The Pendulum of Battle, Operation Goodwood July 1944

The Pendulum of Battle, Operation Goodwood July 1944 by Christopher Dunphie, Pen and Sword Books, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, 2004, 202 pp.,$36.95 (hardback)

The 60th anniversary of the D-Day invasion of Normandy has triggered a large number of books dealing with that period, most of which contribute little or nothing to the knowledge of that campaign. Brigadier Dunphie's effort is different than most in several respects. First, it is one of few in-depth coverages of Operation Goodwood. It is not the most popular battle with the Americans, who did not participate, or the British, who did not win. The Germans, who won, have covered it in some detail. Hans von Luck provides a good view from the other side of the hill in his Panzer Commander. Von Luck is also an important contributor to Dunphie's explanation of what went wrong with one of the largest tank battles in North West Europe.

The Pendulum of Battle is not organized and structured as are most military history books, it reads more like a battlefield tour, and Annex C provides route directions for such a tour. In fact, the basis for this volume is a series of British Army Staff College Normandy battlefield tours from the end of World War II until 1979. Not only does this make for excellent coverage of small-unit actions, complete with maps and pictures of each of these actions, but many of the pictures are modern views of the same areas shown in the wartime views, making it easy to find the locations in the Normandy of today.

The commanders of the critical units, on both sides of the battle, were leaders of the original battlefield tours. Many of these commanders are included as sources by the author. Among these are Major General G.P.B. "Pip" Roberts, the 37-year-old commander of the 11th Armoured Division; Colonel H. von Luck, commander of the 125th Panzer Grenadier Regiment; Major Bill Close, commander of A Squadron, 3rd Royal Tanks; Captain RC. Walter of C Squadron, 2nd Fife and Forfar Yeomanry; and Lieutenant (later Brigadier) David Stileman, commander, G Company, 8th Rifle Brigade. This helps provide details of the small-unit tactical actions, which is seldom found in military histories.

Goodwood was a three-corps operation with the VIII British Corps' three armoured divisions conducting the main attack with its divisions in trail, while the II Canadian and I British Corps conducted attacks with five infantry divisions to protect the flanks of the primary thrust by VIII Corps. The initial mission of VIII Corps is best illustrated by an extract from the Second British Army's Plan for Goodwood, paragraph 5, "Initial Operations VIII Corps: The three armoured divisions will be required to dominate the area Borguebus-Vimont-Bretteville, and to fight and destroy the enemy, but armored cars should push for the south towards Falaise, and spread alarm and despondency, and discover 'the form.'" Unfortunately, even these limited and initial goals were not met.

After four days of intense combat, with the loss of more than 400 tanks, all that had been achieved was an advance of roughly eight miles from the Orne bridgehead to the Bourguebus Ridge. One small victory was the final capture of Caen, a D-Day objective, on 16 July. However, General (later Field Marshal) Montgomery indicated that he was pleased with the outcome of Goodwood since it had achieved its goal of drawing most of the German armor to the VIII Corps' front to facilitate Operation Cobra by the First U.S. Army.

Unfortunately, the author draws some odd conclusions while supporting Montgomery's view of the outcome, including the point that the tank losses were easily made up from the 500 spares already available in theater. While lend-lease Shermans were certainly available, it seems odd that more mention was not made of the tank crew casualties that the loss of over 400 tanks must have created. When 75 and 88mm solid-shot rounds killed a Sherman, they must certainly have had the effect of killing and wounding hundreds of crewmen. Little is said about the opportunities that the capture of Falaise might have afforded the allies by enabling the capture of significant German forces when the Third U.S. Army swept past that point later.

Goodwood then must stand as another of Montgomery's failures in northwest Europe. It should be ranked along with his failure to capture his D-Day objectives, open the port of Antwerp by early clearing of the Scheldt estuary in a timely manner, the failure of Market-Garden, his cautious handling of the north flank of the Ardennes, and his extremely cautious and overly expansive crossing of the Rhine.

Considering all the above, this is still an interesting book. The results of the largest British tank battle in Europe can be very instructive to armor leaders of today. What looks like good tank country can, in many cases, become good tank-killing country. Artillery, infantry, and tactical air generally worked well in Goodwood, when they were used. Unfortunately, these critically needed forces were consistently underemployed.

COPYRIGHT 2005 U.S. Army Armor Center
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