Operation Tractable

Following a break-out by the First US Army and the Third US Army from the beachhead during the Battle of Normandy after Operation Cobra on 25 July 1944, Adolf Hitler ordered a counter-offensive against the US breakout, Operation Lüttich. Lieutenant General Omar Bradley, commander of the 12th Army Group, was notified of the counter-offensive by signals deciphered via Ultra radio intercepts and prepared to defeat the counter-offensive and to encircle as much of the German force as possible. Following the failure of Lüttich, the town of Falaise became an objective of the Commonwealth forces, to cut off virtually all of Army Group B (Generalfeldmarschall Günther von Kluge). General Harry Crerar, commanding the new First Canadian Army and Lieutenant-General Guy Simonds (II Canadian Corps), planned an Anglo-Canadian offensive, Operation Totalize. Totalize would rely on a night attack using the new Kangaroo armoured personnel carriers to achieve a breakthrough of German defences supported by US heavy bombers the next day. Despite gains on Verrières Ridge and near Cintheaux, the Canadian offensive stalled on 9 August, with powerful German counterattacks resulting in many casualties for the Canadian and Polish armoured and infantry divisions. By 10 August, Canadian troops had reached Hill 195, north of Falaise, but needed another set-piece attack to overcome the German defences. ==Prelude==

Tactics Operation Tractable incorporated lessons learned from Operation Totalize, notably the effectiveness of mechanized infantry units and tactical bombing raids by heavy bombers. Tractable was to be a daylight attack; an initial bombing raid was to weaken German defences, followed by an advance by the 4th Canadian (Armoured) Division on the western flank of Hill 195, while the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division attacked on the eastern flank with the 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade in support. Their advance would be protected by a large smokescreen by Canadian artillery. Once in Trun, joining with the Third US Army at Chambois could be quickly accomplished. The main defence of the road to Falaise was the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend, which included the remnants of two infantry divisions. German forces within the Falaise Pocket approached 350,000 men. Had surprise been achieved, the Canadians would likely have succeeded in a rapid break-through. On the night of 13/14 August, a Canadian officer lost his way while moving between divisional headquarters. He drove into German lines was killed and the Germans discovered a copy of Simonds' orders on his body. ==Battle==

Initial drive for Falaise Operation Tractable began at 12:00 on 14 August, when 800 Avro Lancaster and Handley Page Halifax heavy bombers of RAF Bomber Command struck German positions along the front. By the end of the first day, elements of the Canadian 3rd and 4th divisions had reached Point 159, directly north of Falaise, although they had been unable to break into the town. To bolster his offensive, Simonds ordered the Canadian 2nd Infantry Division to move toward the front, with the hope that this reinforcement would be sufficient to enable his divisions to capture the town. Although the first day's progress was slower than expected, Operation Tractable resumed on 15 August; both armoured divisions pushed southeast toward Falaise. The Canadian 2nd and 3rd infantry divisions—with the support of the Canadian 2nd Armoured Brigade—continued their drive south towards the town. On 16 August, the Canadian 2nd Infantry Division broke into Falaise, encountering minor opposition from units and scattered pockets of German infantry. Stanisław Maczek—the Polish divisional commander—split his forces into three battlegroups each of an armoured regiment and an infantry battalion. One of these struck southwest, cutting off Trun and establishing itself on the high ground dominating the town and the Dives river valley, allowing for a powerful assault by the Canadian 4th Armoured Division on Trun. The town was liberated on the morning of 18 August. As Canadian and Polish forces liberated Trun, Maczek's second armoured battlegroup manoeuvred southeast, capturing Champeaux and anchoring future attacks against Chambois across a front. With reinforcements quickly arriving from the 4th Canadian 4th Armoured Division, Maczek was in an ideal position to close the gap the following day. The presence of the Polish Armoured Division also alerted Generalfeldmarshall Walther Model of the need to keep the pocket open. By early afternoon, Battlegroup Stefanowicz had captured the hill, annihilating a German infantry company in the process. Polish casualties accounted for nearly 50 per cent of those sustained by the 1st Canadian Army. By late afternoon of 19 August, Canadian and Polish forces had linked with the US 80th US Division and 90th US Division already in the town. The Falaise Gap had been closed, trapping Model's forces. As the link occurred, the II SS Panzer Corps had begun its counterattack against Polish forces on Hill 262, to reopen the pocket. At the same time, the 16th Infantry Division and the 12th SS Panzer Division attacked American and Canadian forces from within the pocket, opening small channels through Allied positions. By mid-morning, 2,000 survivors of the German 2nd Parachute Division had managed to breach Canadian positions along the Dives River and at Point 117. Around noon, several units of the 10th SS Panzer Division Frundsberg, 12th SS Panzer Division and the 116th Panzer Division managed to break through these weakened positions. By mid-afternoon, reinforcements from an armoured battlegroup formed from the South Alberta Regiment and the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders of Canada under Major David Vivian Currie managed to reach St. Lambert-sur-Dives. Over the next 36 hours, the battlegroup repulsed almost continual attacks by German forces, destroying seven German tanks, twelve anti-tank guns and forty vehicles. Currie's battlegroup was able to inflict nearly 2,000 casualties on the German forces, including 300 killed and 1,100 captured. By the evening of 20 August, the Germans had exhausted their attack against St. Lambert-sur-Dives; the surviving members of the LXXXIV Corps (General Otto Elfeldt) surrendered to Canadian and American forces near Chambois. Directly southwest of Mont Ormel, German units moved along the road as the Poles inflicted heavy casualties on German forces moving towards Mont Ormel with a well-coordinated artillery barrage. Sévigny's assistance was crucial in defending Hill 262 and he later received the Virtuti Militari (Poland's highest military decoration) for his exertions during the battle. From the northeast, the 2nd SS Panzer Division planned an attack against the four infantry battalions and two armoured regiments of the 1st Polish Armoured Division dug in on Hill 262. The first attack against Polish positions was by the "Der Führer Regiment" of the 2nd SS Panzer Division. The Podhale Rifles battalion was able to repel the attack but used much of its ammunition in doing so. The second attack was devastating to the dwindling armoured forces of the Polish battlegroups. A German tank, positioned on Point 239 (northeast of Mont Ormel), was able to destroy five Sherman tanks within two minutes. As the assault from the southwest ran out of momentum, the 2nd SS Panzer Division resumed its attack on the northeast of the ridge. Since Polish units were now concentrated on the southern edges of the position, the 2nd SS Panzer Division was able to force a path through to the 3rd Parachute Division by noon, opening a gap in the pocket. Generaloberst Paul Hausser, commander of the 7th Army, ordered the positions to be "eliminated". 21 August Night was welcomed by the German and Polish forces surrounding Mont Ormel. Fighting was sporadic, as both sides avoided contact with one another. Frequent Polish artillery barrages interrupted German attempts to retreat from the sector. As the remaining Polish forces repelled the assault, their tanks used the last of their ammunition. The Falaise Gap had been closed, with a large number of German forces still trapped inside. ==Aftermath==

Analysis By the evening of 21 August 1944, most of the German forces in the Falaise Pocket had surrendered. Nearly all of the German formations that had caused significant damage to the Canadians throughout the Normandy campaign had been destroyed. The Panzer Lehr Division and the 9th SS Panzer Division existed in name only. Simultaneously, elements of Army Group G including the 15th Army and the 5th Panzer Army moved to engage American forces in the south. In the following week, elements of the First Canadian Army attacked the Germans on the Seine to break through to the Channel Ports. On the evening of 23 August, French and American troops entered Paris. Casualties Due to the successive offensives of early August, exact Canadian casualties for Tractable are not known. Losses during Totalize and Tractable are put at 5,500 men. German casualties during Operation Tractable are also uncertain; approximate figures can be found for casualties within the Falaise Pocket but not for the Canadian operations during Tractable. After the Falaise Pocket, the German 7th Army was severely depleted, having lost from 50,000 to 200,000 men, over 200 tanks, 1,000 guns and 5,000 other vehicles. Polish casualties for Operation Tractable (until 22 August) are 1,441 men, of whom 325 were killed (including 21 officers), 1,002 wounded (35 officers) and 114 missing, which includes 263 men lost before the Chambois and Ormel actions from 14 to 18 August. ==Notes==