Thanks Carl,
It is my understanding that Torch was not supposed to involve a lot fighting. Not saying it was regarded as a peace-time dress rehearsal.
It was hoped the French leaders would agree to a cease fire before the Allies landed, or shortly after. That could not be counted on the & planned for full combat operations were included. Some Allied leaders were overly optimistic about the French attitude & professed surprise when they did resist. The battle lasted three days, killed over 300 Allied soldiers and wounded approximately 1000 more. Theres a tendency for many hack histories to look into Op TORCH no further than the press releases or a few other overused items. Tactically and operationally the plans for a full on amphibious invasion were executed. The state of the art, for Nov 1942, equipment and doctrine were used. Lack of experience & over optimism caused a number of lower and intermediate level commanders to make mistakes. Others did much better.
Was Torch then intensively studied for lessons learned for both Pacific and Husky/Overlord? Salerno was in-between together with Anzio.
Yes. The same naval staffs of the amphib fleet planned TORCH and the subsequent operations. On the navy side there was a fair amount continuity of command. Individuals rotating in & out of staff or command positions occurred, but there was a accumulation of experience. Ramsey ensured that experience was transferred from the Mediteranean to the UK for the last six months of preparing for NEPTUNE/OVERLORD. On the Army side there was somewhat less continuity. Anderson's 1st Army HQ was returned to the UK & only a few staff participated in subsequent ops in the Med. 8th Army HQ accumulated some experience in Ops HUSKY & BAYTOWN & Monty made sure some staff with this experience went to the UK at the end of 1943. The Brit infantry divisions that remained in the Med accumulated experience in Ops HUSKY, BAYTOWN, AVALANCHE, & SHINGLE, as did the US Army divisions, corps, and army staff. Note that Mark Clark was deeply involved in planning Op TORCH, HUSKY, AVALANCHE, BRIMSTONE, FIREBRAND first as Eisenhowers deputy, then as the 5th Army commander. A number of key staff officers were shifted between Ikes HQ, 7th Army, and then 5th Army specifically for planning the amphib portion of the operations. None of this was perfect but it worked.
A break did occur in the US Army between the Med and preparation for Op NEPTUNE. As I pointed out earlier few experienced staff or commanders were transferred to Britain. Clark with the largest experience remained in the Med. Bradly with little was placed in charge of US 1st Army, while Patton with more experience was given a follow up role.
There were reports and analysis passed back and forth between the PTO & ETO/MTO. HQ AGF was responsible for that on the Army side & the information was filtered in many cases by school staffs with no direct experience. PTO experience was narrower as the battles or campaigns were smaller through 1942-44. In the MTO/ETO staffs were planing army or army group size ops and were less able to focus on the assault phase. In that there was a tendency to pay less attention to PTO lessons as those were limited to brief beach head or lodgment battles.
How much was MacArthur taken into confidence?
I heard one Army officer describe the reports coming from Macs command as "garbage". I've not read them, so I don't know. That individual had studied Army ops in the PTO as part of his Command and Staff schooling so maybe his opinion meant something. Eichelberger & Kruger planned and executed a lot of amphib ops. But, their reports were filtered through Macs HQ staff. Also their larger operations were in the PI, after the amphib ops in Europe were wound down.
If Ramsey was the recognized expert after Overlord, he could just be allocated to Pacific (unified command to use a newer term).
Technically he was. IIRC he went to India to supervise Commonwealth ops relating to Sumatra, Mtaylasia, the Adaman Islands. ect... Beyond that Turner & his peers had direct experience in the conditions of the PTO. Which Ramsey did not.
True that Pacific command with its split into USN and US Army (who seemed to be very occupied fighting each other). Could Ramsey go to MacArthur (horror!).
The only significant split in the PTO was between the South Pacific and Central Pacific regions. Mac and Nimitz. The Army/Navy disagreements beyond that were in detail. As anticipated in War Plan ORANGE the bulk of the ground forces for the Pacific War were to be Army, and the Army ground forces used would be subordinate to the Navy in those operations. Little changed in the Central Pacific there. The number of Marines deployed was far more than anticipated. Perhaps three times the proportion originally envisioned. That had to do with manpower allocations reaching as far back as the 1940 mobilization, the Europe first policy, and reductions in the planned size of Army ground forces. King formed additional Marine units out of the overall manpower allocation for the Navy, to make up for Army units that were either diverted to Macs S PAC command, or that were never mobilized.
This brings up one item of lessons learned imperfectly. 1943-45 the Navy strengthens the Marine units on a ongoing basis. Redoing the TE/TO frequently to increase firepower or combat power. AGF sent their standard organization infantry divisions to the PTO with relatively few modifications. Additional specialized support units were included for the corps or army level support pool, but this was not the same as the Navy approach with the Marine divisions. This may be because the Marines doctrine was driven from the bottom up,rather than from the top down. This included a very large rotation of veteran officers & NCOs from the Pacific back to training units in the US. This went all the way to the top with the commandant being the veteran division commander on Guadalcanal. It was not until 1945 the Army actively modified its infantry divisions for battle in Japan.
I'd note that much of the experience in the PTO of 1943 & early1944 would not have applied to the ETO. Most of the amphib ops we think of, like Op FORAGER, occured to late or after the same in the ETO wound down. From the perspective of November 1943 the battle on Betio island seemed a anomaly, so its not surprising its lessons did not transfer to the ETO. The main lesson, that infantry losses would be larger than anticipated was not grasped. The heavy losses of the infantry regiments in the PTO 1942-43 were not understood, often dismissed as due to local conditions, or as incompetent command. That one bit the US Army in the ass after larger ops in the MTO or PTO ramped up in late 1943.