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    Anzio 1944: The beleaguered beachhead
    Anzio 1944: The beleaguered beachhead
    Anzio 1944: The beleaguered beachhead
    Ebook213 pages1 hour

    Anzio 1944: The beleaguered beachhead

    By Steven J Zaloga and Peter Dennis

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    About this ebook

    Anzio 1944 covers the amphibious landing which has become one of the most controversial campaigns of World War II.

    In January 1944, the Allies decided to land at Anzio in order to overcome the stalemate at Cassino. Questionable decisions by the Allied leadership led to three months of World War I-style trench warfare, and the entire beachhead suffered from continuous German observation and bombardment.

    Vividly describing each thrust and counter-thrust, this book takes us through the agonizing struggle as each side sought to retain or regain mastery. It shows how Anzio proved to be a stepping stone not only to Rome but also to the liberation of Italy.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
    Release dateJan 20, 2013
    ISBN9781472800169
    Anzio 1944: The beleaguered beachhead
    Author

    Steven J Zaloga

    Steven J. Zaloga is a senior analyst for Teal Group Corp., an aerospace consulting firm, where he covers missile and drone technology as well as international arms transfers for clients in the aerospace industry and the government. He served for more than two decades as an adjunct staff member with the Strategy, Forces, and Resources division of the Institute for Defense Analyses, a federal think-tank, retiring in 2021. He is the author of numerous books on military technology and history, including NVG 294 Allied Tanks in Normandy 1944 and NVG 283 American Guided Missiles of World War II. He currently lives in Maryland, USA.

    Read more from Steven J Zaloga

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      Book preview

      Anzio 1944 - Steven J Zaloga

      ORIGINS OF THE BATTLE

      The Anzio amphibious landing of 1944 was one of the most controversial Allied operations in Europe in World War II. Although intended to break the stalemate in the Italian theater by making an end run around the German Gustav line defenses near Cassino, instead Anzio itself became a stalemate. Churchill famously remarked, We hoped to land a wildcat that would tear out the bowels of the Boche. Instead, we have stranded a vast whale. The Anzio operation presents a classic study of ambitious political objectives doomed by limited military resources. Grim memories of the nearly disastrous Salerno landings haunted the Allied commanders, and instead of a bold advance after the initial landing in January 1944, they consolidated the beachhead to await the inevitable German counter attack. The beachhead survived three violent attacks in February, the largest German counter attacks in the west until the Ardennes offensive ten months later. By March, Anzio had degenerated into an agonizing stalemate. Ironically, an operation that had been launched to redeem the Gustav line operation in the end depended on a successful conclusion of the Cassino breakthrough before the bridgehead could be exploited. To further add to the controversy of the operation, Gen Mark Clark decided to focus the advance out of Anzio in the direction of Rome rather than eastward to trap the German forces retreating from the Cassino sector. Rome fell to the Allies on 4 June 1944, but it was a bitter victory that was quickly forgotten when the main Allied campaign opened in Normandy two days later.

      THE STRATEGIC SETTING

      At the heart of the Anzio controversy was the divergent strategic perspectives of the British and American allies. For Churchill, the Mediterranean was the carotid artery of Empire, the key access route to Egypt, the Middle East, and ultimately to India. Military operations in the Mediterranean were historically well suited to British proclivities for a peripheral engagement strategy when dealing with a strong continental power such as France in the early 19th century or Germany in the middle of the 20th century. British power rested on its naval strength and its army was too small on its own to overcome a major land power like Germany in direct confrontation. As a result, Britain preferred to use the leverage of maritime mobility to extract maximum results from modest commitments of ground forces. Britain depended on a coalition strategy for the final end-game against a land power such as Germany, but in the mid-term, a peripheral strategy supported this objective. In the case of the Italian campaign, Churchill saw operations as serving several essential purposes. It drew off German strength from the Russian front, providing aid and comfort to the beleaguered Red Army. The commitment of army resources was not particularly extensive, and indeed much of the manpower in the Italian campaign came from the colonies, including Canada, South Africa, India, and New Zealand. The Mediterranean theater played on British strengths, especially the well established Royal Navy presence, and exploited Axis weaknesses, especially the vulnerability of the Italians.

      The American perspective was significantly different. Since the US was fighting a two-front war in both the Atlantic and the Pacific, American leaders were not keen on wasting resources in secondary theaters. The US Army chief of staff, George C. Marshall, saw the primary aim of the campaign in Europe to be the defeat of Germany. Marshall was unconvinced by Churchill’s depiction of the Mediterranean as representing the soft underbelly of Europe and considered Churchill’s preference for Mediterranean operations to be a prestige venture that was strategically unsound. Marshall wanted a direct confrontation with Germany as soon as possible on the most feasible battleground, namely an invasion of northern France. Any other operations were merely distractions from the main goal. From a political perspective, the United States had little reason to support British imperial ambitions, and indeed there was a strong anti-imperial strain in US foreign policy both before and after World War II that was only partly suppressed for the sake of the coalition during the war.

      Ultimately, Churchill managed to win over Roosevelt to Mediterranean operations in 1942–43. The Allies were not yet ready to land in France as was all too clear from the performance of the inexperienced US Army in Tunisia in 1942–43. Roosevelt recognized that it was essential to keep Russia in the war on the Allied side, and Stalin was insisting on a second front. The Mediterranean theater offered the prospect of morale-boosting victories on the cheap since Italy was clearly vulnerable. Furthermore, Hitler seemed willing to take the bait and waste significant forces in the theater even if it was a strategic dead end for Germany.

      Although Churchill had won Roosevelt’s acquiescence to continued Allied operations in the Mediterranean in the winter of 1943–44, the US support was not unconditional. The US was not willing to devote substantial naval or army resources to the theater since critical operations in both Europe and the Pacific were expected in the summer of 1944. At every turn, Allied commanders in Italy would have to beg for every last battalion, every last landing craft, and every last fighter plane. Their only leverage was the prospect of liberating Rome. Both Churchill and Roosevelt recognized the political importance of seizing a major Axis capital, and Rome would certainly do even though Mussolini had been forced out of the war in September 1943 after the Salerno landings. The lure of Rome helped extract a few extra resources for the Italian theater in spite of growing US impatience.

      If British and American differences in strategic outlooks set the broad parameters for operations in Italy, combat experiences in 1943 helped shape the operational setting. The Mediterranean theater might seem like the soft underbelly of Europe on a map, but it did not seem that way to Allied army units involved in the fighting in 1943. Campaigns in Italy are inevitably dominated by the Italian geography, especially the Apennine mountain chain which form the spine of the Italian peninsula in the center. The narrow coastal plains offered the Allies little room to maneuver, and as a result, the fighting in Italy in the autumn and winter of 1943 inevitably involved bitter infantry fighting to overcome determined German defenses in the foothills and mountains. This became all too clear when the Allied advance bogged down along the Gustav defensive line in front of Cassino on the western side of the Apennines and in front of Ortona on the eastern side. The obvious solution to this dilemma was an amphibious operation, exploiting the Allies’ naval superiority to shift forces around the German defenses as had been done in September 1943 at Salerno. The US Fifth Army commander, Gen Mark Clark, had set up a special staff within his G-3 (operations) department in October 1943 specifically to look for amphibious landing opportunities.

      US infantry practice amphibious landings near Pozzuoli in early January in anticipation of Operation Shingle. (NARA)

      While there was little question that an amphibious operation was the solution to the stalemate in front of the Gustav line, there was the overriding issue of naval resources. A total of 90 LSTs (landing ship, tank) were available in the Mediterranean in the autumn of 1943 after the Salerno landings and they were being used to move troops and supplies from North Africa and Sicily into Italy. However, in preparation for Operation Overlord (Normandy) and Operation Anvil (southern France) scheduled for May 1944, 68 of these ships were scheduled to depart in mid-December 1943 for their new assignment. A similar situation affected other necessary equipment for amphibious operations such as landing craft, DUKW amphibious trucks and other equipment. Any amphibious operation in Italy would have to be undertaken soon and with limited resources.

      CHRONOLOGY

      8 November 1943 – Alexander outlines mission to Clark of an amphibious landing to outflank the Gustav line, starting the planning process

      25 November 1943 – Plan for Operation Shingle is presented to Gen Alexander by Fifth Army G-3

      10 December 1943 – Clark suggests revision of Operation Shingle, enlarging the landing force

      22 December 1943 – Operation Shingle canceled due to failure of Fifth Army to advance past Cassino

      25 December 1943 – Churchill resurrects Operation Shingle as a means to revive the flagging fortunes of the Italian campaign

      21 January 1944 – Task Force 81 departs ports in Naples area for Anzio

      0200 hours, 22 January 1944 – Pre-landing bombardment of Anzio beaches begins, first landings follow

      0500 hours, 22 January 1944 – Kesselring receives first news of landings, activates Case Richard, the reinforcement plan

      25 January 1944 – First skirmishing along Anzio perimeter, mainly around Aprilia

      Midnight, 30 – 31 January 1944 – Allies begin first attack out of beachhead

      31 January 1944 - British infantry secure Campoleone,

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