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Originally Posted by Doppleganger I believe that Rundstedt did indeed say that about Rommel, as they were in disagreement over where to place German armoured forces in the West in anticipation of the D-Day landings. Rundstedt agreed with Guderian that the German panzer reserves should be placed inland near Paris so that they could counter-attack and envelop Allied armoured thrusts. Rommel disagreed and wanted them placed near the coast which negated their mobility and thus their main strengths. As Rommel was officially in charge of these forces Hitler took Rommel's advice. Interestingly though, some say part of Rommel's real reasoning was to have some army divisions in positions that suited him because he was involved in the July bomb plot. Certainly the 21st panzer division seemed to fall into this category. | This is one area I think Rommel may well have been right though, under normal operating conditions keeping the panzer units back so that they can move to counter where required makes sense but these were far from ideal conditions for the movement of armour as the Luftwaffe was toast leaving the allies with total air superiority and making effective movement all but impossible.
I also tend to believe that the only option available to the Germans on D-Day was to defeat the allies on the beaches as once they became established the war was effectively over.
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Faith is a cop-out. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can’t be taken on its own merits.
- Dan Barker, "Losing Faith in Faith", 1992 |