Fredendall's rise to military command in World War II was facilitated by
General George Marshall, the
U.S. Army Chief of Staff; and
Lieutenant General Lesley J. McNair, the commander of
Army Ground Forces, a friend and colleague. McNair had included Fredendall on a list of the top three generals he believed capable of commanding all U.S. Army forces being sent to
Britain. Marshall, in turn, had recommended the swaggering Fredendall to Lieutenant General
Dwight D. Eisenhower for a major command in the
Allied invasion of North Africa, codenamed
Operation Torch. General Marshall was especially fond of the youthful-looking, cocky Fredendall, describing him as "one of the best" and remarking in a staff meeting when his name was mentioned, "I like that man; you can see determination all over his face." Fredendall himself was convinced that neither Eisenhower nor his deputy, Major General
Mark W. Clark, wanted him in Africa since he was above both in pre-war rank. However, with such glowing testimonials from senior commanders, Eisenhower chose Fredendall to command the 39,000-man Central Task Force (the largest of three) in Operation Torch. Eisenhower cabled Marshall on November 12, 1942, four days after the invasion, "I bless the day you urged Fredendall upon me and cheerfully acknowledge that my earlier doubts of him were completely unfounded." Eisenhower, in notes dictated to
Harry C. Butcher on December 12, 1942, said, "…
Patton I think comes closest to meeting every requirement made on a commander. Just after him I would, at present, rate Fredendall, although I do not believe the latter has the imagination in foreseeing and preparing for possible jobs of the future that Patton possesses." Eisenhower later came to regret both this assessment and his selection of Fredendall for the command. Fredendall was assigned to command the
U.S. II Corps in its
advance into Tunisia against
German forces. (He thus became the second-oldest of the 34 generals to serve as a U.S. Army corps commander in World War II, after
Innis P. Swift, commander of the
I Corps in the
Pacific.) II Corps served under the
British First Army, whose commander,
Lieutenant General Kenneth Anderson, considered Fredendall incompetent well before the loss at Kasserine. Fredendall was given to speaking and issuing orders using his own slang, such as calling
infantry units "walking boys" and
artillery "popguns." Instead of using the standard military map grid-based location designators, he made up confusing codes such as "the place that begins with C." This practice was unheard-of for a general and distinguished graduate of the Command and General Staff School, who had been taught to always use standardized language and procedures to ensure clarity when transmitting orders under the stress of combat. Fredendall's informality often led to confusion among his subordinates, and precious time was lost attempting to discern his meaning. During the advance into Tunisia, Fredendall used an
engineer company of the
19th Engineer Regiment to build a large, dug-in
corps headquarters
bunker behind the front in a place called Speedy Valley (nine miles southeast of
Tébessa). Blasted and drilled out of solid rock, the bunker (actually two U-shaped complexes running into the hillside) took three weeks to construct. An anti-aircraft battalion was emplaced to protect the headquarters. Fredendall also ordered a bulletproof
Cadillac similar to Eisenhower's, and regularly phoned Oran to find out why it was not being delivered faster. Then-
Brigadier General Omar Bradley called the headquarters "an embarrassment to every American soldier," and General Eisenhower, the
Supreme Allied Commander in North Africa, after viewing the elaborate structure, reminded his senior commanders that even generals must assume personal risk in combat. Fredendall rarely visited the front lines, and had a habit of disregarding advice from commanders who had been farther forward and had actually reconnoitered the terrain. He split up units and scattered them widely, and at critical defense points had positioned U.S. forces (against advice) too far apart for mutual support or effective employment of
artillery, the strongest American arm. During the
Battle of Kasserine Pass, Eisenhower sent Major General
Ernest N. Harmon to report on the fighting, to assist Fredendall and the other Allied commanders, and to determine whether Fredendall or his
1st Armored Division commander, Major General
Orlando Ward, should be replaced. Harmon noted that Fredendall and his superior, Anderson, rarely saw each other, and failed to properly coordinate and integrate forces under their command. Fredendall was barely on speaking terms with Ward, whom he had deliberately left out of operational meetings after Ward had repeatedly protested the separation of his command into weaker 'penny packet' forces distributed across various sectors of the front. Allied forces were bereft of
air support during critical attacks, and were frequently positioned by the senior command in positions where they could not support each other. Subordinates later recalled their utter confusion at being handed conflicting orders, not knowing which general to obey—Anderson or Fredendall. While interviewing field commanders, Harmon heard much criticism over what many Allied officers viewed as a
cowardly, confused, and out-of-touch command. Noting that Fredendall seemed out of touch (and at one point, intoxicated), he requested and received permission to go to the front and intervene where necessary to shore up Allied defenses. On March 5, 1943, after the American
rout at Kasserine Pass, Eisenhower visited II Corps headquarters and conferred with Brigadier General Bradley. Eisenhower asked "What do you think of the command here?" Bradley's response was "It's pretty bad. I've talked to all the
division commanders. To a man they've lost confidence in Fredendall as the corps commander." British
General Sir Harold Alexander, the
18th Army Group commander, informed Eisenhower that he would welcome a replacement for Fredendall. Eisenhower offered the II Corps command to Harmon, who declined on the grounds that it would be unethical to appear to personally benefit from his negative assessment of Fredendall. Eisenhower then decided on
Major General George S. Patton as Fredendall's replacement. On March 5, 1943, Eisenhower personally flew to
Tebessa to inform Fredendall of his decision to replace him, which he couched in terms of a routine reassignment. Eisenhower arranged the replacement so that Fredendall's reputation was not formally brought into disrepute, an action some believe he soon came to regret. On March 6, 1943, Patton replaced Fredendall. When Patton arrived at II Corps headquarters, Fredendall was at breakfast. Patton had disliked Fredendall in 1941 when they were both division commanders at
Fort Benning,
Georgia. After a brief conference, Patton formally relieved him, saying II Corps "was primarily a tank show and I know more about tanks." Patton noted in his diary that Fredendall was "Very nice, conducted himself well – very well." In a letter to his wife Beatrice that day, Patton even wrote that "Fredendall is a great sport, and I feel sure, is a victim largely due to circumstances beyond his control." However, only a week later, after an initial inspection of his new command, Patton had completely changed his mind: "I cannot see what Fredendall did to justify his existence." Fredendall was the first of seven American corps commanders in World War II to be "relieved of command", most for medical reasons. In his after-action report for the Kasserine battles, the
2nd Armored Division commander, Major General
Ernest N. Harmon, called Fredendall both a moral and physical coward and later said he was "a son of a bitch."
Reassignment and stateside duty At Eisenhower's recommendation, Fredendall returned to the United States. Eisenhower's aide made a report on Fredendall to
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in which he communicated, without elaboration, Eisenhower's view that Fredendall should be reassigned to a training command. As a result, Fredendall spent the rest of the war in command of the Second Army which was responsible for training in the eastern United States. Because he had not been formally reprimanded by Eisenhower, he was eligible for appointment to lieutenant general and three-star assignment, which he duly received, along with a hero's welcome on his return to the United States. and at first even granted interviews to members of the press. However, after a sarcastic comment on his generalship by a
Time magazine reporter, Fredendall changed his mind, and largely blocked further press coverage of his command. The widespread custom of
theater commanders to transfer senior commanders who had failed in battlefield assignments to stateside training commands did not in any way improve the reputation or
morale of the latter, who were now saddled with the difficult job of convincing a disgraced commander to take the lead in advocating radical improvements in existing army training programs—programs which, like Fredendall himself, had contributed to the embarrassing U.S. Army reverses in
North Africa. Fredendall served through the end of the war in 1945, and retired on March 31, 1946. ==Death==