Monday, August 22, 2022

Wehrmacht Officers at the French Beach

Luftwaffe and Heer officers on the beach of France during landing exercise for "Operation Sea Lion", summer 1940. Facing the camera in the middle is General der Pioniere Alfred Jacob (General der Pioniere und Festungen im Oberkommando des Heeres). German Army and Navy planners set to work in a race against time to solve the manifold and unfamiliar problems of a large- scale amphibious operation. The first big problem was that there were no landing craft, and very little shipping of any description. By gathering up all the barges from inland waterways at the cost of paralyzing large sections of industry, the Germans could reckon on barely enough shipping space to put an effective force ashore in England.6 But towed barges at the mercy of the slightest wind-roughened seas were hardly ideal. The perils of improvisation, furthermore, would be heightened by the lack of naval protection. The only way to guard the convoys seemed to be to mass all submarines and light surface vessels on the North Sea flank and at the same time mount a diversionary expedition on the Atlantic side to draw the British Fleet away from the main crossing. The Navy was decidedly cool toward the project. Grossadmiral Erich Raeder, the Navy Commander in Chief, as early as July had uncovered so many risks that he strongly recommended against the operation except as a last resort.


At left is Generaloberst Franz Halder (Chef des Generalstabes des Heeres), while second from right is General der Pioniere Alfred Jacob (General der Pioniere und Festungen im Oberkommando des Heeres).

Source :
https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-E-XChannel/USA-E-XChannel-4.html
https://www.oocities.org/~orion47/WEHRMACHT/HEER/General2/JACOB_ALFRED.html

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