If Normandy Failed

[letterpage]

If the invasion of Normandy in ww2 failed was there a plan B

[vulcan]

Never heard of a plan B but probably America would have dropped the atomic bomb on Germany.

[vehelpfulguy]

I doubt America would have ever dropped a bomb anywhere in Europe.

D Day was a "must not fail" operation, but of course we could have been forced back into the sea and it could have failed.

They would have tried again with a similar operation, but it may well have been 2 or 3 years later.

They may well have landed somewhere else other than Normandy.

While the beaches were good for landing on, the land just behind the coast was awful (small fields with high hedges) and it took them weeks to fight their way through this and many allies were killed.

[vehelpfulguy]

Did a search on Google on "what if D Day had failed" and found a few sites

Like this

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3732417.stm

[terambulan]

Another invasion as per Roman & Danes in the past.

[Paul22118]

I think it is worth appreciating that Operation Overlord was actually plan B. When the invasion, or the liberation of France as Churchill preferred to call it, was first mooted, the plan was drawn up by General Morgan. It is clear that an 'invasion' would have to take place eventually from our Country to somewhere on the European mainland. When Eisenhower, Montgomery and the supreme HQ staff reviewed the plan it was deemed to be too small in content and there was a possibility of it being unsuccessfull. They therefore bolstered almost every aspect of the basically sound plan by increasing numbers, vehicles, ships, aircraft and supplies. The Mulberry harbour was instigated and despite a short delay on June 5th success eventually was reached.

The question should therefore be what if plan B had failed. We threw just about everything into Overlord, which if unsuccessfull would then have become plan C probably some years later.

The atomic option cannot be ruled out. Many historians feel that if all else had faile Germany could have been adequately disabled by one or two well placed bombs. When faced with defeat, as we may have been, it would have been an option - the final one admittedly but when your back is against the wall we needed to survive.