24
ERWIN ROMMEL KNEW FROM THE START THAT HE WAS going to quarrel with Heinz Guderian.
General Guderian was exactly the kind of aristocratic Prussian officer Rommel hated. He had known him for some time. They had both, in their early days, commanded the Goslar Jaeger Battalion, and they had met again during the Polish campaign. When Rommel left Africa he had recommended Guderian to succeed him, knowing the battle was lost; the maneuver was a failure because at that time Guderian had been out of favor with Hitler and the recommendation was rejected out of hand.
The general was, Rommel felt, the kind of man who put a silk handkerchief on his knee to protect the crease in his trousers while he sat drinking in the Herrenklub. He was an officer because his father had been an officer and his grandfather had been rich. Rommel, the schoolteacher’s son who had risen from lieutenant colonel to field marshal in only four years, despised the military caste of which he had never been a member.
Now he stared across the table at the general, who was sipping brandy appropriated from the French Rothschilds. Guderian and his sidekick, General von Geyr, had come to Rommel’s headquarters at La Roche Guyon in northern France to tell him how to deploy his troops. Rommel’s reactions to such visits ranged from impatience to fury. In his view the General Staff were there to provide reliable intelligence and regular supplies, and he knew from his experience in Africa that they were incompetent at both tasks.
Guderian had a cropped, light-colored moustache, and the corners of his eyes were heavily wrinkled so that he always appeared to be grinning at you. He was tall and handsome, which did nothing to endear him to a short, ugly, balding man—as Rommel thought of himself. He seemed relaxed, and any German general who would relax at this stage of the war was surely a fool. The meal they had just finished—local veal and wine from farther south—was no excuse.
Rommel looked out of the window and watched the rain dripping from the lime trees into the courtyard while he waited for Guderian to begin the discussion. When he finally spoke it was clear the general had been thinking about the best way to make his point, and had decided to approach it sideways.
“In Turkey,” he began, “the British Ninth and Tenth armies, with the Turkish army, are grouping at the border with Greece. In Yugoslavia the partisans are also concentrating. The French in Algeria are preparing to invade the Riviera. The Russians appear to be mounting an amphibious invasion of Sweden. In Italy the Allies are ready to march on Rome. There are smaller signals—a general kidnapped in Crete, an intelligence officer murdered at Lyon, a radar post attacked at Rhodes, an aircraft sabotaged with abrasive grease and destroyed at Athens, a commando raid on Sagvaag, an explosion in the oxygen factory at Boulogne-sur-Seine, a train derailed in the Ardennes, a petrol dump fired at Boussens…I could go on. The picture is clear. In occupied territories there is ever-increasing sabotage and treachery; on our borders, we see preparations for invasion everywhere. None of us doubts that there will be a major allied offensive this summer, and we can be equally sure that all this skirmishing is intended to confuse us about where the attack will come.”
The general paused. The lecture, delivered in schoolmaster style, was irritating Rommel, and he took the opportunity to interrupt. “This is why we have a General Staff: to digest such information, evaluate enemy activity, and forecast his future moves.”
Guderian smiled indulgently. “We must also be aware of the limitations of such crystal-gazing. You have your ideas about where the attack will come, I’m sure. We all do. Our strategy must take into account the possibility that our guesses are wrong.”
Rommel now saw where the general’s roundabout argument was leading, and he suppressed the urge to shout his disagreement before the conclusion was stated.
“You have four armored divisions under your command,” Guderian continued. “The 2nd Panzers at Amiens, the 116th at Rouen, the 21st at Caen, and the 2nd SS at Toulouse. General von Geyr has already proposed to you that these should be grouped well back from the coast, all together, ready for fast retaliation at any point. Indeed, this stratagem is a principle of OKW policy. Nevertheless, you have not only resisted von Geyr’s suggestion, but have in fact moved the 21st right up to the Atlantic coast—”
“And the other three must be moved to the coast as soon as possible,” Rommel burst out. “When will you people learn? The Allies control the air. Once the invasion is launched there will be no further major movements of armor. Mobile operations are no longer possible. If your precious panzers are in Paris when the Allies land on the coast, they will stay in Paris—pinned down by the RAF—until the Allies march along the Boulevard St-Michel. I know—they’ve done it to me. Twice.” He paused to draw breath. “To group our armor as a mobile reserve is to make it useless. There will be no counterattack. The invasion must be met on the beaches, when it is most vulnerable, and pushed back into the sea.”
The flush receded from his face as he began to expound his own defensive strategy. “I have created underwater obstacles, strengthened the Atlantic Wall, laid minefields and driven stakes into every meadow that might be used to land aircraft behind our lines. All my troops are engaged in digging defenses whenever they’re not actually training.
“My armored divisions must be moved to the coast. The OKW reserve should be redeployed in France. The Ninth and Tenth SS divisions have to be brought back from the Eastern Front. Our whole strategy must be to prevent the Allies from securing a beachhead, because once they achieve that, the battle is lost…perhaps even the war.”
Guderian leaned forward, his eyes narrowing in that infuriating half-grin. “You want us to defend the European coastline from Troms? in Norway all around the Iberian peninsula to Rome. Where shall we get the armies from?”
“That question should have been asked in 1938,” Rommel muttered.
There was an embarrassed silence after this remark, which was all the more shocking coming from the notoriously apolitical Rommel.
Von Geyr broke the tension. “Where do you believe the attack will come from, Field Marshal?”
Rommel had been waiting for this. “Until recently I was convinced of the Pas de Calais theory. However, last time I was with the Fuehrer I was impressed by his arguments in favor of Normandy. I am also impressed by his instinct, and even more by its record of accuracy. Therefore I believe our panzers should be deployed primarily along the Normandy coast, with perhaps one division at the mouth of the Somme—this last supported by forces outside my group.”
Guderian shook his head, “No, no, no. It’s far too risky.”
“I’m prepared to take this argument to Hitler,” Rommel threatened.
“Then that’s what you will have to do,” Guderian said, “because I won’t go along with your plan unless—”
“Well?” Rommel was surprised that the general’s position might be qualified.
Guderian shifted in his seat, reluctant to give a concession to so stubborn an antagonist as Rommel. “You may know that the Fuehrer is waiting for a report from an unusually effective agent in England.”
“I remember.” Rommel nodded. “Die Nadel.”
“Yes. He has been assigned to assess the strength of the First United States Army Group under Patton’s command in the eastern part of England. If he finds—as I am certain he will—that that army is large, strong, and ready to move, then I shall continue to oppose you. However, if he finds that FUSAG is somehow a bluff—a small army masquerading as an invasion force—then I shall concede that you are right, and you shall have your panzers. Will you accept that compromise?”
Rommel nodded his large head in assent. “It depends on Die Nadel, then.”