Thread by @TrentTelenko

@NickHewitt4 The LVT's would have made a huge difference at Omaha beach for the same reasons they were the margin between victory and defeat at Tarawa.

They let a large body of formed infantry with an intact chain of command and intact radio net get right on top of an enemy position.

@NickHewitt4 More importantly, they would have used the Maj. Gen. Charles H. Corlett's Kwajalein LVT radio net procedures.

US Army’s 708th Provisional Amphibian Tractor Battalion at Kwajalein put VHF band, quartz crystal controlled FM radios in every LVT.

See:

chicagoboyz.net/archives/41455…

@NickHewitt4 The 708th was a converted US Army independent tank battalion built to support US Army infantry divisions. Everything it did at Kwajalein was standard operating procedure for US Army independent tank units, which had had “Shoot, Move and Communicate” in its...

@NickHewitt4 ...organizational DNA, preventive maintenance as a secular religious catechism, and had liaison with infantry as its reason to exist. Unit for LVT unit, Army troops could drive and swim father, for longer, and more flexibly than the Marines, because radios & vehicle training.

@NickHewitt4 A Corlett style landing at Omaha would have seen 20 LVT per assault regiment in the first wave landing four assault infantry companies.

Each of the two assault regiment's would have had a platoon mixed platoon (5 to 6) of LVT(A)-1 with 37mm gun & LVT(A)-4 with 75mm howitzer.

@NickHewitt4 This would have put 40 LVT-4 mounted .30 and .50 caliber machine guns out of the water at the shingle in the face of the German defenses at less than 300 yards.

The LVT(A)-1 & LVT(A)-5 platoon would be in addition to this.

That is a lot of suppressive fire and radios...

@NickHewitt4 ...that were not there historically.

And in particular, those LVT machine guns would have had gun shields, so the German troops would not have been in a position to pin down those four assault companies as they shook out, set up forward observers and called in naval gunfire.

@NickHewitt4 I expect that eight of the 20 infantry carrying LVT's in the first wave would have been destroyed before they left the beach from the shingle.

The problem for the Germans from that point on would have been target saturation.

For about 15 minutes they have 25-26 LVT in their...

@NickHewitt4 ...face saturating their AT-gun defenses and suppressing their infantry positions with heavy machine gun fire.

Then they would receiving accurate 4.5 inch to battleship caliber naval gunfire after the LVT's leave directed from the formed infantry companies.

This would have...

@NickHewitt4 ...forced the German defenders to prioritize dropping artillery and mortars on any radio antenna they could see in those LVT delivered companies over additional waves of US troops landing at the water line.

@NickHewitt4 IMO, It would take about 1/2 hour for the Germans to totally suppress the LVT forward observers in the infantry companies at the mouth's of the draws.

The problem is that 45 minutes of close infantry dog fight would leave US Army & Navy engineers 45 minutes to work untargeted.

@NickHewitt4 In so many words, a lot of additional passages in the obstacle's off Omaha beach would have been blown.

This puts LCT's & LCI(L)'s on the beach starting hour #2 of the landings.

After about 120 minutes, the 12 surviving LVT's would return with more infantry up at the shingle.

@NickHewitt4 This would start the 2nd cycle of intense and accurate forward observer w-radio directed naval gunfire in German defenses.

This sharp uptick in Omaha beach firepower would start collapsing the integrity of German defenses at 10am under the weight of additional formed infantry.

@NickHewitt4 My guestimate is that at least 1/2 of the Omaha Beach infantry casualties would have been prevented with the use of LVT's in Corlett's Kwajalein style.

@NickHewitt4 @threadreaderapp unroll