The Valour and the Horror

Operation Lüttich:

Operation Lüttich (Liège) was designed to break the Allied offensive in Normandy, and then allow the Germans to destroy the allied forces there. The operation was code named Lüttich (Liège), the place at which Ludendorff, in August, 1914, had,exactly thirty years before to the day, opened the way for the great German march of encirclement across the rear of the French army.

[Field Marshall] Von Kluge suspected that the allies had scented his intentions. His suspicion fell short of actuality. The Allies shad not scented but documented his intentions. On the night of August 5th-6th, Ultra, product of the decrypt service at Bletchey, had alerted Montgomery and Bradley to the movement of panzer divisions westward. At midnight on August 6th-7th, as the attack began, began, Ultra was forwarding to France the timings of the attack and its immediate objectives, Brecey and Montigny, between Mortain and Avaranches; but that news was less important than the earlier transmission, which had allowed Bradley the time to re-align his forces as to ensure that the `Mortain counter-attack', as the Allies were to call Operation Lüttich, would run into into a solid wall of resistance just beyond its starting line.

....Lüttich was therefore compromised from the outset. ... Harried by news of the difficulties of assembly - the detachment of the 1st SS, en route, from Caen since August 3rd, had lost 30 per cent of its strength, the 1116 Panzer Division had failed to detach a promised tank battalion to 2nd Panzer - he allowed his subordinates to postpone H-Hour to midnight of August 6th but insisted that the deadline was final....On schedule, therefore, but in much smaller strength than planned, Lüttich departed from its start line in the early dark of the summer night. Down narrow corridors towards Avaranches, twenty miles distant, drove three armoured columns, two from 2nd SS Panzer on the south bank of the Sée, one from 2nd Panzer on the north bank; a fourth column which 2nd Panzer should have provided was left to wait for the arrival of the tanks of 1st SS. No Artillery barrage preceded the jump-off. It was hoped to heighten the surprise on which Kluge still counted.

The southern columns did achieve some surprise. The American 30th Division had not been reinforced and most of its roadblocks on the approaches to Mortain were quickly overrun. ...Recognising that they were surrounded, the infantrymen of the foremost battalions withdrew to the high ground of Hill 317, overlooking Mortain, dug in for the all round defence and called down their own artillery on to the fringe of their positions. Its heavy salvos at once brought the onward movement of 2nd SS to a halt, and while some [German] tank crews settled to battle things out with the divisional tank-destroyer battalion - fourteen were to fall to the American guns - many of the others drove off the roads to drape their vehicles with camouflage nets against the air attacks which they knew must come as soon as they were caught when stopped.

The northern column was not opposed by American force in such strength, and should have made better progress. At first it did, despite the non-appearance of a tank battalion from the 116th Panzer Divisions to bolster its strength...three miles short of its objective for the day, it ran into the American 9th Division's line of resistance and halted. Soon afterwards the rest of 2nd Panzer, which had delayed its departure to await the promised detachment of 1st SS, was also brought to a stop and further reinforcement by 1st SS could not restart the advance.

Events were now principally influenced by air forces, which had been alerted to engage the multitude of ground targets which Lüttich was expected to present. Far way from the battlefield, Allied combat air patrols established a barrier around the Third Air fleet's runways near Paris and prevented its 300 promised fighters reaching the Mortain area. In the area itself American medium bombers struck hard all day at German movement on the road to the front, while British Typhoon fighters of Second Tactical Air Force engaged pinpoint targets with salvos of 60-pound rockets.`We could do nothing against them', reported General von Luttwitz, the divisional commander, ` and make no further progress.' About thirty of his remaining sixty tanks were knocked out by air attack on August 7th.

John Keegan, Six Armies in Normandy, p. 247-8.

By August 8th, Operation had Lüttich had failed, and with it the German's last chance to destroy the Allied forces in Normandy.

Valour and Horror, Second World War, Canadian history, World War II, W.W.II