[Juha]

Tony
“The RAF lost 47,000 aircrew, some say 55,000. Compare that with the 30,000 killed in the U-Bootwaffe.”

What the h… is the meaning of that comparasion? One can compare the losses of RAF vs LW or vs. VVS or losses of U-Bootwaffe vs Submarine servises of RN, USN or Soviet Navy but are you next time comparing losses of LW to the losses of Submarine service of RN?

“And there was no significant CAS on D-Day or for days afterwards.”

Sometimes I seem to be able to agree with you by some extent!

IIRC 12. SSPzD sent a recon detachment to the coast while waiting Hitler’s permit to attack the Allied beachhead. These armoured cars and armoured half-tracks arrived without too much inference by Allied a/c and were able to give useful info to div HQ.

And when the CO of 21. PzD finally arrived and started act correctly, the div was able to disengage from the eastern bank of was that Orne, move back to Caen, drive through that town and attack against advancing Commonwealth forces without too much inference by Allied a/c. IIRC it lost some 8 tanks in Caen or just outside it, but the attack of the tank-heavy Kampfgruppe was stopped by Commonwealth anti-tank screen with a loss of IIRC some 30 PzIVs. The infantry-heavy KG got to beach between two Commonwealth invasion beaches but was withdrawn because a supply drop to the British Airborne Div was interpret as an airlanding against their LoC. Now IMHO is that the KG would not change the course of battle because at least naval artillery would have made their life miserable near beaches but anyway they would have been a potential threat to the troops on nearby beaches.

So it doesn’t seem that the CAS on June 6th, at least outside landing beaches, was very effective. And it’s ironic that the clearly most effective CAS a/c was the transport planes, probably Dakotas, on that day.


“There was no CAS available to help the Suffolks take the Hillman concrete strongpoint that held up 3 Div throughout D-Day. Therefore Caen was not occupied and no airfield like Carpiquet became available for 2TAF.”

IMHO you give too much importance to Hillman debacle. And Vengeances would not be able to help because to problem was lack of info. But you are right that the basic problem was the lack of RAF control team, what they were called, FAO?

Juha