D-Day. The Battle for Normandy

had lost at least two-thirds of its strength and that ‘the men show signs of nervous exhaustion’. There was also a warning, but received too late, of the Hitler Jugend attack on the night of 8 June. The next day, General Meindl of II Paratroop Corps complained that ‘most of the land-line links are interrupted. Operations are greatly impeded by the considerable delay in the passing on of orders.’ On 10 June, they intercepted a message saying that ‘by order of commander-in-chief West at 10.30 hours, thorough destruction of Cherbourg harbour to begin forthwith’. They also discovered that fear of another invasion in Brittany had prompted the Luftwaffe to destroy four airfields immediately. The greatest coup, however, came with two messages giving the location of Panzer Group West’s headquarters. To preserve the secret of Ultra, an aircraft was sent over the target area first.
    Geyr von Schweppenburg was planning his major attack for dusk on 10 June. Soon after dawn that morning, he climbed the steeple of the Abbaye d’Ardennes on the west side of the city, which Meyer had established as the command post of the 25th SS Panzergrenadier-Regiment. Geyr examined the ground ahead through powerful binoculars. He knew the area well from the late summer of 1940, when he had been training the XXIV Corps ready for the invasion of England. While he was up there he watched British aircraft bomb the panzer regiment of the Hitler Jugend and it confirmed him in his decision that only a night attack was possible.
    That afternoon, Rommel came to see him at his command post in the grounds of the Château de La Caine near Thury-Harcourt. Geyr told him his plan, and although both men would have preferred to attack more towards Bayeux, this change would cause too great a delay. Rommel also wanted to know the next step. Geyr quoted the Napoleonic principle of ‘s’engager puis voir ’. Rommel agreed and took his leave. Geyr warned him about the danger of Allied fighter-bombers. Yet his own headquarters offered the most tempting target. Just after Rommel’s departure reports came in from the Panzer Lehr Division that about sixty British tanks had broken through from Bretteville-l’Orgueilleuse towards Tilly-sur-Seulles. Geyr claimed that because he had no reserves available, he felt obliged to cancel the night attack near Caen. In fact, a far more pressing reason arose for cancelling the offensive that night.
    Rocket-firing RAF Typhoon squadrons came in low, their pilots well briefed on their target. They were then followed by waves of Mitchell medium bombers. Astonishingly, Geyr’s headquarters and its vehicles in the park of the château had not been properly camouflaged. The effect was devastating. His chief of staff died and ‘all personnel of the operations section as well as most of the officers of the forward echelon were killed,’ Geyr wrote later. His signals battalion was virtually wiped out. Geyr himself was wounded, but the psychological shock was far greater. He was incapable of resuming command of Panzer Group West before the end of the month.
    There would be no more attempts to launch a major panzer counterattack against the British Second Army until the II SS Panzer Corps arrived from the eastern front. The lack of infantry reinforcements, because of the time it took to march by night to the battlefront, meant that the panzer divisions had to be broken up into Kampfgruppen , or battlegroups, to hold the line. This completely disrupted German plans to concentrate its armoured forces to throw the Allies back into the sea. All they could do now was secure a front, especially against the British, to prevent a breakout towards Paris. British hopes of enlarging their beachhead were therefore dashed. The open country south-east of Caen remained beyond their reach, and any thought of pivoting on Caen, as Montgomery had claimed, had become impossible. Thus, in the first few days, the pattern of a battle of attrition became established.
     
    Montgomery had to change his approach, although he refused to admit this later. On 10 June, accompanied by General Dempsey, he had a meeting with General Bradley in a field near Port-en-Bessin, where the British and American sectors had joined up. Using a map spread out on the bonnet of his Humber staff car, he explained his amended plan. Instead of a head-on assault on Caen, he would now create a pincer movement on the city. The 51st Highland Division and 4th Armoured Brigade