. Web. 03 Apr. 2010.
.
Thompson, Julian,. Masters of the Battlefield: the World's Greatest Military
Commanders and Their Battles, from Alexander the Great to Schwarzkopf.
London: Sevenoaks, 2007. Print.
In 1942, the Allies decided to help out the Soviet Union and opened up another front to the war in Western Europe. The United States and Britain did not have a large enough military to mount an invasion at the time but they had drawn up plans to prepare for an invasion in case Germany’s western front weakened or the Soviet Union was put into dire straits. In August of 1942 the Canadians attempted an invasion of the French port city of Dieppe. It was a poorly planned and coordinated invasion that was meant to be a test the defense that Germany had established that ended in disaster, nearly 5,000 troops were either killed, wounded, or captured. In July 1943, British, American, and Canadian troops invaded Sicily as the western front expanded from Africa into Europe. The valuable experience from the amphibious landings in southern Europe would be used to launch to launch the largest invasion force in the world to crack open the solid ...
Gregorio Dati, Diary, in Gene Brucker (ed), Two Memoirs of Renaissance Florence (Waveland Press, 1991) p. 107
The comparison of German forces in France in 1943 versus 1944 provides a compelling argument that allied forces should have transitioned from defense to offense at a decisive point in Western France. Clausewitz states that, “A sudden powerful transition to the offensive - the flashing sword of vengeance - is the greatest moment for the defense” (Clausewitz, 370). Handel also emphasizes “timing is everything” in relation to the optimal transition from defense to offense (Handel, 190). The Americans and British did transition in 1943 to the offensive with the invasion of Sicily and the Italian campaign (Murray, 375). However, they did not capitalize on the opportunity in 1943 to attack the weaker German forces in France to brandish the “flashing sword of vengeance” that Clausewitz advocates.
Ginsborg P (1990). ‘A History of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics: 1943-1980’ Published by Penguin; Reprint edition (27 Sep 1990).
T.J. Cornell, The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC), London and New York: Routledge, 1995
At dawn of 19th August 1942, six thousand and one hundred Allied soldiers, of whom roughly
Early in the operations Alexander’s vague commander’s intent encouraged Patton to develop an independent understanding, different from Alexander’s, to the point that he assumed he would push north, beyond phase line blue, along with Montgomery to protect his flank all the way to Messina. (site) Mission Command crises culminated when General Alexander shifted the boundaries between the 7th and 8th Armies.(site) Alexander made his decision based on lack of trust in the 7th Army and his own clouded commander’s intent and incomplete understanding of the follow-on effects of a quick capture of Messina. His decision denied the Allies an opportunity to execute a quick breakout through the Axis defenses. But more importantly, it motivated General Patton to abandon his disciplined initiative and ignored Alexander’s directive to push north to protect Montgomery’s flank. Instead, he drove to Palermo seeking to reclaim this army’s prestige and later with a secure port of Palermo beat Montgomery to Messina. (site) The Allies’ poor foundation of Mission Command delayed a promising advance and replaced it with a rogue commander this allowed the German General Hube, a very competent combatant, time to concentrate and consolidate his forces to stiffen his defensive positions to delay the Allies until he was able to evacuate the bulk of his forces
By the summer of 1943 the Allied Powers had finished their campaigns in North Africa. Their next objective was to move into Sicily and invade Italy to cause the Germans to move northwest from the coast. This came to be known as “Operation Husky which was designed to open the shipping lanes in the Mediterranean, eliminate it as an Axis base, and to aid in the fall of Mussolini’s government” (Hickman n.d.). In July 8th, 1943 Mowat, now an intelligence officer was ordered to head to Sicily to participate in Operation Husky. They left the night of the 8th and encountered terribly rough seas due to the sirocco. The sirocco is an intense wind that comes off of the Sahara. It looked as though Operation Husky would be cancelled. Fortunately, later that night the wind slowed and the platoons were able to continue with the operation. The invasion commenced on the night of July 9th, landing on the west side of the Pachi...
"Life in Italy During the Middle Ages." Life in Italy. Life in Italy, 2014. Web. 29 Apr. 2014. .
West and Russia, Scandanavia, and the Ottomans in the East. As Italy defends against France
Marcel Le Glay, Jean-Louis Voisin, Yann Le Bohec. A History of Rome. West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.
The Web. The Web. 6 Nov. 2013. Trueman, Chris. A. Italy and World War One. Italy and World War One.
During the Norman Conquest and as seen throughout history, Sicily was of vital strategic importance as a control point for sea routes in the Mediterranean Sea. Great generals from Belisarius to Patton and Montgomery have used Sicily as the start poin...
World War II was the bloodiest war in all of war history. The war went on and eventually turned against Germany and the Nazis. The Nazis did not however relax their assault against the Jews. As the war went on the Nazis killed the Jews in greater and greater numbers (Strahinich 17). Mussolini was jealous of Hitler but he was naturally drawn to form an alliance with Germany. Italy could have joined with allied countries but they would not have gone along with Mussolini's expansion plans while Hitler did. Italy seized Albania in 1939. To make sure Germany would win the battle Italy invaded France on June 10, 1940 but they were unsuccessful. Even though Mussolini failed, Hitler still rewarded Mussolini for attacking France.
Favro, Diane G.. The urban image of Augustan Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. (266)