U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

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von thoma
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U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#1

Post by von thoma » 29 Jul 2016, 02:08

Why doesn't any USMC unit was required for landing on the D-Day ?
As far as I know, U.S. Marine Corp was a great specialist in such operations on the beaches.
Thanks for your answer.
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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#2

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 01 Aug 2016, 00:27

1. The Marines were a subset of of the Navy & Admiral King did not want them used for tasks unrelated to the primary naval operations of the USN.

2. The Marines were a subset of the Navy & Marshal did not have any use for extra naval components.

3. The US Army had revived amphibious training & beach assualt training since late 1939 & accumulated as much recent experience as the Marines. ie: the 1st Inf Div was making its third combat beach assault in Normandy. It had been rehearsing beach assaults since 1940. The 3rd ID had started its amphib training in late 1939 & its first beach landing in Jan 1940


Bradleys staff misunderstood the previous training and combat experience on a number of important points. My guess is they would have used any large group of Marines incorrectly as they did other other assets.


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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#3

Post by Sheldrake » 01 Aug 2016, 01:14

von thoma wrote:Why doesn't any USMC unit was required for landing on the D-Day ?
As far as I know, U.S. Marine Corp was a great specialist in such operations on the beaches.
Thanks for your answer.
The biggest single reason was probably that geography meant that the war in the ETO would be led by the Army and the war in the Pacific by the Navy. The USMC was the USN's private army and could be reserved for operations in the theatre which they had control. By D day SHAEF and the allied expeditionary force had more experience of the type of amphibious landing they would make than the USMC. The USMC had observers and there was a transfer of knowledge between theatres, but the right service was in the right theatre.

The US Army had developed a lot of expertise in amphibious operations between 1942-44 mounting joint operations with the British as part of combined operations with air and naval forces. The Allied expeditionary force led by Eisenhower had probably more expertise in mounting large scale amphibious assaults than the US navy. By June 1944 the Allied Combined Operations had mounted Op Torch,Op Husky, Op Avalanche and Op Shingle. These were all mounted in European waters, with multiple allied corps, against the Germans.

Nothing mounted by the US Navy before D Day involved more than a single division, or other than US forces. None of their operations were against the main continental land mass of the enemy. Their plans could ignore the constraints of coalition warfare or intervention by substantial enemy land forces.

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#4

Post by von thoma » 02 Aug 2016, 04:41

I Understood.
Thanks to both.
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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#5

Post by Ironmachine » 02 Aug 2016, 08:18

What follows may be interesting:
Amphibious Aspects Of The Normandy Invasion
by Hanson Baldwin - Originally Published December 1944
Before Hanson Baldwin left this country for Normandy the Editors of the Marine Corps Gazette asked him to cover the operation from the standpoint of the Marine officer.


Our experience in the Pacific aided the Normandy invasion, but we can learn much from it for future use. Failure to study Pacific developments was a great error made by Germany.

The amphibious operations of the Pacific, which in 1945 will open their greatest chapter, will profit by the lessons learned on the beaches of the Bay of the Seine in the summer of 1944.

But in turn the success of the Normandy invasion and the defeat of Germany owe much to the experiences gained and the technique developed in the prior campaigns of the Pacific. Germany lost the Battle of Normandy-and as a result, the war-because the Allies were able to land and supply over open beaches an army that numbered a million men twenty days after D-day, and close to three million within four months. The Germans had based their defense of the West on the defense of ports; they underestimated the Allied amphibious strength and the Allied ability to supply an army over open beaches.

The enemy was bemused with his own lies about the effectiveness of the submarine campaign; many of the German prisoners taken in Normandy were amazed at the Allied armada of ships and craft of all types used in the invasion of Normandy. The capacity of our landing craft and the Allied skill in the general technique of amphibious war were other surprises. One of Hitler's greatest mistakes-and he has made many-was his failure to keep a closer eye on developments in the Pacific, developments which have revolutionized the difficult art of amphibious war.

Two other great factors, one of them an erroneous German G-2 "estimate of the situation", insured the success of the invasion of France, and the victory in Normandy.

Feints Made to Fool Nazis
Even before D-day the Germans had expected the Allies to make their main landings in the Pas de Calais area. When our first assault was made against the base of the Cotentin peninsula, the enemy continued to cling to his belief that another landing would be made in the Pas de Calais area. His troop dispositions, his strategy, and captured documents all emphasize this mistaken estimate. The Germans were encouraged in their wrong-headedness. Lt. General George Patton's Third American Army, then in England, was concentrated at British East ports on D-day, and climbed into and out of landing boats for the benefit of German reconnaissance planes and German agents. The obvious inference, one which the Germans made, was that an attack against the Pas de Calais-Dunkerque-Belgium area was in the making. At the time that the Bay of the Seine landings were being made, naval demonstrations were made in the Pas de Calais area. Other feints were also made. A small force was concentrated in Scotland to "threaten" Norway, and dummy parachutists were dropped as far south as Rennes in Brittany.

Enemy Fooled Till Battle is Won
After D-day, careful security, which hid for as long as possible the exact whereabouts of Patton's Third Army, contributed to the German confusion. Lt. General Lesley J. McNair, then chief of the Army Ground Forces, was sent to England, and after his death, Lt. General John L. DeWitt went, as part of a "cover" plan to convince the Germans that another United States Army or Army group was posed to strike at the Northern French coast. As a result of feint, subterfuge, and secrecy, the enemy was fooled until the Battle of Normany was won.

The Third Army was concentrated within the Cotentin peninsula, where it massed with the First Army, for the successful break-through attempt of July 25.

The Germans stripped the Breton peninsula of most of its troops in order to reinforce the Normandy battlefront. Patton's army, therefore, rampaged across Brittany with little opposition when the break-through was finally made. On the other hand, the Nazis, until just a short time before the break-through, kept the strength of the Fifteenth Army north of the Seine virtually intact. As a result, the enemy was defeated in detail; the Seventh Army was smashed in Normandy, and the Fifteenth Army was no match for our victorious troops when they crossed the Seine.

Appraisal of Job Must Be Critical
Had these two German armies been concentrated, the whole campaign in France would have had a different course. Surprise and subterfuge and security are of fundamental importance in war.

The second great factor that made victory sure in the invasion of France was air superiority. It was a superiority so complete that it was virtually air domination. The preparatory bombardments and the close support of ground troops were helpful and extremely useful, but air power's greatest contribution was against enemy communications and supply routes. For a time the supply problem of the enemy was exceedingly difficult, in places almost insoluble. German division commanders spoke in these days of Normandy hedgerow fighting, of seeing only six German planes over their division areas in four weeks. The enemy was forced to move by night, to burrow and hide by day. Reinforcements, replacements, and supplies came up piecemeal. The enemy "build-up" was much slower than our own, in part because Allied planes limited German mobility, slowed down all his combat reactions, and reduced his power to maneuver. Partially because of this slowness in concentration, partially because the Germans retained a large army in the Pas de Calais area, the expected large-scale German counterattack against our beachheads never developed, and victory on Normandy, and France, was won.

Any appraisal of the invasion of Normandy against the background of our Pacific experience must be critical as well as laudatory. In general, the operation was superbly done. No operation of similar scope or difficulty is recorded in prior military history. It deserves the descriptions it has received-"Wellsian", "Jules Verne", a "modern miracle". In detail, much was magnificent, some was not. This correspondent believes that Pacific amphibious technique is more advanced than that used in the invasion of France, but this statement must at once be qualified by emphasizing that none of our Pacific operations have been of such magnitude as the invasion of France, and in none of the assaults yet made in the Pacific have we invaded continental land masses where our beachheads might be subject to counter-offensive by large strategic reserves.

German Defenses Weaker Than Anticipated
In both oceans an absolute prerequisite of success has been naval superiority, control of the sea. In the invasion of France that control was very nearly absolute. The few German sea attacks were confined to mine-laying planes; a few isolated torpedo planes; E-boats which succeeded only once, and then without result, in breaking through the outer screen; submarines, which were ineffective; and "gadgets", like "human torpedoes" and explosive-laden, radio-controlled motor boats. But for the sake of the record it should be emphasized that the naval vessels that supported the invasion of France did not constitute, as too often reported, "the greatest fleet in history". Actually the combat fleet in the Bay of the Seine, and that available in distant support, was far less impressive in numbers and in strength than any one of many task forces which have been utilized in the Pacific. In the days before invasion, this correspondent and many naval officers frankly viewed the naval support available with some concern. It consisted in large measure of older vessels. Not a single new battleship not a single aircraft carrier was employed. As it happened, the naval support was more than adequate, partly because not as many German coast defense guns were sited within range of the landing beaches as had been feared. But in any military operation, especially one so difficult as an amphibious invasion, it is better to be safe than to be sorry. If the force is available, the naval support should not be the minimum necessary but should be the maximum possible.

In the interests of the future record, it should also be noted that the German coast defenses in the Bay of the Seine area were not as concentrated, and not as strong per yard of sea front, as the Japanese defenses of Tarawa or Kwajalein. At least two army generals who had served in the Pacific-Major General Charles H. Corlett, commander of the XIX Corps in France, and in the Pacific, commander of the Seventh Division in the Aleutians and at Kwajalein; and Major General J. Lawton Collins, commander of the VII Corps in France, and a veteran of the New Georgia battles in the South Pacific-were able to make comparative judgments about the defenses. This correspondent talked with these observers and many others, and the concensus of opinion was German defenses were weaker than anticipated.

Not until the late Field Marshal Erwin Rommel made his inspection of the coastal defenses of France in the Winter of 1943-44 did the enemy commence vigorous and energetic work on the scale expected. At the time of invasion the defenses were formidable but still incomplete. Underwater obstacles had been laid, but all of them were completely exposed at low tide and hence subject to destruction by hand-placed charges. Numerous pill-boxes and casemates were still under construction. The minefields were not as extensive as feared. The coastal defense was a "crust"; there was very little defense in depth. Poles and posts against glider landings, called "Rommel's asparagus", were still being placed in fields. "Omaha" and "Utah" beaches at the base of the Cotentin peninsula were not, therefore, as difficult beaches to assault as were the beaches at Tarawa and in the Marshalls. But they did present different problems. "Omaha" beach was hemmed in by ninety to 100-foot bluffs, surmounted and seamed with pillboxes which enfiladed the beach and exposed our assault troops to plunging fire. "Utah" beach was backed up by inundated areas which had to be crossed. Each amphibious landing presents a distinct and individual problem; each must have minute planning and careful terrain study.

Air Weaknesses Discovered
Other lessons that can be learned from the invasion of France may be summarized in the following points:

1. Air. Pre-invasion bombing was particularly helpful in destruction of bridges and disruption of railroad freight yards, thus partially isolating the invasion area. Coastal batteries were also destroyed, or had to be re-emplaced elsewhere, either in woods or in casemates. The close-support bombing during the invasion was handicapped by weather. Weather so greatly limits and sometimes completely shackles the air arm that victory should never be built upon the assumption of maximum use of that arm. On D-day, in France, the heavy bombers, bombing a few minutes before H-hour, had to bomb blind through overcasts. To avoid hitting our own troops they bombed over rather than short; most of the bombs fell inland and the beach defenses were not affected. The lack of Navy and Marine Corps aircraft trained to close support work in amphibious operations was felt. Few of the fighter-bombers or dive-bombers "took out any of the beach pillboxes, for there was very little "pin-point" bombing on D-day. Other air weaknesses, since remedied, were lack of American night fighters, very few night "intruders" for harassment of enemy communication lines, and the lack of rocket-equipped planes. P-47s were finally equipped with Navy rockets, which Major General "Pete" Quesada, able head of the Ninth Fighter Command, has said he prefers to Army rockets, because they are larger and do not use tubes, hence do not reduce the plane's maneuverability.

2. Shells, like bombs, did not reduce the enemy's beach defenses. Naval gunfire did neutralize or knock out a number of the enemy's coastal batteries, and large shipping suffered no serious loss from the enemy's gunfire. The beach defenses and pillboxes were hurt, but not knocked out, since the preparatory bombardment was far briefer than some of those in the Pacific had been, and the enemy defenses "weathered" it. A great volume of shellfire is necessary to produce morale results.

3. A rocket barrage from landing craft-the final blow before H-hour-helped to break up the enemy's barbed wire, destroy mines, and stun the enemy, but had no appreciable effect on pillboxes. Rockets were widely dispersed and inaccurate but have undoubted morale effect. However, they must be used in great volume.

To sum up the foregoing three points, it might be said that amphibious assaults are best prepared by intense pre-invasion bombing. Heavy bombers must concentrate chiefly upon communications centres. Mediums, lights, dive, and fighter-bombers, using bombs, rockets, cannon, machine guns, incendiaries, and phosphorous, must operate against pillboxes, beach defenses, and pin point targets in continuous, not intermittent, operation. At the same time the naval gunfire should be of maximum possible intensity and duration, with AP, or anticoncrete shells used where necessary against concrete works, and common, or high-explosive against field fortifications, barbed wire, and the like. The rocket barrage also depends for effectiveness upon volume, and to some extent upon continuity.

Sand Clogs Ducks' Bilge Pumps
4. Amphibious tanks, or the Marine "amphtracks" ("Alligators" and "Water Buffaloes") were not used in the invasion of France, except in minor supply roles. One high-ranking Army general wanted to use them, but was persuaded that the configuration of the beach made it unnecessary. Nevertheless, they would have been highly useful on D-day. Many of the Army's "Ducks" swamped in the rough water. This was due to several reasons. The "Duck" is not the best of rough-water craft. Many "Ducks" in the Bay of the Seine were overloaded by Naval officers who were in charge of unloading the assault troops and equipment. Some of the "Ducks" had been sandbagged to protect their drivers and passengers against mines; the sand bags were snagged, and when water washed in, the sand was washed down into the bilge pumps, clogging them. The assault wave, instead of being led by "amphtracs" which could crawl out of the water up on to land, was led by other types of invasion craft. Much of this gear was swamped, and some of it was knocked out by German gunfire. The "doughboys" came ashore in Landing Craft Vehicle Personnel (LCVPs), or Landing Craft Tanks (LCTs), or similar standardized landing craft, and many of them had to struggle through thigh-deep water under enemy fire. The Marines who were at Tarawa know what that means. Amphtracs, which might have been used but were not, have proved their great utility in war, but we have not yet, by any means, completed the development of amphibious mechanized and armored vehicles. Mechanized warfare is still in its infancy, and every branch of it should be developed to the full. And it is clear that tanks should be landed with the leading assault waves.

5. In the early days of the invasion, optimum use was not made of all the vast fleet of landing craft assembled in the Bay of the Seine. Direction was not always good; too many landing craft lay off the beaches empty with no orders, while the men ashore badly needed supplies and reinforcements. The Navy unfortunately broke down the chain of command in the landing craft fleet. Landing Craft Infantry (LCIs) were detached from their units, squadron and flotilla commanders were by-passed, and there were some hours and days of confusion. On the beaches, the Army's special Engineer Brigades, and the Navy's Shore Battalions did not always work as closely or as intimately as is essential. There was lacking in France some of the smoothness of the best Pacific operations.

6. The "build-up" phase was, however, expedited by a number of "wrinkles" that the Pacific might well emulate. The artificial harbors erected off the Bay of the Seine were, in some ways, luxuries, and did not greatly increase the capacity of the invasion beaches, but they did ease unloading. Breakwaters of "blockships"-old merchant marine or naval vessels deliberately sunk off the beaches to provide sheltered unloading areas for landing craft-proved of great usefulness during rough weather. The great steel rafts, anchored further offshore and intended to break up the wave action, were a partial failure, though the huge concrete caissons which formed the major part of the permanent breakwaters of the artificial ports, were more successful. Flexible oil pipelines laid at the average rate of about ten miles a day across France were another successful innovation. The American genius is well-adapted to supply and construction work. In the opinion of this correspondent our logistics, including the construction of docks, pipelines, airfields, and the like, are far ahead of those of any other nation-the Germans not excepted.

But the greatest lessons the Pacific theatre can learn from the invasion of France are two:

The closest sort of cooperation is essential between all services, all arms, and all branches in amphibious operations.

In the final analysis, machine power is never enough. It is the man on two feet with hand grenades, rifle, and bayonet-backed up by all that modern science can devise-the man with fear in his stomach but a fighting heart, that must secure beachheads. He it is who wins the glory and pays the price, who changes the course of history. Man is still supreme in a mechanistic war.
https://www.mca-marines.org/gazette/amp ... y-invasion

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#6

Post by pugsville » 02 Aug 2016, 10:35

why were the buffalo armoured tracked landing vehicles used on D-day? a marine.army thing? hey were using them in the pacific well before june 1944.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landing_V ... _Alligator

"In Europe LVTs were mainly used for landings and river crossing operations as well as assaults in swampy zones. By the end of 1943, 200 LVT-1 had been delivered to the British Army for training, in preparation for future operations in Europe. The U.S., British and Canadian armies used the Buffalo in the Battle of the Scheldt (1944), during the Operation Plunder crossing of the Rhine, along the Po River in Italy, across the river Elbe, and in a number of other river crossing operations.


Buffalo amphibians during the invasion of Walcheren Island, November 1944.
LVTs were used in the Normandy landings, but their use by the United States was limited as the US Army doctrine in Europe viewed the Sherman DD as the answer to assault on heavily defended beaches. LVT-2s were used to help unload supplies after the landings on Utah Beach, from the cargo ships off the coast to the beach and through the nearby swamps."

so apparently they were no perceived as combat vehicles and were not used for doctrinal reasons.

so re-phrase would they have helped?

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#7

Post by Sheldrake » 02 Aug 2016, 16:41

pugsville wrote:why were the buffalo armoured tracked landing vehicles used on D-day? a marine.army thing? hey were using them in the pacific well before june 1944.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landing_V ... _Alligator

"In Europe LVTs were mainly used for landings and river crossing operations as well as assaults in swampy zones. By the end of 1943, 200 LVT-1 had been delivered to the British Army for training, in preparation for future operations in Europe. The U.S., British and Canadian armies used the Buffalo in the Battle of the Scheldt (1944), during the Operation Plunder crossing of the Rhine, along the Po River in Italy, across the river Elbe, and in a number of other river crossing operations.


Buffalo amphibians during the invasion of Walcheren Island, November 1944.
LVTs were used in the Normandy landings, but their use by the United States was limited as the US Army doctrine in Europe viewed the Sherman DD as the answer to assault on heavily defended beaches. LVT-2s were used to help unload supplies after the landings on Utah Beach, from the cargo ships off the coast to the beach and through the nearby swamps."

so apparently they were no perceived as combat vehicles and were not used for doctrinal reasons.

so re-phrase would they have helped?
This has been asked and discussed before.
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... o#p1967765

The short answer is that:

1 The first version of the the LVT that would have been much use on D day as an assault craft was the LVT-4 which had armour and a ramp at the rear. The LVT1 1 lacked armour and the LVT2, first use Nov 1943) required any troops to exit over the side. The tracked LVT 4 could get to all sorts of places a DUKW couldn't and was widely used in North West Europe from Winter 1944-45

2. The LVT was needed in the pacific because assaults often had to to land on the far side of coral reefs that would beach or rip the bottom from a landing craft. There were enough beaches to land in France that did not need access over reefs. DUKW had been in serv ice since July 1943 and were just as good for transferring stores from ship to shore.

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#8

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 03 Aug 2016, 02:23

Sheldrake wrote:....
2. The LVT was needed in the pacific because assaults often had to to land on the far side of coral reefs that would beach or rip the bottom from a landing craft. There were enough beaches to land in France that did not need access over reefs. DUKW had been in serv ice since July 1943 and were just as good for transferring stores from ship to shore.
There was a shoal, reef, or mudflat in front of several of the British beaches, that caused the first wave on those to come a hour after the first wave on the western beaches.

One possible misperception here is the US Marines frequently assaulted defended beaches. That is not quite the case. With a few exceptions the Japanese tactic was to defended the beach itself with a relatively light outpost line, and place the primary defense & fortifications at least 500 meters & more typically much further inland. The sort of dense forward defense actually overlooking the beach as found in France & Belgium was something of a anomaly. It could be found at fortified ports, like Dieppe, or on islands so small everywhere overlooked the beach. Betio island is a example of that. Had the Germans followed the Japanese practice they would have placed the concrete, mines, and wire several thousand meters inland & created concentrations around natural defenses & at critical locations. Think Shuri Line or the Umurubrogol high ground on Peleiu.

Generally the Japanese covered the beach with a few MG bunkers or some light AT guns. Those were supported from a distance by longer range weapons which were positioned to cover the man defense zone as well or could be repositioned to cover it.

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#9

Post by Rob Stuart » 03 Aug 2016, 03:14

There was a shoal, reef, or mudflat in front of several of the British beaches, that caused the first wave on those to come a hour after the first wave on the western beaches.
This might not be correct. The Allies decided to land at low tide and I believe that the staggered landing times for the five beaches simply reflected the fact that low tide occurred at different times at these beaches.

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#10

Post by LineDoggie » 03 Aug 2016, 03:38

von thoma wrote:Why doesn't any USMC unit was required for landing on the D-Day ?
As far as I know, U.S. Marine Corp was a great specialist in such operations on the beaches.
Thanks for your answer.
Mostly myth


the US Army did some 80 Amphibious landings in WW2 from the ETO/MTO/PTO from Attu to Okinawa

the USMC did some 20 landings

The US Army had 3 times the number of AMTANK and AMTRAC bns and committed 20 Divisions to the pacific compared to the 6 of the Corps.
"There are two kinds of people who are staying on this beach: those who are dead and those who are going to die. Now let’s get the hell out of here".
Col. George Taylor, 16th Infantry Regiment, Omaha Beach

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#11

Post by Rob Stuart » 03 Aug 2016, 03:49

By D day SHAEF and the allied expeditionary force had more experience of the type of amphibious landing they would make than the USMC. The USMC had observers and there was a transfer of knowledge between theatres, but the right service was in the right theatre.

The US Army had developed a lot of expertise in amphibious operations between 1942-44 mounting joint operations with the British as part of combined operations with air and naval forces. The Allied expeditionary force led by Eisenhower had probably more expertise in mounting large scale amphibious assaults than the US navy. By June 1944 the Allied Combined Operations had mounted Op Torch,Op Husky, Op Avalanche and Op Shingle. These were all mounted in European waters, with multiple allied corps, against the Germans.

We could add that SHAEF also included British officers who had been involved in planning such operations as the successful invasion of Madagascar and the fiasco at Dieppe. These were smaller in scale than the landings you mention, both of them involving a bit less than a division's worth of troops, but useful lessons were still learned from them. As well, the British studied amphibious operations between the wars, since, like the USMC, they anticipated having to fight the Japanese, and developed the motor landing craft (MLC), the LCM, and the Landing Craft Assault (LCA). So I think it's perfectly true to say that "By D day SHAEF and the allied expeditionary force had more experience of the type of amphibious landing they would make than the USMC".

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Re: U.S. troops landing on the D-Day

#12

Post by Sheldrake » 03 Aug 2016, 08:41

Carl Schwamberger wrote:
Sheldrake wrote:....
2. The LVT was needed in the pacific because assaults often had to to land on the far side of coral reefs that would beach or rip the bottom from a landing craft. There were enough beaches to land in France that did not need access over reefs. DUKW had been in serv ice since July 1943 and were just as good for transferring stores from ship to shore.
There was a shoal, reef, or mudflat in front of several of the British beaches, that caused the first wave on those to come a hour after the first wave on the western beaches.

One possible misperception here is the US Marines frequently assaulted defended beaches. That is not quite the case. With a few exceptions the Japanese tactic was to defended the beach itself with a relatively light outpost line, and place the primary defense & fortifications at least 500 meters & more typically much further inland. The sort of dense forward defense actually overlooking the beach as found in France & Belgium was something of a anomaly. It could be found at fortified ports, like Dieppe, or on islands so small everywhere overlooked the beach. Betio island is a example of that. Had the Germans followed the Japanese practice they would have placed the concrete, mines, and wire several thousand meters inland & created concentrations around natural defenses & at critical locations. Think Shuri Line or the Umurubrogol high ground on Peleiu.

Generally the Japanese covered the beach with a few MG bunkers or some light AT guns. Those were supported from a distance by longer range weapons which were positioned to cover the man defense zone as well or could be repositioned to cover it.
It is true that there were reefs off Juno beach and Sword beaches which affected then timing of the assaults which ere timed as mid point between low and high tide to avoid the obstacle belt across high tide. However, this did not seem to be as significant to the success or level of casualties sustained on these beaches.

Nor would LVT-4s have allowed the assault to go ahead earlier on either beach. All of the D D Day invasion beaches were, by Pacific standards very heavily fortified, with an obstacle belt at high tide, covered by fire from machine guns, mortars, field artillery and anti tank guns from fortified strong points sited to cover beach exits in enfilade, and supported by reserves including tanks and assault guns. The D day assault would be made by combined arms teams with tanks and armoured engineers. Many of those landing at H Hour and all of those landing subsequently would be landed from Landing Craft Tank which could not climb reefs. There were 32 DD tanks per sector, but these were a novelty with unknown effectiveness and reliability.

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