Title: | Battle of the Scheldt: The planning of this operation revisited through the eyes of the COPD |
Authors: | Stefan Lindelauf |
Material Type: | Thesis |
Publisher: | Brussels [Belgique] : Royal Military Academy, 2014 |
Article on page: | 69 |
Languages: | English |
Tags: | Working paper ; CSEM/HStO 128 ; World War, 1939-1945 |
Abstract: |
Until the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, NATO’s raison d’être resided in deterring any aggression coming from the USSR and/or its satellite states of the Warsaw Pact. After the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1992, and certainly after 9/11, NATO was suddenly confronted with a new set of missions and a far more complex operational environment. Planning tools such as NATO’s Guidelines for Operational Planning (GOP) needed to be revised, and updated based on the recently acquired experiences. The Comprehensive Operations Planning Directive V2.0 (COPD) of October 2013 is the most recent answer of NATO with regards to Operational Art. The purpose of this document is to “outline the military procedures and responsibilities governing the preparation, approval, assessment, implementation and review of operations plans to enable a common approach to operations planning.” 2 Furthermore, by embracing the concept of Comprehensive Approach, NATO admits that its military organization is no longer capable of finding solutions to conflicts on its own. In order to achieve the goals set out by the political leadership a more holistic solution must be sought and this in close collaboration with non-military actors. This type of collaboration was non-existent in 1944, especially at the operational level of war. On June 6, 1944 the Allied Forces landed on the shores of Normandy to liberate Europe from Nazi-Germany and hereby executed the largest combined-joint operation the world had ever seen. As the Allies advanced very fast across France and Belgium, it soon became imperative to General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, to acquire and secure a sheltered deep water port in order to sustain all future operations in Western Europe. In September 1944, Field Marshall Montgomery’s and General Bradley’s Army Groups were severely hampered by the growing incapacity to sustain their operations from the shores of Normandy. 3 Antwerp and its port were liberated on September 4, 19444. The port and its facilities were intact but of no use as long as the Scheldt estuary was still under German control. The 1st Canadian Army, which was part of Montgomery’s 21st Army Group, received its new directive on September 27 and had to clear the Scheldt estuary. The Battle of the Scheldt would eventually last for more than two months and on November 28, 1944 the first of many liberty ships, Fort Cataraqui, docked bringing food and supplies to the starving Dutch population.5 The aim of this study is not to criticize the actual plan or its execution. My intent is to analyse whether the Operational Framework developed using the COPD on a historical operation, leads to different conclusions. Thus my research question is: “To what extent will the planning of this operation using modern tools provide us an Operational Framework that is fundamentally irreconcilable with the original plan?” And does NATO’s Comprehensive Approach have an impact on the planning at the operational level of the Battle of the Scheldt? Although the COPD puts a significant emphasis on collaborative planning at the strategic, the operational, and the tactical levels, this study will focus on the operational level and more specifically on Phase 3a of the operational planning process: Mission Analysis. The goal is to produce an Operational Framework, and subsequently compare it with the actual Allied plan. Chapter 1 frames the study with regards to the doctrine used, the players, and the assumptions used to start the planning process. Chapters 2 – Review the Situation, 3 – Analyse the Mission, and 4 – Develop the Operational Framework will represent the main body of this study. In chapter 5, I will describe how the Battle of the Scheldt was planned by the Allies and compare this with the partial conclusions obtained previously by going through the COPD process in chapters 2, 3, and 4. By doing so, I intent to limit the influence of what actually occurred. This study will also propose an alternative Allied course of action for the entire operation (Ann C). |
Online | http://units.mil.intra/sites/UBDef-BUDef/_layouts/DocIdRedir.aspx?ID=UBDEF-32-9413 |
Copies (1)
Barcode | Call number | Media type | Location | Section | Status |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
118576R | RMA Mast CSEM/HStO 128 DIV/19 | Thesis | Royal Military Academy | BIBL ERM Cave | Not for loan |