Patton had been a dissenter on that score, seeking, almost insisting on, being given his head, with no limits on what he could do except the fuel in his tanks and the food in the bellies of his men. Eisenhower had given him short shrift, drawing more than one look from the inner circle at his ‘out of character’ testiness.
“Your Army Group commanders will be holding separate sessions immediately after this briefing, and they will present your input to me tomorrow.”
There were some disappointed looks amongst the ensemble, but it made good sense to reduce the group size into manageable chunks, as well as limiting the discussion to those involved with each aspect. None the less, each of the seniors knew that they would keep an ear open for anything that might be useful to pass on to another.
Hood caught Ike’s eye, the slightest of signals confirming that the orderlies had luncheon ready.
“Gentlemen, I regret to say that the folders you possess may not leave this building and must be handed in at the document security station immediately you leave this room. Your copy will be returned to you for this afternoon’s briefings.”
He let the few murmurs of dissent pass.
“To give our Armies enough time to stockpile resources, to go over the attack plans and for Allied Second Army Group to become ‘fact’, I have set the initial diversionary attack’s time for 0300hrs on December 2nd. If the enemy responds as we anticipate, Operation Spectrum Blue, the initial main attack, will commence at 0800hrs on December 4th. We do not anticipate launching ‘Pantomime’ until early spring, probably part of Spectrum’s phase Indigo. Good luck to you all.”
The officers sprang to attention as Eisenhower turned and strode from the room, his exterior calmness beginning to crumble under the anxieties that ate at him, the responsibility weighing even more heavily than did his command of Overlord, some sixteen months previously.
Alone in his suite, it took three cigarettes and two coffees to restore any vestige of faith in himself and his ability to see the matter through to a successful end.
His mind tackled a niggling issue once more.
His men were tired, very tired, although replacements were arriving and some units were being rested in quieter areas.
The thought, as always, was balanced by the fact that the enemy had to be similarly tired and, by all intelligence reports, were not only greatly worn down numerically, but also hobbled by supply issues.
It was something that Von Vietinghoff had said that constantly troubled him.
Whilst the Generals present had all acknowledged the weariness of the Allied troops and balanced it against the state of their enemy, Vietinghoff’s response had started with the assertion that the Soviet soldier was the most resilient fighting man on the planet.
‘A sip of water and a bite of bread will keep him fighting all day, Herr General.’
Eisenhower shuddered involuntarily.
Not for the first time that week, he closed his eyes and prayed.
The Soviets, with their love of maskirovka, had been extremely impressed with the FUSAG operation during D-Day and subsequent weeks.
FUSAG, or First US Army Group, had been a phantom, a figment in the collective imaginations of the Overlord planners, and it had sold Hitler and his generals, hook, line, and sinker.
The German Army had continued to hold strong units in the Pas de Calais in response to the huge FUSAG strength waiting in England, an illusion perpetrated by double agents, inflatable tanks, false buildings and works, mock warships made of wood, and a complicated signals network serviced by a handful of men. The cream on the cake had been Patton, who led the false formation, although it must have grated on him to be deprived of his opportunity during the early days of Overlord.
It had worked once and, never being ones to set aside a good idea, SHAEF planners had decided to try it again, and so Allied Second Army Group was formed, although solely in the minds of men.
The wounded Montgomery was cited to command it, although the fact that the Field Marshall would never command men in the field again was known only to a handful in the highest echelons. His ‘double’ was already moving around the British countryside, trying hard to be noticed by someone with a link to Moscow.
The Soviets were no fools and the Allied planners intended to be careful to reduce the similarities to FUSAG as much as possible, even to the point of allocating real units, such as veteran units withdrawn for recuperation to volunteer units from across the world arriving in theatre to train and acclimatise; hence the designation ‘Allied’ rather than US or British.
In many ways, FUSAG started as an extra for which there were no great expectations. Events would later push it into a prime position in the new European War.
Chapter 108 – THE DISCOVERIES
Those that I fight, I do not hate; those that I guard, I do not love.
It had been an unauthorised flight, in as much as those in power at Mikoyan-Gurevich had not informed the People’s Ministry of the Aircraft Industry, the Council of People’s Commissars, Marshal Novikov of the Red Air Force, Malenkov of the GKO, who was the member with responsibility for aircraft production, or even Mikhail Gromov, Chief of the Flight Research Institute at Stakhanovo, whose facility was the location for the flight
The Mikoyan-9 was the Soviet Union’s first attempt at a home produced turbojet aircraft and its maiden flight was a disaster.
Konstantin Djorov, temporarily detached from his assignment as OC 2nd Guards Special Fighter Regiment, had gently eased the aircraft into the sky and the problems had started almost immediately.
He tried to gain height and, even though the vibrations were decidedly worrying, he could not help but be impressed with the rate of climb and obvious presence of unbridled power in the MIG. Passing four thousand metres and still rising strongly, the vibrations grew worse and the experienced pilot decided to ease back on the throttles.
Whatever it was that happened next was unclear but its results were impressive to the observers on the ground; less so for the occupant of the test aircraft.
Djorov later explained that it seemed that his wings started to disintegrate, immediately followed by the loss of his rear stabilisers.
He could not explain what happened after that.
All he knew was that, one moment he had been wrestling with a dying aircraft, the next he was aware of a silence that was, to say the least, weird, and he realised that he was floating gently in the freezing cold snowy sky.
When he was brought back to the test base, one of Mikoyan’s designers had asked him what he might suggest to help.
Djorov verbally exploded and got right in the face of the shrinking man, and at a range of about three centimetres let rip as only a man who has recently had a close acquaintance with impending death can do.
“You send me up in a fucking death trap and then ask me what I suggest? Fucking Idiot!”
Djorov stepped back, aware that it wasn’t necessarily just the young engineer’s fault.
He turned to escape the awkward moment, intent on cleaning up in the comfort of his billet.
Something caught his eye and he decided to make the most of the moment.
He pointed at the pair of aircraft sat outside the Mikoyan pilot’s rest facility.
Moving back in closer to the engineer, but this time with a quieter approach, Djorov hissed his considered response.