D-Day. The Battle for Normandy

‘an office seeker rather than that of a soldier’. ‘His theory is that by this method one gets on a level with the men. A commander cannot command and be on the same level. At least that is my opinion. I try to arouse fighting emotion - he tries for votes - for what? However he was very pleasant [to me].’
    Patton also despised Montgomery, whom he called ‘the little monkey’. But he had felt a certain gratitude on 1 June, just before the invasion, when Montgomery insisted twice to Bradley that ‘Patton should take over for the Brittany, and possibly the Rennes operation’. The next morning, he noted in his diary, ‘I have a better impression of Monty than I had.’ Patton, who followed events in Normandy with intense frustration, felt that Bradley’s attempt to advance on a broad front was wrong. Constant minor attacks to win ground, in his view, led to far more casualties in the long run than a concentrated offensive.
    German commanders agreed. ‘I cannot follow the reasoning,’ wrote Generalleutnant Schimpf of the 3rd Paratroop Division, ‘that these tactics were supposed to have helped avoid bloodshed, as I was told by captured American officers. For although losses on the day of attack could be kept comparatively low, on the other hand the total losses suffered through the continuous minor attacks launched over a long period, were surely much heavier than would have been the case if a forceful attack had been conducted.’ Elsewhere he wrote of American battalion attacks: ‘For our troops, this type of defence against continual assaults was an excellent training and acclimatisation to the fighting ways of the enemy.’ With impressive foresight, Patton wrote on 2 July that they should be attacking down the west coast towards Avranches with ‘one or two armored divisions abreast’, supported by air power.
    At last on 4 July, his Third Army headquarters began to embark. Patton himself flew over two days later in a C-47 to the landing strip above Omaha beach. His plane was escorted by four P-47 Thunderbolts, the fighter-bomber which would later support his astonishing advance across France. As soon as he reached French soil, Patton was on exuberant form. News of his arrival spread instantly among the soldiers and sailors of Omaha beach command. His presence was supposed to be a closely guarded secret, but they crowded around with cameras, taking photographs as if he were a movie star. Patton stood up in the Jeep sent for him and addressed them in his inimitable style: ‘I’m proud to be here to fight beside you. Now let’s cut the guts out of those Krauts and get the hell on to Berlin. And when we get to Berlin, I am going to personally shoot that paper-hanging son of a bitch, just like I would a snake.’ His audience loved it, cheering and whooping wildly. Patton and Eisenhower were indeed unalike.
    The next day he had lunch with Bradley, Montgomery and his chief of staff, the charming General Freddie de Guingand. ‘After lunch, Montgomery, Bradley and I went to the war tent,’ Patton wrote in his diary. ‘Here Montgomery went to great lengths explaining why the British had done nothing.’ Despite his earlier support for Patton, Montgomery now did not want the Third Army to become operational until after Avranches had been captured. This, the Americans suspected, was an attempt to keep Bradley under the command of his own 21st Army Group for longer. Bradley studiously refused to answer. As soon as Patton’s Third Army was activated, he would in practice become independent from Montgomery, since he would then command the US 12th Army Group, with Hodges and Patton as his two army commanders.
    Bradley and his staff were beginning to thrash out ideas for Operation Cobra, which became the great breakthrough towards Avranches and Brittany. But in the meantime Bradley insisted on continuing the general advance to take Saint-Lô and the road west to Périers. Lying beyond the Cotentin and Bessin marshlands and bocage , the Saint-Lô- Périers road would provide their start-line for Cobra. But there was still a long and bloody fight in front of them to get there.
     
    At the same time as the Panzer Lehr offensive in the early hours of 11 July, the German 5th and 9th Paratroop Regiments east of the River Vire had attacked the 29th Division and its neighbour, the 2nd Division. But while the Panzer Lehr assault against the 30th Division had disrupted its preparation for the general advance on