WI Dday goes better in first week

1) Had luck been with the Western alies could Cherbourg and Caen have been taken in first week?

2) If that happened how much difference to time of end of the war and facts on the ground when Churchill and Stalin carved up spheres of influence in the fall of 1944?

Derek Jackson said:

1) Had luck been with the Western alies could Cherbourg and Caen have been taken in first week?

Click to expand...

Caen, yes, Cherbourg no.

IMO D-Day went about as well as could be hoped. The Allies made some major mistakes: the scattering of the airborne forces, the failure to crater the beaches, the mishandling of the DD Shermans.

However, they had considerable luck as well: the success of the deception plan, the fortuitous landing at a weak point on UTAH, the weather timing (having bad weather they but not the Germans knew would break conveniently, so the Germans were off-guard and Rommel was on leave).

The Allies could have done somewhat better, but not enough to have a major effect on the course of the war.