The European Theater Of Operations

A description of General Eisenhower's wartime command, focusing on the general, his staff, and his superiors in London and Washington and contrasting Allied and enemy command organizations.

With the publication of "Riviera to the Rhine", the Center of Military History completes its series of operational histories treating the activities of the U.S. Army's combat forces during World War II. This volume examines the least known of the major units in the European theater, General Jacob L. Devers' 6th Army Group. Under General Devers' leadership, two armies, the U.S. Seventh Army under General Alexander M. Patch and the First French Army led by General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny, landing on the Mediterranean coast near Marseille in August 1944, cleared the enemy out of southern France and then turned east and joined with army groups under Field Marshal Sir Bernard L. Montgomery and General Omar N. Bradley in the final assault on Germany. In detailing the campaign of these Riviera-based armies, the authors have concentrated on the operational level of war, paying special attention to the problems of joint, combined, and special operations and to the significant roles of logistics, intelligence, and personnel policies in these endeavors. They have also examined in detail deception efforts at the tactical and operational levels, deep battle penetrations, river-crossing efforts, combat in built-up areas, and tactical innovations at the combined arms level.

Although readily admitting the importance of combat service support forces, military students and historians alike tend to concentrate on combat and combat support units when studying operations, giving only passing attention to the vital work of the logisticians, signalmen, transport troops, and the rest. This is regrettable, for the operations of combat service support units-especially in a global conflict like World War II with its vast distances and varied terrains-have much to teach us about modern warfare, lessons that remain of surpassing importance to our profession. The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater of Operations supports the proposition that the experience of medical personnel in war directly stimulates advances in medical science. More importantly, it demonstrates that the organization of health care in the combat zones, including evacuation of the wounded, control of disease among troops and civilian populations, and care of prisoners of war, contributed directly to the Allied victory. The exploits of the doctors, corpsmen, and medical support units provide a model for the planning and organization of medical support in today's Army. This volume continues a subseries begun in 1966 with the study of medical support of the Army in the Mediterranean Theater. The Center of Military History will soon complete this project with the publication of a similar study of the very different challenges faced by the Medical Department in the Pacific.

From El Alamein to the breaching of the Siegfried Line, here are the major battles, unforgettably recorded by the men who fought them. EUROPEAN THEATER, 1940 to 1945 From the over-all view of grand strategy to the fox-hole view of the individual rifleman, these authoritative accounts recreate with immediacy and in full dimension the historic battle for Europe. THE CHASE OF THE BISMARCK BEHIND ROMMEL’S LINES ATTACK AT EL ALAMEIN RAID ON REGENSBURG THE BATTLE FOR CASSINO ANZIO TO ROME AIR DROP ON NORMANDY OMAHA BEACH BREAKOUT AT ST. LÔ THE HÜRTGEN FOREST BASTOGNE THE CAPTURE OF REMAGEN BRIDGE SMASHING THE SIEGFRIED LINE and other battles Complete with maps and running commentary, this is a companion volume to COMBAT: PACIFIC THEATER-WORLD WAR II.