Supreme Commander

by Stephen E. Ambrose

  26. Eisenhower to CCS, October 31, 1943, EP, No. 1370.

  27. Ehrman, Grand Strategy, p. 74.

  28. Eisenhower to CCS, November 4, 1943, EP, No. 1373.

  29. Eisenhower to Alexander, November 9, 1943, EP, No. 1380.

  30. Eisenhower to Alexander, November 10, 1943, EP, No. 1381.

  31. Esposito (ed.), The West Point Atlas, Vol. II, Map 99.

  32. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 426–29; Summersby, Eisenhower Was My Boss, p. 83.

  33. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 443–44; Summersby, Eisenhower Was My Boss, p. 108.

  34. Eisenhower to Cunningham, October 16, 1943, EP, No. 1340.

  35. Cunningham to Eisenhower, October 10 and October 21, 1943, EP, No. 1340, fns. 1 and 2.

  CHAPTER 21

  1. Forrest C. Pogue, The Supreme Command, in Greenfield (ed.), U. S. Army in World War II (Washington, 1954), p. 25; Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, pp. 759–64.

  2. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 419–21.

  3. Ibid., pp. 428, 430–31.

  4. Ibid., p. 428.

  5. Ibid., p. 428.

  6. Memorandum to Smith, October 2, 1943, EP, No. 1310.

  7. Eisenhower to Marshall, September 20, 1943, EP, No. 1271.

  8. Eisenhower memorandum of December 6, 1943, EP, No. 1408; Eisenhower Office Diary, October 19, 1943.

  9. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 27.

  10. Eisenhower to Arthur Eisenhower, October 20, 1943, EP, No. 1352.

  11. Butcher, My Three Years, p. 434; Eisenhower’s comment of October 28, 1943, EP, No. 1366.

  12. Eisenhower to Van Horn Moseley, October 7, 1943, EP, No. 1324.

  13. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 433–36.

  14. He told Butcher there was “not enough wallop in the initial attack.” Ibid., p. 434.

  15. If made Chief of Staff, Eisenhower would be on the CCS to represent the OVERLORD viewpoint, but OPD feared he would not be as effective in dealing with the British as Marshall.

  16. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 29–30; Ehrman, Grand Strategy, Vol. V, pp. 170–71.

  17. Mideast and AFHQ had, after the Cos disaster, been combined into one theater. Eisenhower’s authority in Mideast, however, was vague.

  18. Eisenhower memo of December 6, 1943, EP, No. 1408; Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 194.

  19. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 197; Eisenhower memo of December 6, 1943, EP, No. 1408.

  20. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 451–52; Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 196.

  21. Matloff, Strategic Planning, pp. 334–58; Ehrman, Grand Strategy, Vol. V, Chapters 4 and 5; U. S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic Papers, The Conferences at Cairo and Tehran 1943 (Washington, 1961), pp. 203–9, 248, 424, 481.

  22. U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, Cairo, pp. 360–61; Eisenhower memo of December 6, EP, No. 1408. Here, on Tito, as elsewhere in the second half of 1943, Eisenhower was in agreement with the British and rejected the American view.

  23. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 200.

  24. Ibid., Eisenhower, At Ease, p. 266.

  25. William D. Leahy, I Was There (New York, 1950), p. 208.

  26. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 30–31.

  27. Ibid., pp. 31–32.

  28. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 452–53.

  29. Ibid., pp. 453–55.

  30. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, pp. 802–3.

  31. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 208. The original is framed and hangs in Eisenhower’s Gettysburg office.

  32. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 801.

  33. Ehrman, Grand Strategy, Vol. V, p. 201.

  34. Marshall to Eisenhower, December 10, 1943, EP, No. 1423.

  35. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, pp. 206–7.

  CHAPTER 22

  1. Butcher, My Three Years, 454–57.

  2. Eisenhower to Marshall, December 17, 1943, and December 23, 1943, EP, No. 1423 and No. 1426.

  3. Marshall to Eisenhower, November 23, 1943, EP, No. 1396, fn. 1.

  4. Eisenhower to Marshall, November 24, 1943, EP, No. 1396.

  5. Same to same, December 17, 1943, EP, No. 1423.

  6. See EP, No. 1414.

  7. Eisenhower to Patton, November 24, 1943, EP, No. 1397.

  8. Marshall to Eisenhower, December 21, 1943, and December 28, 1943, EP, No. 1440, fns. 1 and 3.

  9. Marshall to Eisenhower, December 24, 1943, EP, No. 1428, fn. 1.

  10. Eaker himself protested in a message to Eisenhower of December 18 (in Smith Coll. EOC). The same day he told Arnold it was “heartbreaking to leave just before the climax.” Craven and Cate, Europe—Torch to Pointblank, p. 749.

  11. Eisenhower to Marshall, December 25, 1943, EP, No. 1428.

  12. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 454–57.

  13. Marshall to Eisenhower, December 28, 1943, EP, No. 1440, fn. 3.

  14. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 463–64.

  15. Eisenhower to Marshall, December 29, 1943, EP, No. 1449.

  16. Smith to Eisenhower, December 30, 1943, EP, No. 1469, fn. 1.

  17. Eisenhower to Smith, December 31, 1943, EP, No. 1469.

  18. Eisenhower to Marshall, December 31, 1943, EP, No. 1470.

  19. Eisenhower to CCS, December 28, 1943, EP, No. 1446.

  20. Alexander to Eisenhower, December 27, 1943, EP, No. 1453, fn. 1.

  21. Eisenhower to Alexander, December 29, 1943, No. 1453.

  22. Same to same, December 31, 1943, EP, No. 1487. Eisenhower played no role in SHINGLE planning. He felt that as he was leaving the theater he should leave it up to Alexander.

  23. Eisenhower to Roosevelt, December 22, 1943, EP, No. 1425.

  24. Roosevelt to Eisenhower, December 23, 1943, EP, No. 1425, fn. 2; U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, 1943, Vol. II, p. 195.

  25. EP, No. 1425.

  26. Roosevelt to Eisenhower, December 26, 1943, EP, fn. 4.

  27. Eisenhower to Marshall, December 31, 1943, EP, No. 1466. De Gaulle, Unity, p. 241.

  28. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 454–57.

  29. Ibid., pp. 460–61.

  30. Interview with Eisenhower, October 11, 1967.

  31. Marshall to Eisenhower, December 29, 1943, EP, No. 1450, fn. 8.

  32. Eisenhower to Mrs. Kincaid, December 28, 1943, Eisenhower’s possession.

  CHAPTER 23

  1. Eisenhower to Aksel Nielsen, September 6, 1943, EP, No. 1238.

  2. Summersby, Eisenhower Was My Boss, p. 114.

  3. Eisenhower to Spaatz, December 24, 1943, EP, No. 1427.

  4. Eisenhower to Colonel William Lee, October 29, 1943, EP, No. 1368.

  5. Eisenhower to Mrs. Milton Eisenhower, October 18, 1943, EP, No. 1347.

  6. Eisenhower to Hazlett, October 20, 1943, Ep, No. 1353.

  7. De Gaulle to Eisenhower, December 28, 1943, EP, No. 1457, fn. 1.

  8. Butcher, My Three Years, p. 464.

  9. Viorst, Hostile Allies, p. 189.

  10. Eisenhower to Wedemeyer, September 13, 1943, EP, No. 1248.

  11. Quoted in Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 34.

  12. Montgomery, Memoirs, p. 484.

  13. Eisenhower to Ismay, December 16, 1942, EP, No. 723.

  BOOK TWO

  PART I

  1. Eisenhower to Marshall, January 22, 1944, EP, No. 1496.

  CHAPTER 1

  1. The best over-all discussion of OVERLORD is Gordon A. Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, in Greenfield (ed.), U. S. Army in World War II (Washington, 1951), pp. 46–82.

  2. Interview with Eisenhower, October 5, 1967, and memo, February 7, 1944, EP, No. 1536.

  3. Smith to Eisenhower, January 5, 1944, EP, No. 1473, fn. 2.

  4. Eisenhower to Smith, January 5, 1944, EP, No. 1473.

  5. Montgomery to Eisenhower, January 10, 1944, EP, No. 1475, fn. 1.

  6. Eisenhower to Montgomery, January 13, 1944, EP, No. 1475; see also Eisenhower to Smith, January 13, 1944, EP, No. 1476.

  7. Eisenhower to Marshall, Ja
nuary 17 and January 22, 1944, EP, Nos. 1483 and 1496.

  8. Eisenhower to CCS, January 23, 1944, EP, No. 1497.

  9. Eisenhower to Marshall, January 17, 1944, EP, No. 1483.

  10. Eisenhower to Haislip, January 24, 1944, EP, No. 1504.

  11. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 472–74.

  12. Quoted in Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 56.

  13. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 472–74.

  14. Quoted in Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 64.

  15. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 472–74; Eisenhower to Marshall, April 30, 1944, EP, No. 1660.

  16. Butcher, My Three Years, p. 488.

  17. Eisenhower to Marshall, January 29, 1944, EP, No. 1520.

  18. Same to same, February 9, 1944, EP, No. 1539.

  19. Same to same, January 18, 1944, EP, No. 1486.

  20. Same to same, February 16, 1944, EP, No. 1553.

  21. Farago, Patton, pp. 417–18.

  22. Marshall to Eisenhower, April 26, 1944, EP, No. 1657, fn. 1.

  23. Eisenhower to Marshall, April 29, 1944, EP, No. 1657.

  24. Marshall to Eisenhower, April 29, 1944, EP, No. 1657, fn. 2.

  25. Eisenhower to Patton, April 29, 1944, EP, No. 1659.

  26. Eisenhower to Marshall, April 30, 1944, EP, No. 1660.

  27. Marshall to Eisenhower, May 2, 1944, EP, No. 1660, fn. 2.

  28. Farago, Patton, pp. 421–23; Eisenhower to Marshall, May 3, 1944, EP, No. 1666.

  29. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 480–82.

  30. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 225.

  31. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 475–78.

  32. Summersby, Eisenhower Was My Boss, p. 129.

  33. Eisenhower to Marshall, January 28, 1944, EP, No. 1517.

  34. Eisenhower to Lee, February 19, 1944, EP, No. 1559.

  35. Same to same, March 22, 1944, EP, No. 1602.

  36. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 499–500.

  37. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 238.

  38. Montgomery, Memoirs, p. 201, quoting a letter from Smith.

  39. Eisenhower to Cunningham, February 23, 1944, EP, No. 1564.

  40. Eisenhower to John Eisenhower, March 31, 1944, EP, No. 1617.

  41. Eisenhower to Marshall, April 17, 1944, EP, No. 1645.

  42 Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 527–33.

  43. Eisenhower to Somervell, April 4, 1944, EP, No. 1627.

  CHAPTER 2

  1. Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, p. 68.

  2. Butcher, My Three Years, p. 479.

  3. Memo, February 7, 1944, EP, No. 1536. What he meant, of course, was a simultaneous ANVIL. Throughout this chapter, when I use ANVIL, I mean one going concurrently with OVERLORD.

  4. Marshall to Eisenhower, February 7, 1944, EP, No. 1531, fn. 3.

  5. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 8, 1944, EP, No. 1538.

  6. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 113–15; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 168–70.

  7. EP, No. 1547, fn. 1.

  8. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 14, 1944, EP, No. 1547.

  9. Memorandum, February 18, 1944, EP, No. 1555.

  10. BCOS to JSM, COS (W), February 19, 1944, EP, No. 1556, fn. 1.

  11. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 19, 1944, EP, No. 1556.

  12. Montgomery to Eisenhower, February 19 and 21, 1944, EP, No. 1561, fn. 1.

  13. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 22, 1944, EP, No. 1562; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 171–72.

  14. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 114–15; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, p. 172.

  15. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 115.

  16. Eisenhower to Marshall, March 3, 1944, EP, No. 1577.

  17. Same to same, March 9, 1944, EP, No. 1582.

  18. Quoted in Matloff, Strategic Planning, p. 422.

  19. Marshall to Eisenhower, March 17, 1944, EP, No. 1591, fn. 1.

  20. Eisenhower to Marshall, March 20, 1944, EP, No. 1593.

  21. Same to same, March 21, 1944, EP, No. 1595.

  22. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 116.

  23. Eisenhower to Marshall, March 27, 1944, EP, No. 1608; Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 116–17; Ehrman, Grand Strategy, Vol. V, pp. 249–54.

  24. Matloff, Strategic Planning, p. 425.

  25. Marshall to Eisenhower, March 31, 1944, EP, No. 1621, fn. 1.

  26. Eisenhower to Marshall, March 27, 1944, EP, No. 1608.

  27. The texts of these messages are given in full in Marshall to Eisenhower. April 13, 1944, EP, No. 1641, fn. 2.

  28. Eisenhower to Marshall, April 12, 1944, EP, No. 1641.

  29. Matloff, Strategic Planning, p. 426.

  30. See draft of an Eisenhower to Marshall cable, not sent, April 17, 1944, EP No. 1645.

  31. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 117; Ehrman, Grand Strategy, Vol. V, pp. 252–58.

  32. Eisenhower Office Diary, April 18, 1944.

  CHAPTER 3

  1. Whiteley to John Kennedy, September 23, 1943, EP, No. 1539, fn. 2, covers the issue. Senior officers at U. S. Eighth Air Force had been heard to say that they only wanted twenty or thirty clear operation days and they would finish the war on their own.

  2. Eisenhower to Smith, January 5, 1944, EP, No. 1473.

  3. Arnold to Eisenhower, no date, EP, No. 1539, fn. 2.

  4. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 499–501.

  5. Ibid., p. 502.

  6. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 9, 1944, EP, No. 1539.

  7. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 127.

  8. Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, p. 217; Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 503–4; Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 127–29.

  9. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 508.

  10. EP, No. 1539, fn. 2.

  11. Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, p. 219.

  12. Ellis, Victory in the West, pp. 99–100. Lionel F. Ellis, Victory in the West, in History of the Second World War (London, 1962), pp. 99–100.

  13. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 128.

  14. Eisenhower to Tedder, February 29, 1944, EP, No. 1575.

  15. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 510–12; Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 124; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 219–20.

  16. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 125.

  17. Eisenhower to Marshall, March 3, 1944, EP, No. 1577.

  18. Same to same, March 21, 1944, EP, No. 1599.

  19. Memorandum, March 22, 1944, EP, No. 1600.

  20. Butcher, My Three Years, p. 507.

  21. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 513; Ellis, Victory in the West, p. 98.

  22. Butcher, My Three Years, pp. 503–4.

  23. See Eisenhower memorandum for the record, March 22, 1944, EP, No. 1600.

  24. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 129; Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 520–22; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 221–22; Ellis, Victory in the West, p. 99.

  25. Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate (eds.), Argument to VE Day, in The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. III (Chicago, 1951), p. 73.

  26. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 520; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 221–22; Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 129.

  27. Eisenhower to Tedder, March 9, 1944, EP, No. 1584.

  28. Churchill to Eisenhower, April 3, 1944, EP, No. 1630, fn. 1; Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 521.

  29. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 524.

  30. Ibid., p. 526.

  31. Eisenhower to Churchill, April 5, 1944, EP, No. 1630.

  32. Churchill to Eisenhower, April 29, 1944, and Eisenhower to Churchill, May 2, 1944, EP, No. 1662.

  33. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 528–30.

  34. Eisenhower to Marshall, April 29, 1944, EP, No. 1658.

  35. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 531–33.

  36. Churchill, Closing the Ring, pp. 529–30.

  37. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 132; Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 224–30; Ellis, Victory in the West, p. 96.

  38. Craven and Cate, Argument to VE Day, p. 73.

  39. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 132.

  40. Harrison, Cross-Channel Attack, pp. 224, 230.

 
; CHAPTER 4

  1. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 140.

  2. Feis, Churchill-Roosevelt-Stalin, p. 318.

  3. U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. III, pp. 641–42.

  4. Eisenhower to CCS, January 4, 1944, EP, No. 1489, fn. 1.

  5. Eisenhower to Marshall for CCS, January 19, 1944, EP, No. 1489.

  6. McCloy to Eisenhower, January 25, 1944, EP, No. 1489, fn. 2.

  7. Roosevelt to Eisenhower, March 15, 1944, in U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. III, pp. 675–76.

  8. De Gaulle, Unity, pp. 240–41.

  9. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 145–46.

  10. Memorandum for diary, March 22, 1944, EP, No. 1601.

  11. Pogue, Supreme Command, pp. 146–47.

  12. Eisenhower to Brooke, April 9, 1944, EP, No. 1636; Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 163.

  13. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 147.

  14. Eisenhower to CCS, May 11, 1944, EP, No. 1681.

  15. Summarized in Marshall to Eisenhower, May 13, 1944, EP, No. 1691, fn. 1.

  16. Eisenhower to Marshall, May 16, 1944, EP, No. 1691.

  17. Roosevelt to Marshall, June 2, 1944, FDR Library, Hyde Park.

  18. Memorandum for diary, May 23, 1944, EP, No. 1708.

  19. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 147.

  20. The Americans did not know the Prime Minister was going to act; see Hull to Chapin, June 2, 1944, U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. III, p. 698.

  21. Churchill, Closing the Ring, pp. 629–30; De Gaulle, Unity, p. 253.

  22. Eisenhower Office Diary, June 4, 1944.

  23. De Gaulle, Unity, pp. 255–56, Funk, De Gaulle, pp. 257–59.

  24. U. S. Dept. of State, Foreign Relations, 1944, Vol. III, p. 701.

  25. Eisenhower to CCS, June 4, 1944, EP, No. 1733; memorandum for diary, June 3, 1944, EP, No. 1732.

  26. Pogue, Supreme Command, p. 149.

  27. Interview with Eisenhower, October 21, 1967.

  28. De Gaulle, Unity, p. 256.

  29. This account is based on interviews with Eisenhower, on At Ease, pp. 267–68, on Crusade in Europe, p. 431, and on an Eisenhower memorandum to Smith, May 20, 1944, EP, No. 1696.

  30. Eisenhower to Marshall, February 15, 1944, EP, No. 1550.