Patton: Ordeal and Triumph by Ladislas Farago

Author:Ladislas Farago [Farago, Ladislas]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Westholme Publishing
Published: 2005-05-02T16:00:00+00:00

23. THE SHADOW OF BRADLEY

On July 12th, when he realized that his offensive was running into dead ends around the midriff of the Cotentin Peninsula, Bradley decided to write it off and replace it with a bolder, firmer and more elaborate design—a breakthrough at last to Avranches. Devised as a major effort with its own code name, “Cobra,” the operation was to penetrate the German defenses in the Cotentin by the combination of concentrated power on the ground and overwhelming bombardment from the air. The perspective within which Bradley had conceived “Cobra” was basically the same as had motivated his July offensive; and the objectives remained unchanged—Brittany was the eventual goal, the Coutances-Caumont line the first step toward it.

Martin Blumenson, who has made the most exhaustive study of “Cobra,” called attention to the difference between what “Cobra” was originally planned to be and what it became in the end—essentially the difference between a breakthrough and a breakout. The former, according to Blumenson, “signified a penetration through the depth of the enemy defensive position”; while the latter, employed post facto to describe the results (rather than the intentions) of the operation, meant “leaving the hedgerow country, shaking loose from the Cotentin, acquiring room for mobile warfare—goodbye Normandy, hello Brest.”

In his effort to place “Cobra” in its proper historical slot, Blumenson wrote: “Reporters writing after the event and impressed with the results stressed the breakout that developed rather than the breakthrough that was planned.” As it was, “Cobra” was remarkable in its conception, and superb in its execution. It became “the key maneuver,” as Blumenson concluded, “from which a large part of the subsequent campaign in Europe developed.”

Chastened by his recent experience, Bradley had set his expectations reasonably low but his hopes sky high. “If this thing goes as it should,” he told General Collins a week before the jump-off, “we ought to be in Avranches in a week.” And he told Major General Lewis H. Brereton of the Army Air Forces on July 11th, two days before the First Army published the “Cobra” plan, that “the attack was designed to break out of the Cotentin and complete the liberation of France.”

Patton, on his part, was as skeptical of “Cobra” before the attack as Blumenson became many years afterward.

But he changed his mind when he gradually discovered that “Cobra” was indeed a modified version of his own Opus No. 1. He had no doubt that somehow he had inspired it and Bradley —deliberately or unwittingly—had copied his ideas. For “Cobra” had all the major elements of Patton’s original design —the vertical attack on the road net with increased emphasis on armor, the narrow corridor concept with Avranches at its terminus. Yes, this was his plan, he thought, somewhat deboldened and bowdlerized, for Bradley would never dare go as far out as Patton was raring to go.

Of course, he had an enormous stake in its success. If “Cobra” delivered what Bradley fondly hoped it would, and punched a hole in the German defenses, the Third Army would be made operational to exploit the breakthrough and develop it into a breakout.

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