Salerno D-Day Plan by the US War Dept Historical Division.
Operation Avalanche was the main landing on the Italian mainland on the 9th of September 1943. Lt. General Richard McCreery’s British Tenth Corps, and General Ernest Dawley’s U.S. VI Corps, both under Lt. General Mark Clark’s American Fifth Army at SALERNO, comprised an initial four divisions which landed and pressed inland against stiff opposition from Maj. General Rudolf Sieckenius’ 16th Panzer Division (PzD).
Salerno beachhead 9 Sep 1943 looking north. The pieces of paper tell players where their units are.
Meanwhile, German reserves were being hurriedly thrown towards the front – the Hermann Göring Division, 15th Panzergrenadier Division (PzGrD), and the 29th Panzergrenadier Division from LXXVI Panzer Corps. Units arrived piecemeal with additional elements from 3rd Panzergrenadier Division.
Salerno, 56 ID, 167 Bde (L) holds 64 PzGr Regt (R) from 16 PzGrD,
By the 12th of September, the Allies were in a defensive posture, needing infantry and supplies to push north as was planned. On the 13th the counterattack began. The American shortage of infantry was partially addressed by parachuting 504th and 505th Parachute Infantry Regiments (PIR) into the southern part of the beachhead on the nights of the 14th and 15th. The British landed elements of the 7th Armoured Division (AD) and 23rd Armoured Brigade (ABde) further north.
HMS Warspite hit by an Me109 pretending to be a Do 217 K-2.
Naval gunfire and air support proved vital for breaking up German attacks. HMS Warspite, providing ship to shore bombardment on its final operation, was crippled and towed back to the UK after an attack by Do 217 K-2 bombers launching Fritz X glide bombs. By the 17th, General von Vietinghoff had ordered the German forces to break off the counterattack. An operation that had been considered to be very high risk by the Allied planners had succeeded by a narrow margin and laid the foundation for the clearing of Italy.
16 PzD Recce discovers that there is no bridge at ALBENELLA.
We had previously wargamed the 36th (Texas) Infantry Division (ID) landing at PAESTUM in a regimental level game put on by Richard Lindlay using Blitzkrieg Commander, but had not attempted anything at this level of resolution. Fortunately this game split nicely down into a corps of two divisions for each of four players, Playing out over 90 minutes with the usual pre-and-post 30 minutes consuming post-Christmas fayre and discussing the likelihood of Russia collapsing in 2026.¹
16 PzD is halted by the impassable terrain and a firm American defence.
The game followed the historical outcome pretty closely, although with Kamfgruppe Haas almost reaching SALERNO and BR 56th ID pushing further out of the bridgehead than historically was achieved. The game was a little slow to start as players re-aquainted themselves with the turn sequence and combat table. I was forgiving when Command and Log/Med units found themselves out of position, reasoning that the staffs of commanders knew their own business and didn’t need to be told to stay in touch with subordinate units.
The pace speeded up as the game moved on with Phil doing no more than his usual amount of grumbling at the outrageous swings of misfortune inflicted upon him by rubbish dice. Elsewhere, Steve accepted the historical situation that 16 PzD found itself in when, at the confluence of the rivers SELE and CALORE, it found itself unable to cross the steep banks on both sides of the river.
29 PzGrD in Sicily. They are mostly in cotton summer desert uniforms with a mix of grey and sand helmets.
American artillery ranged along the southern side of the fork wrought massive damage. Phil promptly cried that the Germans had been “set up!” It was a fair cop, but blame Italian geography and German lack of recce rather than me! In summary, the game provided an engaging evening for five of us and I have a much better appreciation of the battle with the strategic and political situation that surrounded the decision to land there. Additional targets were the port of TARANTO and airfields at TUSCIANO, on the SALERNO plain, and at FOGGIA on the northeast side of the country.
Post Husky invasion Plans.
Footnotes
- Even if they don’t, they have already lost the war that they started.
Not Quite Mechanised 