Posted on 11/05/2014 4:26:53 AM PST by Homer_J_Simpson
Outstanding summary!!!
The Pearl Harbor comparison is apt. Both of these events caught the Americans napping because the events in the run-up was viewed through the lens of expecting the Japanese/Germans to conform to the Americans expectations.
In the case of the Bulge the Allies were misled by there reliance on Ultra, IMO. How is that? The Germans wireless security regards the actual offensive was pretty effective so there was no barking dog from Ultra to say, hey boys we are going to attack on 12/16. No barking dog, no need for the Allies to worry right? See the German counterattack just after D-Day at Avranches(sp).
What Ultra did provide was a whole host of side information that had the Allies, in the main, not been convinced that the Germans were pretty well beaten should have tipped them off.
Regards Col. Dickson’s warnings: Col. Dickson, in short, suffered from the boy who called wolf to often. As an “alarmist” most of his higher ups just said, “there goes Monk again”.
Well off to work :-(
Regards
alfa6 ;>}
So many times in World War 2 intelligence failures were based on the enemy not doing what they were expected to do. We ought to start a list.
I’ll nominate:
The Fall of France, 1940 (The French expected a redux of the Schlieffen Plan)
Operation Barbarossa (Both sides: Stalin didn’t expect the Germans to attack, the Germans didn’t expect the Soviets to be able to conjure up new armies faster than they could destroy them)
Pearl Harbor
Midway
Fall Blau (German summer offensive/road to Stalingrad. The Soviets expected the main effort on the Moscow axis)
Opreration Bagration (the Germans expected the Soviet offensive in southern Poland and Romania, not Belorussia)
Overlord (Operation Fortitude)
Ardennes Offensive
Seems to me that every major combatant in the war made a mistake at one time or another in basing their strategy on what they thought the enemy would do, not what he could do. Of course, there are always choices forced on military leaders by the reality of finite resources. Nobody has enough to prepare for every possible contingency. That’s why “Monk” Dickson becomes the boy who cries “wolf.” The allies didn’t act on all his warnings because they couldn’t. Nobody could. So at some point, you have to allocate your resources based on your best guess of the enemy’s intentions. With those decisions you always run the risk of being wrong.
That’s why the generals get paid the big bucks.
The only reason that the Battle of the Bulge worked for any amount of time was the lack of clear skies. Once the skies cleared, the Germans were done.
I suppose one doesn't even become a general without self-confidence, so the tendency to trust one's judgment (or, as you put it, "allocate your resources based on your best guess of the enemy’s intentions") is undoubtedly strong. My only point was something I'm learning to do personally as part of the human condition: developing enough humility and wisdom to guard against being colossally and catastrophically wrong. I imagine that tension plays a big role in all wars, where resources and information are always finite.
Did you know that Napoleon invented relief pitching? He did, according to Bill James, the acclaimed baseball analyst and writer.
Bill explained that Napoleon would hold out of a battle a third or so of his army, keeping them resting at some distance away. Then, after a day or two when the battle had devolved into a stalemate between to exhausted armies, Napoleon would send in his fresh reserves to wipe out the enemy!
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