This post or, rather, a series of posts was long in the making since required a significant thinking and re-thinking (and recalling) of many details of WW II and Western Allies approach to that war, and, I think, it is as good time as any to start writing about Dwight D. Eisenhower and his role both in WW II and, as a consequence, in what followed until his famous farewell speech on 17 January 1961 from the White House. I stated not for once, that we all still live in the world which was largely formed in the crucible of battles of WW II and it seems it is a good idea to revisit some very important (and crucial) events of that war. So here is a short intro:
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It is rather an
arduous task to discuss WW II, namely European Theater of Operations, with many
Americans who, as strange as it sounds, are more or less acquainted with the
peculiarities of Allied operations after D-Day. The reason for this difficulty
is simple--it is normal to be patriotic and have many biases associated with
such a position. The amount of books in the US dedicated to European Theater is
immense, so is the number of different TV shows and, of course, there is always
Hollywood which is hugely responsible for developing of those American biases
when dealing with WW II. Yet, it is, very often, precisely this gigantic number
of "studies", narratives, stories and reflections on Allied operation
in Europe which creates a problem--for an average American it simply becomes impossible
to dig for the truth, especially for the one which requires at least basic
understanding of issues of military strategy, operational art and, to a certain
degree, tactics. Moreover, understanding of how those three interact and how
they relate to a larger military-political picture is even more difficult task,
since requires a good grasp on realities of a war, and especially the war as
complex and brutal as WW II. Hence, Hollywood and pop-history.
My personal experiences with these uniquely American
attitudes and biases throughout the years ranged from being overwhelmed by
militant ignorance on anything WW II related to me, a former Soviet military
professional, explaining actual facts of US Army military planning and operations
to a number of people who would pass, under normal conditions, for people "well-versed"
in US WW II military history. The case in point is me, not for once, being forced,
with quotes and even scans of documents, to debate many American WW II history buffs
that Operation Cobra was a result of
Omar Bradley's idea and planning and that General George Patton was merely an
attribute to this operation. But it is almost impossible to break through
American Patton's myth, which was enhanced immensely by the famous movie with
George C. Scott's genius (and detached from actual war reality) performance,
which won him an Oscar. As Ladislas Farago noted in his book, when the movie came
out in West Germany early 1970s, Germans couldn't understand how" an
obscured American general merited a movie", when there was not one made about
Zhukov, Montgomery or even Rommel. But that is what constitutes the main
problem--a Hollywood version of WW II and of Allied operations in Europe.
Idealized view of the WW II, as merely a combination of artsy maneuvers
conducted by military leaders who were modern reincarnations of Napoleon and
who were ready to "breakthrough", "pursue",
"envelop" or "annihilate", continues to persist in the US.
Patton, who was just another Army Commander, and by far not the most remarkable
one, among very many generals of anti-Hitler Coalition, merited two major
Hollywood motion pictures, while Allied Supreme Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower
got himself a 1979 TV mini-series and a rather obscured, yet again TV, 2004 movie
with Tom Selleck as Ike--hardly an appropriate tribute to a man, who not only
was a huge part in American push, together with incomparable George Marshall, for
the Second Front but effectively stopped the war in Korea and went on to become
a truly great American President, especially viewed from today's vantage point,
against the background of a number of mediocrities who since occupied the White
House. In US WWII mythology Ike was and is hardly a persona who fits into
American perception of the war, which is not surprising--most Americans simply
have no grasp of realities of the warfare in general and of WW II in particular
and that is a travesty.
While Hollywood portrayed Patton as a hand gun
whipping, fearless "leader" ready to literally lead his Third Army
to, well, even Moscow, Ike's balanced, no-nonsense approach to the realities of
his high command, while being militarily admirable, made not a very good
material for Hollywood. Yet, both Eisenhower and Patton represent an inherent
and, probably, irresolvable contradiction of contemporary American military
history, since are counter positioned a strategic and operational reality and a
myth, and this brings to the fore the issue of scales and proportions, which is
crucial when dealing with WW II. The question is then this: was Ike a great
general?
Here is the
catch: real military leadership under conditions of WW II had absolutely
nothing to do with the qualities exhibited (and greatly embellished later by
his propagandists) by Patton. As studies of his campaigns, especially his debacle
at Lorraine, pointed out (such as review by Dr. Christopher Gabel for Combat Studies Institute at US Army Command And General Staff College at Leavenworth, KS) Patton's
exploits were "ruthless and reckless". The question is, then, why
reckless. It will be answered later. To understand this issue one has to look at the realities of the
Western Front's South by Fall of 1944. Realities were such that the Third Army
faced "Few of the Germans
defending Lorraine could be considered First-rate
troops. Third Army encountered whole battalions made up of deaf men,
others of cooks, and others consisting
entirely of soldiers with stomach ulcers. The G2 also identified a new series of
German formations designated voIksrenadier
divisions). These hastily constituted divisions numbered only 10,000." It is hardly a force to be compared to Wehrmacht circa
1941-43 but that is mainly the force on fighting which Patton's mythology is
built in the US and the one which obscures serious strategic and operational
choices Ike was facing since he, unlike Patton, had two large Army Groups under
his direct command and was the one, who, among very few others, was responsible
for finally turning Overlord into the actual operation--a command and
leadership level of which Patton could only dream about and for which he was
ultimately unqualified. But, if one discounts Patton's mythology, which is
strictly a local American phenomenon and the one which complicates and, in
fact, impedes understanding of WW II dynamics, was Ike, in the end, a good military
leader? The answer to this question can be found in identifying qualities which
realistically were required for the prosecution of such a war as WW II was. It
is immediately possible to say that Ike was qualified to do so and the only
debate which is possible here is the one of a style not of a substance of what
Ike was doing, especially once one begins to go back to 1941-42 and see how
Eisenhower, then assuming the position of the head of Marshall's OPD, viewed
European Theater and that will require an excurse into the Sledgehammer ideas. It all comes down to this:
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