PC/WI: Far more Landing Ship Tanks instead of Landing Craft at Normandy?

WILDGEESE

Gone Fishin'
Reading about the Landing Ship Tanks it stated that there was never enough of them in the theatres that they fought in.

What if they somehow they managed double or even treble production and used them at Normandy instead of the Higgins boats Landing craft?

What I'm thinking of is using them at high tide and landing armoured vehicles tanks etc on the beach thus avoiding the need to use DD tanks even if many were lost to German artillery.

Would this work?

Would it avoid the bloodbath at Omaha beach?

Regards filers.
 
The mines on the obstacles were capable of wrecking the LST. Some oft the obstacles were able to hole a LST or damage the ramps. The preference is to land at high tide but the obstacles made it impractical in this case.

Most tank companies were landed on the beaches by LCT. Roughly one of four was a DD type.

The problem on O Beach was a across the board failure in fire support. Unlike the other beaches the defenders were undamaged and unsuppressed. The defense was able to bring full fire power on target for over a hour.
 
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Driftless

Donor
Wasn't part of the issue relative scarcity of yard space where the craft could be built? LST could built at second-tier sized yards, LCT's at even smaller facilities, and the Higgins LC's could be built in a furniture factory (in theory)
 
IIRC the Americans were able to complete 1,054 LST out of 1,155 ordered. Therefore trebling production of them is going to be difficult.
 
Reading about the Landing Ship Tanks it stated that there was never enough of them in the theatres that they fought in.

Also known as Large Slow Targets.

LSTs are not the solution you are looking for, as they are too big - capacity c 18 tanks, c5000t - and so you will suffer heavy losses if only a few are hit on the run in to the beach.

More suitable would be more LCTs - capacity c 5 tanks, c600t - which were used to carry the DD tanks before launching, and land non-DD tanks from the same units.

The Allies decided to land at low tide to make it easier for all landing craft to be refloated by the rising tide, so they could withdraw from the beach after landing their cargo.

The solution for Omaha is probably landing more armour. On the British beaches the assault waves included Sherman DD tanks, Sherman tanks landed directly by LCTs, howitzer armed tanks, flail tanks for clearing mines, AVREs (Churchill tanks adapted for engineering uses), self-propelled tracked artillery, self-propelled AAA. On Omaha only the first 2 were used, plus some armoured bulldozers, due to a shortage of LCTs.

The biggest difference was in the casualties to engineers, and the speed of getting through the obstacles on the landward side of the beaches, where for example the British could use armoured vehicles to clear wire obstacles and mines, blow up bunkers from a distance, and lay bridges to get over seawalls/anti-tank ditches. On Omaha much of this had to be done by hand.
 
The solution for Omaha is probably landing more armour. On the British beaches the assault waves included Sherman DD tanks, Sherman tanks landed directly by LCTs, howitzer armed tanks, flail tanks for clearing mines, AVREs (Churchill tanks adapted for engineering uses), self-propelled tracked artillery, self-propelled AAA. On Omaha only the first 2 were used, plus some armoured bulldozers, due to a shortage of LCTs.
It would have helped if they hadn't launched to DD's so far from shore, so most would have landed instead of sunk.
 
The Allies decided to land at low tide to make it easier for all landing craft to be refloated by the rising tide, so they could withdraw from the beach after landing their cargo.

Landing at low tide also allowed the Allies to avoid the German beach obstacles, which were placed assuming the Allies would be landing at high tide, when the distance the troops would have to cover under fire would be minimised.
 
Yeah, LSTs are more for when you’ve secured the beachhead and cleared the obstacles. And once that’s done, they are very good at doing their job. For all the accolades directed towards the Mulberries, the LSTs put far more material, supplies, and men ashore and did so without being affected by the subsequent channel storms.
 
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