What if Hitler made fighting Britain a serious consideration from the start..

[TheMarcksPlan]

Yes, just posted there to that effect.

[Paul Lakowski]

As requested, screenshots from When Titans Clashed, Table B, by David Glantz:

Thanks!
I'll just note that Glantz's figure of 3.27mil (2.93mil army plus 340k VVS/NKVD) already exceeds your "2-3mil" west of DD line, especially given your more capacious definition.

I think you're being a tad hyper-obsessive over details when I threw out an approximation. The point I was making was that the Soviet Union had 17 million additional soldiers and trained reservists, plus millions more it could press into service (and millions more who would reach the age of service with every passing year) that Germany needs to account for after it takes care of the Red Army units west of the Dvina-Dnieper. And of those 3 to 4 million (happy?) west of the Dvina-Dnieper, I don't think it's reasonable to expect more than, oh I don't know, 2-3 million to be caught in the opening encirclements of any ATL and unable to escape.

So no matter how well Barbarossa is planned, Germany is still left facing a Red Army that dwarfs it in size with a virtually unending stream of new recruits, in a gargantuan country with little to no infrastructure but with superior armaments output, and that can be endlessly supplied by the western powers. So to claim that Barbarossa would in some way have been easy if only Germany had planned it better is absurd. For Germany to attack the Soviet Union while simultaneously waging war against the UK and USA was, to put it mildly, an extremely difficult undertaking with little chance of success no matter how well it was planned.

Their was never a prewar plan that envisaged two front war, the worse case was defending against a combined Franco Polish attack , prior to the war. Direct war with USSR/USA was never taken seriously unless a decade more rearmament occurred [IE- MID 40S]. Of course once Hitler hijacks the process, time constraints becomes phantasy .

Best prewar approach was to front the conflict between Japan & China and provide the Chinese with all the armaments they need in exchange for 10 years supply of Wolfram. That would have cost the Nazi 2500-3000 LW planes through the 1937-40 period. Mostly a mix of JU-86 some Dornier's and plenty of trainers had been sold to China along with tankettes and troop training & equipment during this period and Double that amount was possible.

Roosevelt would unable to support WALLIE cause.. Congress and the Gallup poll would see to that.

For me the study of history is wasted in books and literary works. Either the numbers add up and make something possible or not. I'd rather take stats graphs & maps over chapters and chapters. Work out the sum checks and dig deeper into the hypothesis. Glantz makes this point as well.

[TheMarcksPlan]

For me the study of history is wasted in books and literary works. Either the numbers add up and make something possible or not. I'd rather take stats graphs & maps over chapters and chapters. Work out the sum checks and dig deeper into the hypothesis. Glantz makes this point as well.

For me it's gotta be both. Certain things are insusceptible to quantitative analysis. The resilience of the SU vs. Czarist Russia in the World Wars, for example, is something that a quantitatively-focused analyst might have got wrong if writing in, say, 1938 (fatefully, most did). [data came in 1939-40 with the Winter War, however, whose real lesson was the RKKA didn't crack even when beaten/bloodied]

On balance, however, historical analysis would benefit from a huge dose of quantitative analysis. Often the data simply isn't there, however.
The important thing is to be ready and wiling to adapt one's outlook to the data, whatever they may be. IMO most folks here come with a tentative opinion then just dig in when faced with counter-arguments. Same with a lot of historians and scholars in general. There's some social science research (always be suspicious of those fields though) showing a correlation between IQ and the strength of cognitive bias. So basically the smarter you are, the harder it is to have your mind changed - you're good at making arguments against changing your mind. Being an honest human with a consistent commitment to the truth is hard, basically.

[Avalancheon]

Operation Typhoon was a million-man offensive that jumped off several hundred kilometers east of DD. It was probably the largest double-envelopment in military history (Kiev is the other candidate - also east of the Dniepr and for its main northern pincer substantially so), successfully destroying multiple Soviet fronts via penetrations even farther East than your supposed categorical limit on such events happening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Moscow

So the Germans bagged ~1.3mil prisoners in the two largest encirclements in the history of the world, both happened East of DD (one happened far east of it), yet somehow you still think the Red Army was safe from destruction beyond this line. I don't get it.

Precisely. The battle of Kiev, and the battle of Vyazma-Bryansk, are unprecedented in the history of warfare. They represent the largest encirclements not just in terms of soldiers killed and captured, but also in terms of geographic area covered. (Operation Uranus is a distant contender) It was the sort of thing that could only happen in the vastness of the Eastern front.

For about a decade I stopped reading about the Eastern Front because I too reached the conclusion that Barbarossa was futile. That was after a few years of studying the topic, including in college under academic guidance, so I'm aware of the tremendous weight of conventional wisdom on these matters.

Well, it depends on exactly how you define 'futile.' As far as destroying the Red Army in a single campaign went, a case could certainly be made that operation Barbarossa was indeed futile. But thats only if you look at it as a single isolated event. If you instead look at Barbarossa as the prequel to subsequent campaigns, then it looks much less futile. It didn't destroy the Red Army in 1941, but it did shape the Eastern front in a way that put them at risk of total defeat in 1942. (Although that was partly a function of them being weakened by the foolish attacks ordered by Joseph Stalin during the winter and spring)

I'm going to go off on the treatment of logistics in this forum, please don't take this as directed at anyone personally. I remember posting here - probably multiple times - that the "Germans sucked at logistics." I've read a bit more recently and I was wrong.

The mention of "logistics" here has a talismanic quality: Anyone who first brings up logistics is a Serious Person (amateurs vs. professionals etc.); everyone else is reverent of Logistics and deferential to its revealed "truths." Nobody digs into the details of logistical planning the way we often do regarding operations; I suspect because shooting and driving are cool and running supply columns is boring. Operation Bolero doesn't have a commemoration while Operation Overlord - virtually Bolero's footnote - gets Hollywood treatment every year.

This is an interesting way of looking at things, but its also slightly misleading. Operation Overlord was always going to be a risk operation, no matter how secure the prior logistical buildup to it was. The Allies were conducting a massive amphibious landing against a fortified coast, which is one of the most difficult military operations possible. There was also (at least in the Army) a disparity in training and leadership between the Anglo-Americans and their German opponents, which made this gamble even more dicey.

The typical pose here isn't to dismiss logistics' primacy, rather it's to treat it as if a sacred, exogenous fact insusceptible to analysis or feasible counterfactual. We defer to the occasional bit of logistics Conventional Wisdom and get on to the fun stuff.

This is bassackwards because logistics is more susceptible to quantifiable, armchair analysis than operations/tactics. With adequate data (admittedly harder to find than operational accounts) it's more straightforward to posit alternate logistical outcomes than operational.

For example: Bolero doesn't succeed if the Uboats aren't beaten in 1943 - that's just the arithmetic of stuff to move and ships to move stuff, which depends on how many ships you have, which depends in part on how many ships you've lost. Alternate Overlord's, OTOH, depend on non-arithmetical factors like morale, training, and leadership. We armchair analysts can say more, and more intelligently, about Bolero than Overlord.

You make a valid point here. The type of reasoning you diagnose can be observed in this very thread. Certain posters tend to dismiss the possibility of the Afrika Korps achieving more than they historically did, by lazily referring to the limited port capacity in Libya. They rarely go into detail about the exact numbers, and if they do, the figures are treated as if they are immutable. The suggestion that port capacitys can be increased by certain expedients is viewed with suspicion.

This is true of Barbarossa as well. Its logistics are simple compared to the infinite operational scenarios and the myriad variables regarding each side's training, morale, leadership, etc. Supplies moved from west to east via rail (mostly) then within the East via truck/horse (generally). The rails did most of the lifting by ton-kilometers, the trucks/horses closed the gaps between railheads and soldiers.

The Ostheer's logistics were much better than RKKA's. Germany had more trucks and horses supporting fewer men and weapons. Germany's trucks were better than Russian trucks (i.e. had higher average lift capacity and were more reliable). Folks like to cite that AGC had to stockpile a million spare parts because of its diverse truck park. This criticism misses something obvious: AGC stockpiled a million spare parts, mostly for its supply columns. Would an army that ignored logistics, or was incompetent at it, possess the wherewithal to find, move, and use a million spare parts?

The average person simply isn't capable of seeing the nuances in a particular war or military. Their understanding is dominated by stereotypes and myths. Hence why we have the meme of 'German logistics'. The public knowledge seems to swing back and forth like a pendulum, from one extreme to another. First they start out believing that the German army was entirely motorised. Then, when they find out that wasn't the case, they switch to the belief that the German army was entirely dependent upon horses. There is no rhyme or reason to any of it. Context and nuance is a foreign concept to the average person.

Critics of Barbarossa seemingly always compare German logistics to, say, American, which makes no sense. The Heer was qualitatively the world's best army in WW2 but its qualitative edge over the 2nd-place armies (Wallies qualitatively) doesn't mean the Wallies were operationally/tactically incompetent. Likewise, American field armies had the best logistical support; this doesn't imply the Germans sucked at logistics. Re Barbarossa, the comparison should be to Soviet logistics, not ideal or American. Volume IIB of Askey's Operation Barbarossa has great analysis showing how much better-supplied the Ostheer was than RKKA. The Border Battles revealed terrible Soviet logistics, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of ... _logistics (has cites in article).

As an aside, excellent American logistical support wasn't flawless (See Patton's drive across France, which was shorter than AGC's advance in Barbarossa and outran its logistics). It was also extremely expensive: within the field armies alone, the American divisional slice was mid-30's thousands - nearly twice the German in Barbarossa. I would prefer 200 German divisions with German logistics to ~120 American divisions with American or even perfect logistics.

Well, the time period in question is also important. The quality of German divisions certainly declined as the years went on. They lost more and more of their best trained and experienced men. But even by 1944, they were still superior to the Anglo-Americans on a unit per unit basis. Trevor Dupuys studys go into detail about this.

A better-functioning railroad would have made better use of rolling stock: Traffic snarls reduce the productivity of stock; many cars sat around idly when the entirely-preventable loss of loco functionality in cold weather stranded them in the East. Nonetheless, more rolling stock would have helped and was readily available: in the year after Barbarossa, Germany demanded and received tens of thousands of additional rolling stock form Western Europe. Prior to Barbarossa they had already taken many cars but were concerned to maintain good relations with French/Belgian/Dutch rail authorities. When Germany's true military needs emerged however, the predictable reaction was to abandon those niceties. See MVAR v.2 at 136-152 for much more great info on the role of occupied railways. Given adequate (or merely terrible) Barbarossa strategic conception, Germany would have tapped these resources earlier. In addition to "borrowing" from occupied countries, Germany could simply have produced more locos and trains herself. Production escalated dramatically later; many other programs could have been traded to support a successful Barbarossa (steel hampered rolling stock production for example and Germany exported 8 million tons of it in 1940).

Operation Barbarossa posed such a drain on the Reichsbahn that they were struggling to fulfill their obligations. The deficit of rail traffic prevented them from sending their coal deliverys to Romania, which led to them reducing their shipments of oil to Germany the following year. (Thus leading to Adolf Hitlers desire to secure the oil fields in the Caucasus)

[pugsville]

You make a valid point here. The type of reasoning you diagnose can be observed in this very thread. Certain posters tend to dismiss the possibility of the Afrika Korps achieving more than they historically did, by lazily referring to the limited port capacity in Libya. They rarely go into detail about the exact numbers, and if they do, the figures are treated as if they are immutable. The suggestion that port capacitys can be increased by certain expedients is viewed with suspicion.

The laziness is with those who propose operations without saying how they will be logistically supported. If spomeonbe is proposed alternative operations it's really incumbent of them to show how they are possible.

[TheMarcksPlan]

Well, it depends on exactly how you define 'futile.' As far as destroying the Red Army in a single campaign went, a case could certainly be made that operation Barbarossa was indeed futile.

Agreed. That's why all my Eastern Front ATL's are based on preparation for at least a two-summer campaign. I was using "Barbarossa" as metonym for Germany starting a war with SU.

The 1941 campaign was a strategic victory for Germany: it severely weakened a key member of the Allied coalition and should have set up Germany for a knock-out blow in 42.

This is an interesting way of looking at things, but its also slightly misleading. Operation Overlord was always going to be a risk operation, no matter how secure the prior logistical buildup to it was. The Allies were conducting a massive amphibious landing against a fortified coast, which is one of the most difficult military operations possible.

IMO it was never in doubt that, if the U.S. can get its army to Europe, it can cross the channel against weak German opposition (i.e. if the SU is still slapping the Ostheer around). Amphibious landings are difficult, yes, but the industrial strength of the Anglosphere focused against 6 mostly-bad German divisions? It would require exceptional innovation to lose that battle in the long run IMO.

But even by 1944, [Germans] were still superior to the Anglo-Americans on a unit per unit basis. Trevor Dupuys studys go into detail about this.

His last book - BoBulge - is free for Kindle Unlimited members...

The average person simply isn't capable of seeing the nuances in a particular war or military. Their understanding is dominated by stereotypes and myths.

It's a pervasive fact of life. Most people are helpless against strongly-asserted narratives combined with the aroma of authority. Lack of attention span, time for research, and plain-old mental horsepower.

Certain posters tend to dismiss the possibility of the Afrika Korps achieving more than they historically did, by lazily referring to the limited port capacity in Libya. They rarely go into detail about the exact numbers, and if they do, the figures are treated as if they are immutable. The suggestion that port capacitys can be increased by certain expedients is viewed with suspicion.

I agree insofar as this pertains to the influence of Malta. Re increasing port capacity in general, I'm more suspicious but perfectly willing to admit lack of depth on the topic. Expanding ports would seem to require dredging and building breakwalls, both of which are years-long projects in peacetime. And then there's a "second-order" logistics problem: what are the logistics of the logistics-enhancers (e.g. dredgers and breakwall-builders) and how to supply them without fatally compromising DAK's logistics in the short-term? Again, not a firm conclusion just a first-pass analysis.

OTOH the Wallies supplied ~80 divisions divisions in France over beaches; Germany had MFP/Siebel and needed to supply only half-dozen of so divisions to get Rommel through Egypt. Why not just use the beaches and build more amphibious craft (especially if Malta is out of the picture)?

Any stats on how much of DAK's supplies offloaded on the beaches OTL, btw?

Operation Barbarossa posed such a drain on the Reichsbahn that they were struggling to fulfill their obligations. The deficit of rail traffic prevented them from sending their coal deliverys to Romania, which led to them reducing their shipments of oil to Germany the following year. (Thus leading to Adolf Hitlers desire to secure the oil fields in the Caucasus)

The Barbarossa-induced railroad Winter Crisis impacted everything, an under-remarked facet of the war. During November 41 - March 42, the German economy tanked, just when it needed production for its planned blow in the East. This also allowed Speer et. al. to cook the books and use early '42 as the baseline for his "Armaments Miracle."

As with so many other monumental events, the solution was simple (acquire/produce more rolling stock, prevent the loss of rolling stock by building a few dozen cheap warming sheds in the East). Just as the solution to WW2 and the Holocaust was simple: accept Stalin's offer of anti-Hitler alliance in 1939. Much of the work of historians, IMO, is to strip away narratives spun by the powerful to expose the simple facts that the powerful would prefer to hide.

[pugsville]

I agree insofar as this pertains to the influence of Malta. Re increasing port capacity in general, I'm more suspicious but perfectly willing to admit lack of depth on the topic. Expanding ports would seem to require dredging and building breakwalls, both of which are years-long projects in peacetime. And then there's a "second-order" logistics problem: what are the logistics of the logistics-enhancers (e.g. dredgers and breakwall-builders) and how to supply them without fatally compromising DAK's logistics in the short-term? Again, not a firm conclusion just a first-pass analysis.

OTOH the Wallies supplied ~80 divisions divisions in France over beaches; Germany had MFP/Siebel and needed to supply only half-dozen of so divisions to get Rommel through Egypt. Why not just use the beaches and build more amphibious craft (especially if Malta is out of the picture)?

Any stats on how much of DAK's supplies offloaded on the beaches OTL, btw?

0 %. While some was ferried up and down the coast , arrival in North Africa was not by beach.

The Allies had put a lot of effort in and had an oil pipeline , artificial harbors, and lots of specially constructed ships, and were trucking their supplies a much smaller difference.

And where do you 80 Divisions from?, how about 28 and nowhere near enough supplies for full offensive operations, in fact supplies were something like supply for half of that required for all divisions to be fully supplied offensively.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Ball_Express
"After the Allied breakout and the race to the Seine River, some 28 Allied divisions needed constant resupply. During offensive operations, each division consumed about 750 tons of supplies per day, totaling about 21,000 tons in all. The only way to deliver them was by truck – thereby giving birth to the Red Ball Express.

At its peak, it operated 5,958 vehicles and carried about 12,500 tons of supplies per day"

[TheMarcksPlan]

And where do you 80 Divisions from?

Wasn't the whole force in France supplied from the beaches until Wallies took Antwerp?
These campaigns aren't my interest (too lopsided) so if that's wrong I'll stand corrected. Your quote, however, only applies up to the breakout from Normandy - prior to Antwerp's capture and prior to further buildup of Allied forces.

[TheMarcksPlan]

The Allies had put a lot of effort in

This is the kind of statement in which my only interest is how, psychologically, to avoid an increase in blood pressure when reading it. Nothing personal but, like, how much effort [quantified in man-hours, m3 of concrete, tons of fuel, steel, etc.]? What percentage of Allied effort went into this effort, such that we can compare Axis ability to match it, in light of the overall economic balance? What was the second-order logistical load of this effort, meaning how many ships had to sail around Africa to bring labor/materials to enhance Allied first-order logistics and how does that total effort (first-order and second combined) compare to a theoretical Axis effort to match it? In the context of an Axis Mediterranean strategy instead of Barbarossa, what's the relative payoff?

And look - I think an Axis Mediterranean strategy instead of Barbarossa is a bad idea: it's a blueprint for Stalin taking Cologne and maybe Bordeaux by 1945 instead of stopping at the Elbe, so it's not my ideas I'm defending here.

[pugsville]

The Allies had put a lot of effort in

This is the kind of statement in which my only interest is how, psychologically, to avoid an increase in blood pressure when reading it. Nothing personal but, like, how much effort [quantified in man-hours, m3 of concrete, tons of fuel, steel, etc.]? What percentage of Allied effort went into this effort, such that we can compare Axis ability to match it, in light of the overall economic balance? What was the second-order logistical load of this effort, meaning how many ships had to sail around Africa to bring labor/materials to enhance Allied first-order logistics and how does that total effort (first-order and second combined) compare to a theoretical Axis effort to match it? In the context of an Axis Mediterranean strategy instead of Barbarossa, what's the relative payoff?

And look - I think an Axis Mediterranean strategy instead of Barbarossa is a bad idea: it's a blueprint for Stalin taking Cologne and maybe Bordeaux by 1945 instead of stopping at the Elbe, so it's not my ideas I'm defending here.

It's not just about resources. You cannot just turn a tap and divert industrial, military and engineering experience from one field to another. It takes time and experience, and rushing into a massive program on very little experience skipping the learning steps is the way to massively waste resources. It takes time to train people, and when you need to train the trainers so you can train enough people the delays pile up, The US and British in the first ww1 took about 2 years to deploy mass armies to front after decided to, they had industrial resources and manpower to to fashion into the required form took a long time, and both the British New Army in 1916 and the AEF in 1918 started with less than stella combat experiences, green forces often learn from bitter experience and blood.

And one the key problems in the Axis Mediterranean strategy is the lack of co-ordination and willingness to work as an alliance, the British and US really worked pretty well as a coalition. the Axis just did not. In part co-operation just was not part of there ethos, fascism is about dictating rather the co-operation, and it affected everything they did. Nazi Geeman was a maze of competing petty empires, Goring. Himmler , the navy, the Army were competing not co-operating. And A Mediterranean strategy requires this. And the external diplomacy is not easy either, Spain, Italy and Vichy France have competing interests. The Axis approach to strategic planning, diplomacy, industrial effort, intelligence was all really shallow on the whole. Everything was dumbed down to thought bubble limitations of the leadership at the top.Politics, influence trumped everything and the appointment of people with experience and skills to do actual strategic planning was just not done.

Both Britain and the USA had by 1944 quite extensive amphibious landing and support experience. They were 1st rate Naval powers, and developed much specialized equipment and had been planning and building to the 1944 invasion for at least 2 years. Both the US and Britain had extensive naval reserve services and merchant marines which enabled much trained and semi trained manpower to be available to ease rapid expansion of forces. the US and Britain thought strategically about industry and logistics , and sea borne logistics, while the Germans had their operation mission tactics on land they were really lacked strategic, industrial and logistic thinking.

None of that is true for the Axis in 1940-41. Germany was not a real naval power. The reserves of manpower with even a passing experience at sea was very small. had no experience in amphibious landings and operations. They did look at their own sort of artificial harbor but hardly ready till 1942.

[pugsville]

And where do you 80 Divisions from?

Wasn't the whole force in France supplied from the beaches until Wallies took Antwerp?
These campaigns aren't my interest (too lopsided) so if that's wrong I'll stand corrected. Your quote, however, only applies up to the breakout from Normandy - prior to Antwerp's capture and prior to further buildup of Allied forces.

I've really just googled some stuff it's Wikipedia entry I don't hold it up as something thatss definitive. I have not read much of ww2-Normandy-1944 so it's quick and not very deep research so it could well be wrong.

Just 80 divisions seemed a lot so I was looking around see what I could find of it. I;'m interesting in logistics generally so I'll dig aorund and see what i can turn up maybe CARL might have some papers of France 1944 logistics.

[pugsville]

A number of minor ports where used before the capture of major ports. The first three main ports captured and put into service. They are much larger than teh ports on North Africa and dealt in much larger tonnages.

Cherboug was oeprtaing 6 weeks after capture and by November averaging 14,300 a day.
Le Harve the End of December 9.500 tons a day,
Rouen - 4,000 tons day first week November

ttps://books.google.com.au/books?id=KXDlNtXZFUwC&pg=PA360&lpg=PA360&dq=cherbourg+1044+port+allied+use&source=bl&ots=umm2Wwxeqv&sig=ACfU3U2Qz4bh9JAC3aqCBoXOCvkikU7i3w&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjkx8G9h8TmAhUwxzgGHXd7B5UQ6AEwG3oECAwQAQ#v=snippet&q=LehArve&f=false

[ljadw]

And where do you 80 Divisions from?

Wasn't the whole force in France supplied from the beaches until Wallies took Antwerp?
These campaigns aren't my interest (too lopsided) so if that's wrong I'll stand corrected. Your quote, however, only applies up to the breakout from Normandy - prior to Antwerp's capture and prior to further buildup of Allied forces.

I've really just googled some stuff it's Wikipedia entry I don't hold it up as something thatss definitive. I have not read much of ww2-Normandy-1944 so it's quick and not very deep research so it could well be wrong.

Just 80 divisions seemed a lot so I was looking around see what I could find of it. I;'m interesting in logistics generally so I'll dig aorund and see what i can turn up maybe CARL might have some papers of France 1944 logistics.

The following is from Ruppenthal (Logistical Support of the Armies VolI P 43)
Discharge in June : Omaha and Utah :289,827 tons + 4,558 from minor pornts .
In June only 80% was discharged of the préinvasion estimates .
July ( 1-25 ) : Omaha and Utah ;446,854,Cherbourg :17,656 ,minor ports :37,362 .
In July 87 % was discharged of the préinvasion estimates .
August :
Normandy Beaches :536,775
Cherbourg :266,644
Minor northern European ports :134,852
Southern France :174,500
Etc..
In August 1,112,771 tons were discharged = minus 265,730 behind the préinvasion estimates. Thus also some 80%.
BUT,these figures are the tons of supplies that arrived at the ports and were discharged at the ports .
They are NOT the supplies that arrived at the front units ,only a part, an unknown part ,of the 1,9 million tons that were discharged between June 6 and 31 August ,arrived at their destination during that period .

[pugsville]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_l ... y_Campaign

"In addition to the Mulberry, small ports were used; Courseulles, which was mainly used by fishing boats, had a draught of 2.9 metres (9 ft 6 in), making it suitable only for shallow-draught vessels, such as barges. A daily average of 860 tonnes (850 long tons) was unloaded there in June, rising to 1,500 tonnes (1,500 long tons) in July and August. Operations ceased on 7 September.[35]

Port-en-Bessin was operated as a bulk petroleum terminal, servicing both the British and American forces. Shallow-draught oil tankers drawing up to 4.3 metres (14 ft) could enter the port and larger tankers up to 5,000 gross register tons (14,000 m3) could discharge using Tombolas, floating ship-to-shore lines.[35] Two ship-to-shore lines were in operation by 25 July, and six tanker berths were in operation, with pipelines connected to the bulk petroleum storage terminal, which had a capacity of 10,000 tonnes (9,800 long tons) of petrol and 2,000 tonnes (2,000 long tons) of aviation fuel.[56] The port was opened to store ships on 12 June, and to tankers on 24 June. Some 87,000 tonnes (86,000 long tons) of petrol was discharged by 31 July, and a daily average of 11,304 tonnes (11,125 long tons) of stores were discharged until the port was closed on 25 September.[35]

--------------------------------
"Cherbourg was captured by the Americans on 27 June but it was very badly damaged and was not opened to shipping until 16 July.[57] Some 510 tonnes (500 long tons) of its daily capacity was allocated to the British. It contained the only deep-water berths in Allied hands and was useful in reducing the load on Port-en-Bessin. The railway line from Cherbourg to Caen commenced operation on 26 July, using rolling stock captured near Bayeux.[35] The lack of deep water berths meant that a large proportion of the supplies shipped went in coasters that could discharge at the small ports rather than in large, ocean-going Liberty ships.


"The British beaches were closed on 3 September 1944. By this time 221,421 tonnes (217,924 long tons) had been discharged through small ports, 615,347 tonnes (605,629 long tons) over open beaches, and 458,578 tonnes (451,335 long tons) through Mulberry B.[47] This meant that 25 per cent of the total tonnage had been landed through Cherbourg and the small ports, 12.5 per cent through Mulberry B, and 62.5 per cent over the beaches. The tonnage handled over the beaches greatly exceeded the expectations of the planners; but it is unlikely that the invasion would have been launched in the first place without the reassurance provided by the Mulberry"

------------------------------------------
"Ports
RASC troops stacking ration boxes in the harbour at Dieppe on 14 October 1944

Antwerp was captured on 4 September but the port was unusable until 29 November because the Scheldt estuary remained in German hands until after the Battle of the Scheldt.[90] In the meantime, a port construction and repair company arrived on 12 September and began the rehabilitation of the port. The quays were cleared of obstructions and the Kruisschans Lock was repaired by December.[91] The port was opened to coasters on 26 November and deep draught shipping on 28 November when the Royal Navy completed minesweeping activity.[92]

After crossing the Seine, I Corps had swung left to take Le Havre. Although Saint-Valery-en-Caux was captured on 2 September, a full-scale assault was required to take Le Havre on 10 September, with support from the Royal Navy and RAF Bomber Command, which dropped almost 5,100 tonnes (5,000 long tons) of bombs. By the time the garrison surrendered on 12 September, the port was badly damaged. Unexpectedly, the port was allocated to the American forces.[90]

Le Tréport and Dieppe were captured by the Canadians on 1 September. Although the port facilities were almost intact, the approaches were extensively mined and several days of minesweeping were required; the first coaster docked there on 7 September.[90] The rail link from Dieppe to Amiens was ready to accept traffic the day before.[93] By the end of September, it had a capacity of 6,100 to 7,100 tonnes (6,000 to 7,000 long tons) per day.[77] Le Tréport became a satellite port of Dieppe.[94] Boulogne was captured on 22 September and Calais on 29 September.[95] Both were badly damaged and Boulogne was not opened until 12 October. Ostend was captured on 9 September and in spite of extensive demolitions it was opened on 28 September.[94]"


Here anotehr article that covers ports and tonnages.

https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/US ... cs2-3.html

[pugsville]

And where do you 80 Divisions from?

Wasn't the whole force in France supplied from the beaches until Wallies took Antwerp?
These campaigns aren't my interest (too lopsided) so if that's wrong I'll stand corrected. Your quote, however, only applies up to the breakout from Normandy - prior to Antwerp's capture and prior to further buildup of Allied forces.

I've really just googled some stuff it's Wikipedia entry I don't hold it up as something thatss definitive. I have not read much of ww2-Normandy-1944 so it's quick and not very deep research so it could well be wrong.

Just 80 divisions seemed a lot so I was looking around see what I could find of it. I;'m interesting in logistics generally so I'll dig aorund and see what i can turn up maybe CARL might have some papers of France 1944 logistics.

The following is from Ruppenthal (Logistical Support of the Armies VolI P 43)
Discharge in June : Omaha and Utah :289,827 tons + 4,558 from minor pornts .
In June only 80% was discharged of the préinvasion estimates .
July ( 1-25 ) : Omaha and Utah ;446,854,Cherbourg :17,656 ,minor ports :37,362 .
In July 87 % was discharged of the préinvasion estimates .
August :
Normandy Beaches :536,775
Cherbourg :266,644
Minor northern European ports :134,852
Southern France :174,500
Etc..
In August 1,112,771 tons were discharged = minus 265,730 behind the préinvasion estimates. Thus also some 80%.
BUT,these figures are the tons of supplies that arrived at the ports and were discharged at the ports .
They are NOT the supplies that arrived at the front units ,only a part, an unknown part ,of the 1,9 million tons that were discharged between June 6 and 31 August ,arrived at their destination during that period .

As big as the Allied port problems were in 1944. The bottle neck was the trucking. In End the ability to move stuff from ports/beaches to the front was the limiting factor. The Trucking operation was als oa short term operation. They were running the trucks into the ground and just getting teh next truck off the beach when it failed.