[fuser]

Hitler apoointed Rommel and Rundsted for defense of Europe against a possible allied invasion.. But both of them argued for different tactics..

Rommel concluded that during the Allied offensive any German tank movement would be nearly impossible due to overwhelming Allied air superiority. He argued that the tank forces should be dispersed in small units and kept in heavily fortified positions as close to the front as possible, so they would not have to move far and en masse when the invasion started.
Basically he wanted to stop the invasion at beeches.

But Rundestd concluded that there was no way to stop the invasion near the beaches due to the equally overwhelming firepower of the Allied navies. He felt the tanks should be formed into large units well inland near Paris where they could allow the allies to extend into France and then cut off the Allied troops.
Another famous general Heinz Guderian sided with Rundestdt....

Finally tank forces were ordered to be placed in middle but became virtually impossible for rommel to use them...

What do you think which approach would have been more appropriate??
Was there any chance of repelling the invasion at beeches by following the rommel's plan..

IMO war was already lost for Germans at this stage anyway and here Rundestd himself analyzes the causes of German defeat in west..

[Thunderhawk]

Rommel's idea has some flaws. If small units were along the Atlantic wall in hardened bunkers then those bunkers would had to have been made which directs resources and effort away from the then still mishmash Atlantic wall. Also, the French resistance could have passed their location to the allies who, especially the British, did develop and use bunker busters. If the tanks survived and attacked the landings on the beaches directly then they could have been gunned down by the navy. If they held back a bit they allowed the invasion force to organize.

Still more effective then having them sit and do nothing and I believe the criticisms of a large centralized force is valid, but I dont believe having them hug the beaches is such a great idea either. With hindsight we see that having them as reserves far off and inaccessible was a waste, but that doesnt mean Rommel's idea would necessarily have been an effective one.

[Smilin' Dave]

It would be pretty difficult to accept Rommel's plan without the advantage of hindsight. Keeping the tanks back gives some flexibility in their usage, be that in repelling an invasion or as a reserve to send East in an emergency or what have you. Keep in mind the Germans hadn't 100% decided which beach would be attacked and how. Sticking them on the beaches (or near enough) takes away their options, and in some respects would be contrary to German doctrine. Holding the tanks back might have worked better had they been released for use earlier (although as I understand it, individual commanders were moving out before they received orders anyway). Rommel's approach to defence had also been somewhat disproven in Italy, with the 'defend everywhere with everything' approach giving way to the use of reserves and defence of key points/barriers.

Even with hindsight it doesn't seem entirely practical. It would have come as no surprise to the Allies that the tanks were on the beaches, they had effectively won the intelligence war by 1944. Thus they could have altered their plans accordingly to counter this threat, even take advantage. Naval bombardment would replace (perhaps augment) the threat of interdiction by aircraft. Shelling could be more dangerous to tanks than aircraft, because artillery can sustain bombardments for longer, where as planes tend to pass after the initially strike (which causes disruption still, but less than shelling can). If things had gone wrong for the panzers down on the beaches, there probably would have been fewer effective reserves to contain any subsequent allied breakout.

[fuser]

What I think that logistic played a very important role in successful allied invasion
The success of "overlord" was very much dependent on deception operations like "operation fortitude and operation bodyguard"..
Even rommel started to believe that invasion will occur on Pas de Calais at latter stage.....And no one expecting it on 6th june........It was a complete surprise both location and timing...

But what if Germans had known the exact time and place of invasion?? They didn't really lacked Armour or manpower to fight off allies but they did missed "Luftwaffe".

So, loosely speaking it was air and naval power that won the war for allies in west.

[Thunderhawk]

But what if Germans had known the exact time and place of invasion??

The only way for them to have known would have been either by them being on the winning side of the intelligence war (in which case there are other ramifications) or they got lucky (like Hitler dreaming about Viking settlers in Normandy or some such).

In which case it would probably have been a blood bath. However, the amount of troops and support pouring into the region would probably mean some of the beaches would be taken.

They didn't really lacked Armour or manpower to fight off allies but they did missed "Luftwaffe".

They lacked manpower and armour too.

[fuser]

They lacked manpower and armour too.

I am not saying that they had more men and armor than allies, what I am saying is that it was good enough to fight off allies when used in concentrated form, of course provided they knew the time and place to apply such concentration and I am not implying that they would have won for sure in that case.

[Smilin' Dave]

One difficulty the Wehrmacht would have with fighting off an allied invasion was the quality of troops available. The fortress troops themselves were under equipped and apparently in some cases hadn't started the war in the German army (I've heard of Russians and even Koreans finding themselves deployed to Normandy). Omaha beach ended up being a particularly messing landing in part because it was one of the only beaches defended by regular German troops.

[Thunderhawk]

I am not saying that they had more men and armor than allies, what I am saying is that it was good enough to fight off allies when used in concentrated form,

Did they really have that much extra man power? They were pressing some Soviet POWs and Hitler youth into military service to man the defenses. They had their reserves and units on stand by/relief nearby (I think it was ~100k compared to stationed defenders of ~50k, more accurate numbers would be nice), but they didn't really have much extra manpower on the atlantic wall elsewhere to draw on. The area of the Normandy invasion was huge and had gaps between the beaches. Which length of beaches would the Germans have reinforced? How would they have kept those units safe from naval bombardment, aerial attack and their existance being leaked to the Allies?

If the reinforcements were there for a while, then the allies would have gotten word and softened them up with airpower and/or chosen other spots. If the possible reinforcements/reserves were called upon at the last minute then they would have arrived earlier, but why do you believe earlier deployment would have changed the situation?

[fuser]

Why do you believe earlier deployment would have changed the situation?

I don't think so, I just want to discuss the possibility of repelling the invasion and I admit it was near to impossible. I am more looking for someone who believes and could provide some arguments in favor of repelling an invasion at beaches.

One difficulty the Wehrmacht would have with fighting off an allied invasion was the quality of troops available.

Exactly

[Smilin' Dave]

If your only criteria is that they defend the beaches, without any radical change or consequences... I guess they could have used their nerve gas stockpiles against the troops as they landed. Churchill considered chemical warfare as a last line of defence in the event of the invasion of England. But if you consider the long term consequences the Allies will throw anthrax back... and later on an atomic bomb or two.

But otherwise a lot of the cards are in the hands of the Allies. They had the initiative in that they could notionally land anywhere, or if you want to be really crazy, skip the landing and simply expand the Italian front or something. They have the intelligence advantage, allowing them to hide their moves while seeing that of the Axis. Their strategic resources are significant, and their capacity for strategic strikes exceeds that of their opponents so they aren't likely to lose that advantage. They had even learnt a few valuable lessons from earlier in the war, making the chance of a critical mistake during the passage of events less likely. The only advantage that the Wehrmacht had that I can think of is the standard one of defence... but that's mitigated by the scale involved and their own numerical inferiority at the strategic level.

[Thunderhawk]

They could have pulled troops out of southern Italy, Russia and Southern France.. but to what good? The Soviets were cycling through offensives, the Italian front was the most manpower cost effective for the Germans and Southern France was already poorly defended and waiting to be retaken - contributing to the great success of operation Dragoon.

Perhaps a better method would have been the recall of most of their atlantic Sub fleet into the channel along the French coast, laying in wait for the large transports.. though the Allies did have a lot of dedicated sub hunters looking out for them.

[William_H_Dougherty]

Errr... I have to say I feel like I'm in the minority, considering Rommel to be a talented but not overly spectacular general.

Rundstedt on the other hand, had once been a spectacular general, but probably did not quite grasp the advances in tactics over the 1942-1943 period. Rommel was probably much more aware of what the Allies were capable of.

However, I think we will never be able answer this decisively as both of their plans looked good on paper, and were probably impossible in reality (Hitler misled both Field Marshals as to the panzer, infantry, and air reserves that would be made available to them).

I think most historians agree that the OKW would have been better of picking one of them alone, rather than both as what happened historically.

Instead, the they got two watered down plans, giving Rommel not enough armour to stop the allies at the beaches, and giving von Schweppenburg insufficient armour to check them in the mainland.

- WHD

[GandalfTheGrey]

I've heard of Russians and even Koreans finding themselves deployed to Normandy

One of the nitpicks of Saving Private Ryan was that one of the supposedly German soldiers on the beach was speaking in czech. However it was pointed out that in fact there were some czech nationals who were conscripted by the Germans and sent to Normandy (not sure about Omaha though - that was supposed to be defended by crack German troops).

[William_H_Dougherty]

One of the nitpicks of Saving Private Ryan was that one of the supposedly German soldiers on the beach was speaking in czech. However it was pointed out that in fact there were some czech nationals who were conscripted by the Germans and sent to Normandy (not sure about Omaha though - that was supposed to be defended by crack German troops).

What? As far as my reading goes, the actual divisions at the beach were not exactly crack troops by any stretch of the imagination, many made up of "ethnic german" volunteers (i.e. you volunteer or you go to a concentration camp). However, in-land (hedgerows) they came across some depleated crack divisions (incidentally, some of these also populated by more motivated ethnic german real volunteers).

- WHD

[Smilin' Dave]

I think GtG is referring to the Grenadier division that happened to be deployed at/near Omaha beach by coincidence rather than the fortress troops themselves.

[William_H_Dougherty]

I think GtG is referring to the Grenadier division that happened to be deployed at/near Omaha beach by coincidence rather than the fortress troops themselves.

I'm not too familiar with Omaha to be honest, I just know that it was the toughest slog out of all the beaches. A stray Grenadier division might do that .

As a Canadian Juno Beach has a bit more saliency for me.

- WHD