Western Front (World War II)
| Western Front | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the European theatre of World War II | |||||||||
Clockwise from top left: Rotterdam after the Blitz, German Heinkel He 111 planes during the Battle of Britain, Allied paratroopers during Operation Market Garden, American troops running through Wernberg, Germany, Siege of Bastogne, American troops landing at Omaha Beach during Operation Overlord | |||||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
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Allies 1939–1940 France United Kingdom Poland Netherlands Belgium Luxembourg Norway Denmark (9 April 1940) Canada Czechoslovakia |
Axis 1939–1940 Germany Italy | ||||||||
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1944–1945 United States United Kingdom • Newfoundland[1][2][3] France Canada Poland Belgium Luxembourg Netherlands Norway Czechoslovakia Italy |
1944–1945 Germany Italian Social Republic | ||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
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1939–1940 Maurice Gamelin Maxime Weygand John Vereker, Lord Gort William Boyle, Lord Cork Władysław Sikorski Henri Winkelman Leopold III Émile Speller Otto Ruge William Prior 1944–1945 Franklin D. Roosevelt # Harry S. Truman Dwight D. Eisenhower Winston Churchill Bernard Montgomery Arthur Tedder Omar Bradley Jacob L. Devers George S. Patton Courtney Hodges William Simpson Alexander Patch Miles Dempsey Trafford Leigh-Mallory † Bertram Ramsay † Charles de Gaulle Jean de Tassigny Kenneth Stuart Harry Crerar Kazimierz Sosnkowski Stanisław Maczek |
1939–1940 Walter von Brauchitsch Gerd von Rundstedt Erich von Manstein Heinz Guderian Fedor von Bock Wilhelm von Leeb Erich Raeder Nikolaus von Falkenhorst Prince Umberto 1944–1945 Adolf Hitler † Heinrich Himmler † Hermann Göring † Gerd von Rundstedt Karl Dönitz Günther von Kluge † Walter Model † Albert Kesselring Erwin Rommel † Johannes Blaskowitz † Hermann Balck Paul Hausser Benito Mussolini Rodolfo Graziani | ||||||||
| Strength | |||||||||
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1939–1940
1944–1945
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1939–1940
1944–1945 | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
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1940 1944–1945
Total:
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1940 1944–1945 Total:
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Civilian casualties: 1,650,000 dead[i] | |||||||||
The Western Front was a military theatre of World War II encompassing Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany. The Italian front is considered a separate but related theatre.[j] The Western Front's 1944–1945 phase was officially deemed the European Theater by the United States, whereas Italy fell under the Mediterranean Theater along with the North African campaign. The Western Front was marked by two phases of large-scale combat operations. The first phase saw the capitulation of Luxembourg, Netherlands, Belgium, and France during May and June 1940 after their defeat in the Low Countries and the northern half of France, and continued into an air war between Germany and Britain that climaxed with the Battle of Britain. The second phase consisted of large-scale ground combat (supported by a massive strategic air war considered to be an additional front), which began in June 1944 with the Allied landings in Normandy and continued until the defeat of Germany in May 1945 with its invasion.
- ^ "Royal Artillery". www.heritage.nf.ca.
- ^ Nicholson, G.W.L. (1969). More Fighting Newfoundlanders: A History of Newfoundland's Fighting Forces in the Second World War. St. John's: Government of Newfoundland.
- ^ "Newsletter Volume 3 Issue 1" (PDF). rnfldrmuseum.ca. 2019.
- ^ a b Frieser, Karl-Heinz (2013)The Blitzkrieg Legend. Naval Institute Press
- ^ MacDonald, C (2005), The Last Offensive: The European Theater of Operations. University Press of the Pacific, p. 478
- ^ Ellis 1993, p. 256. "Total German soldiers who surrendered in the West, including 3,404,950 who surrendered after the end of the war, is given as 7,614,790. To this must be added the 263,000–655,000 who died, giving a rough total of 8 million German soldiers having served on the Western Front in 1944–1945."
- ^ Horst Boog; Gerhard Krebs; Detlef Vogel (2006). Germany and the Second World War: Volume VII: The Strategic Air War in Europe and the War in the West and East Asia, 1943-1944/5. Clarendon Press. p. 522. ISBN 978-0-19-822889-9.
Quoting Alfred Jodl's "Strategic situation in spring 1944" presentation. The total given for German forces in the west in May 1944, prior to a slight upgrade of forces in the west in preparation for Operation Overlord, was 1,873,000 personnel.
- ^ a b Ellis 1993, p. 255
- ^ Hooton 2007, p. 90
- ^ MacDonald, C (2005), The Last Offensive: The European Theater of Operations. p. 478. "Allied casualties from D-day to V–E totaled 766,294. American losses were 586,628, including 135,576 dead. The British, Canadians, French, and other allies in the west lost slightly over 60,000 dead".
- ^ a b Ellis 1993, p. 256
- ^ US Army Battle Casualties and Non-battle Deaths in World War 2: Final Report. Combined Arms Research Library, Department of the Army. 25 June 1953.
- ^ Zaloga 2015, p. 239, 6,084 U.S. Army tanks destroyed, including 4,399 M4 Sherman tanks, 178 M4 (105) and 1,507 M5A1 Stuart tanks..
- ^ a b Zaloga 2015, p. 276.
- ^ Zaloga 2015, p. 277, 4,477 British Commonwealth tanks destroyed, including 2,712 M4 Sherman tanks, 656 Churchill tanks, 609 Cromwell tanks, 433 M3 Stuart tanks, 39 Cruiser Mk VIII Challenger tanks, 26 Comet tanks, 2 M24 Chaffee tanks..
- ^ Zaloga 2015, p. 239, 909 U.S. Army tank destroyers destroyed, including 540 M10 tank destroyers, 217 M18 Hellcat tank destroyers and 152 M36 tank destroyers..
- ^ a b Frieser 1995, p. 400
- ^ L'Histoire, No. 352, April 2010 France 1940: Autopsie d'une défaite, p. 59.
- ^ Shepperd 1990, p. 88
- ^ Hooton 2010, p. 73
- ^ George C Marshall (1996). Biennial reports of the Chief of Staff of the United States Army to the Secretary of War : 1 July 1939–30 June 1945 (PDF) (Report). Washington, DC: Center of Military History. p. 202. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2 May 2017. Retrieved 8 July 2025.
- ^ MacDonald 1993, p. 478. "exclusive of prisoners of war, all German casualties in the west from D-day to V–E Day probably equaled or slightly exceeded Allied losses". In the related footnote he writes the following: "The only specific figures available are from OB WEST for the period 2 June 1941 – 10 April 1945 as follows: Dead, 80,819; wounded, 265,526; missing, 490,624; total, 836,969. (Of the total, 4,548 casualties were incurred prior to D-day.) See Rpts, Der Heeresarzt im Oberkommando des Heeres Gen St d H/Gen Qu, Az.: 1335 c/d (IIb) Nr.: H.A./263/45 g. Kdos. of 14 Apr 45 and 1335 c/d (Ilb) (no date, but before 1945). The former is in OCMH X 313, a photostat of a document contained in German armament folder H 17/207; the latter in folder 0KW/1561 (OKW Wehrmacht Verluste). These figures are for the field army only, and do not include the Luftwaffe and Waffen-SS. Since the Germans seldom remained in control of the battlefield in a position to verify the status of those missing, a considerable percentage of the missing probably were killed. Time lag in reporting probably precludes these figures' reflecting the heavy losses during the Allied drive to the Rhine in March, and the cut-off date precludes inclusion of the losses in the Ruhr Pocket and in other stages of the fight in central Germany."
- ^ Overmans 2000, pp. 265, 266, 275 and 279.
- ^ Percy Schramm (1961). Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht: 1940 – 1945: 8 Bde. pp. 1508–1511. ISBN 9783881990738.
{{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help) Only includes those wounded who were not captured after, and only records wounded up to 31 January 1945. Likely to be drastically underestimated considering the corresponding figures for the Eastern Front on the same document. - ^ Niewyk, Donald L. The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust, Columbia University Press, 2000; ISBN 0-231-11200-9, p. 421.
- ^ Statistisches Jahrbuch für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1960 Bonn 1961 p. 78
- ^ Bundesarchiv Euthanasie" im Nationalsozialismus, bundesarchiv.de; accessed 5 March 2016.(German)
- ^ Frumkin, Gregory (1951). Population Changes in Europe Since 1939. London: Allen & Unwin. pp. 58–59. OCLC 924672733.
- ^ "Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) Netherlands" (PDF). Retrieved 4 March 2016.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, pp. 44–45
- ^ Commonwealth War Graves Commission Annual Report 2013–2014, p. 44.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, p. 144
- ^ "Hvor mange dræbte danskere?". Danish Ministry of Education. Retrieved 4 March 2016.
- ^ Frumkin 1951, p. 59
- ^ Keegan, John (1990). The Second World War. Viking. ISBN 9780670823598.
- ^ Glantz, David M. (11 October 2001). The Soviet-German War 1941-1945: Myths and Realities: A Survey Essay (PDF). 20th Anniversary Distinguished Lecture at the Strom Thurmond Institute of Government and Public Affairs. Clemson University. Archived from the original (PDF) on 9 July 2011.
- ^ "The Soviet-German War 1941–1945: Myths and Realities: A Survey Essay" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 September 2008. Retrieved 9 July 2011.
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