Coutances Breakout

Operation Cobra: July 28, 1944: The 4th Armored Division was tasked to take Coutances, the first major town on the road to Avranches, the first step to cutting off the Germans in the Cotentin Peninsula. Despite being delayed for three …

1944-07-28

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Operation Cobra: July 28, 1944: The 4th Armored Division was tasked to take Coutances, the first major town on the road to Avranches, the first step to cutting off the Germans in the Cotentin Peninsula. Despite being delayed for three hours in a minefield, their tanks broke free and reached Coutances before noon, finding the Germans in force. Major General Wood took matters into his own hands, walked through a minefield, and personally directed fire against a German anti-tank position.

Coutances, France,

Operation Cobra was the codename for an offensive launched by the United States First Army under Lieutenant General Omar Bradley seven weeks after the D-Day landings, during the Normandy campaign of World War II. The intention was to take advantage of the distraction of the Germans by the British and Canadian attacks around Caen in Operation Goodwood, and thereby break through the German defenses that were penning in their forces while the Germans were unbalanced. Once a corridor had been created, the First Army would then be able to advance into Brittany, rolling up the German flanks once free of the constraints of the bocage country. After a slow start, the offensive gathered momentum and German Resistance collapsed as scattered remnants of broken units fought to escape to the Seine. Lacking the resources to cope with the situation, the German response was ineffectual and the entire Normandy front soon collapsed. Operation Cobra, together with concurrent offensives by the British Second Army and the Canadian First Army, was decisive in securing an Allied victory in the Normandy campaign.

Wikipedia: Operation Cobra

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