"In many ways, Operation Husky was a dress rehearsal for Overlord, the Normandy invasion that would follow a year later. In fact, in terms of numbers of men, ships, and size of the invasion area, Husky was bigger than Overlord, and it brought General George S. Patton into the public eye. A demanding perfectionist, Patton wanted things done his way and could not stand it when he saw something as important as an officer fail to carry out an order or something as trivial as seeing one of his soldiers without a tie or a helmet. Patton's antagonistic relationship with British General Bernard Montgomery, with whose British Eighth Army he shared the responsibility of seizing Sicily, is well documented, and his arguments with his superior, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, are legendary. The planning was complex and the fighting was fierce, across mountainous terrain. When the Allies were unable to stop tens of thousands of Germans and Italians from escaping from the island to the Italian mainland, Patton was furious at everyone but himself. In the unfolding of Operation Husky, Patton and the Battle for Sicily will take many well-known but disparate aspects of Patton's character and abilities and frame them in a new and revealing light"-- Provided by publisher.
Operation Husky, the combined American and British air and sea invasion of Sicily in July 1943, was one of World War II’s most critical campaigns with General George S. Patton Jr., inarguably America’s most dynamic, courageous, and controversial commander of World War II, at the center. In this new work, author Flint Whitlock covers the history of Operation Husky as it unfolded, with much of the Allied leadership facing internal conflict.
The largest amphibious assault to date came at a crucial moment, and both the planning and execution presented many conflicts for the Allies. Despite the success of Operation Torch in North Africa, the U.S. was still considered not fully tested or trusted by their British partners, and Stalin was clamoring for the Allies to open a second front to take the pressure off his Soviet Union.
Patton's dreams of martial glory and his all-consuming desire to best his chief Allied rival, General Bernard Montgomery, head of the British Eighth Army, to the ultimate prize—the port of Messina—often clouded his judgment. His primary motivation, however, was to prove to “Monty” and other dismissive British generals that the American soldier was as good, if not better, than his British counterpart.
Using Patton’s personal letters and diaries, Whitlock reveals the scathing opinions he held of Montgomery and almost everyone else in the Allied hierarchy (Eisenhower, Marshall, Clark, Bradley, and Alexander, among others)—even Adm. H. Kent Hewitt, USN, whose Eighth Fleet carried Patton’s troops to the beaches and supported them once on shore. In fact, it was the guns from Hewitt’s warships that halted the fierce German and Italian attacks that nearly threw the Americans back into the sea.
From Tunisia to the landing beaches on the south coast of Sicily to the final fight for Messina, this book chronicles how Husky would prove pivotal for both sides. The operation was criticized by some historians as a wasteful effort by the Allies that squandered valuable troops and resources while allowing many of the Italian and German troops to escape in the battle’s final days—an “Axis Dunkirk.” Here, Whitlock makes the case that Husky caused the downfall of Benito Mussolini and the neutralization of fascist Italy, and opened the second front to help Stalin. Moreover, the fight for Sicily proved the worth of American soldiers and seamen—as well as combined Army-Navy planning and logistics capabilities. Ultimately, lessons learned from Husky would be integrated into the Operation Overlord plan launched against France’s Normandy coast the following year.
In many ways, Operation Husky was a dress rehearsal for Overlord, the Normandy invasion that would follow a year later. In fact, in terms of numbers of men, ships, and size of the invasion area, Husky was bigger than Overlord, and it brought General George S. Patton into the public eye.
A demanding perfectionist, Patton wanted things done his way and could not stand it when he saw something as important as an officer fail to carry out an order or something as trivial as seeing one of his soldiers without a tie or a helmet. He argued with U.S. Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, the commander of the Western Naval Task Force, about how to conduct the pre-invasion naval bombardment, and felt Hewitt was full of shortcomings. This revealed partly Patton’s lack of interest in logistics, and partly of the fact that he behaved as if the U.S. Navy were the enemy, rather than the Germans. Patton’s antagonistic relationship with British General Bernard Montgomery, with whose British Eighth Army he shared the responsibility of seizing Sicily, is also well documented, and his arguments with his superior, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, are legendary. The planning was complex and the fighting was fierce, across mountainous terrain. When the Allies were unable to stop tens of thousands of Germans and Italians from escaping from the island to the Italian mainland, Patton was furious at everyone but himself. Sicily itself would prove fateful for both sides. Its fall led to the ouster of Benito Mussolini, the Italian dictator. This, in turn, led to Italy declaring its neutrality and ending its association with Germany as a fighting partner. It also required Hitler to station nearly a million troops in Italy instead of sending them to other fronts where they could have been of decisive use. In the unfolding of Operation Husky,
Patton in Sicily will take many well-known but disparate aspects of Patton’s abilities and character and frame them in a new and revealing light.
