The Allied position in the Central Region at nightfall on 12 August was not very good (see Situation Map). The French command in the south — now the Southern Army Group (SOUTHAG), with II French Corps and II German Corps under command, together with a division’s worth of Austrian troops — was under heavy pressure along the line of the Lech. Here and there it was losing ground. North of the present boundary between SOUTHAG and the Central Army Group (CENTAG), which now ran from Karlsruhe through Bayreuth, with its three corps and some eight divisions, was in a similar situation. It was just holding on to an area whose forward edge ran from west of Kassel to Wurzburg and was hourly expecting attack by fresh formations.
A great blow to CENTAG during the day had been a direct hit from a missile on its Main HQ in the field. The mobile tactical HQ further forward was unharmed, but unhappily the commanding general was in Main HQ at the time and was killed outright. He was replaced by the commander of V US Corps, whose vigorous defence in the Fulda area on CENTAG’s left, the hinge of the whole army group’s position, had been of such vital importance.
The new Commander of the Central Army Group and Commander of the United States Army in Europe was already a familiar figure on television screens on both sides of the Atlantic. It was an appointment as popular with the American public, to whom he had in a few short days of intense exposure become something of a folk hero, as it was in the command he now took over.
To the north of the Central Army Group NORTHAG was deployed in a great bow, with a position running first of all northwards from west of Kassel to within twenty kilometres of Hannover, which was now in enemy hands. Thereafter, the forward edge was much as it had been for the past few days, running south-west along the Teutoburger Wald to Osnabruck, then westwards to the Rhine near Wesel. It was here on the left that most ground in NORTHAG’s sector had been lost, in spite of a determined defence by II British Corps, disposing of one US brigade and some Dutch units in addition to two divisions of its own. West of the Rhine the key Venlo position was still holding. There was no doubt at all that it would soon come under very heavy pressure.
In theatre reserve SACEUR was holding the heavy US division withdrawn in pretty fair shape from V US Corps on the second day of the battle, the second US reinforcement division now less one brigade, two more US divisions married to their prepositioned equipment in the first few days of August, one fairly strong German division, one rather weaker British division, the Canadian Brigade Group of almost divisional strength, and some other troops amounting to about a division all told.
These, adding up in the aggregate to only some seven divisions’ worth, were all nominally under command of the Central Army Group, but with the firm instruction that none must be committed by CENTAG without the Supreme Commander’s authority. They were located largely in Hessen and the Rhineland. Most lay east of the Rhine. The main Rhine bridges, surprisingly enough, were still in service, though only through a major effort on the part of Allied air defence and truly heroic work by army engineers.
Pressure on the Supreme Allied Commander from subordinate commanders to release troops from this reserve had already been considerable, and was now growing. To all requests, however pressing, SACEUR had invariably replied that army groups must manage with whatever local reserves they could find. Inevitably there had followed urgent insistence on the release of battlefield nuclear support, as the only possible way of preventing collapse, if no reserves were to be made available.
The Supreme Commander knew the mind of his Commander-in-Chief, the President of the United States. The President would go to almost any lengths to avoid nuclear attack on the cities of the United States. It was not easy to see how this could be avoided once the battlefield nuclear exchange had begun.
Among the European Allies, opinion on the use of battlefield nuclear weapons in this confused and highly dangerous situation was divided. Understandably the Federal Republic was against it. The United Kingdom was in two minds. The Belgians were in favour, the Dutch against. The French reserved absolutely the right to decide their own nuclear policy but undertook not to use any of their considerable nuclear armoury, battlefield or strategic, without prior consultation.
Meanwhile, Warsaw Pact air attack, conventional and chemical, on the home countries of the Allies, begun on 4 August, continued unabated, though with varying intensity. In the Federal Republic and to a lesser extent in the Low Countries it was hardly to be distinguished from tactical interdiction. In France and the UK it was more strategic in character.
