Technical Sergeant Emanuel Wilson Greene of the 3989th Motor Transport Company

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* Dr. Medford, Assistant Professor of History, Howard University and Dr. Frazier, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Howard University

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Technical Sergeant Emanuel Wilson Greene of the 3989th Motor Transport Company served two years, ten months, and twenty-two days in the U.S. Army during World War II. All but ten months of that time he spent in the European Theater of Operations as an automotive mechanic. It was the first time the Virginia native had ever left the state of his birth; while overseas he promised himself that he would never leave home again. In the thirty-five years he survived following the war, he remained faithful to his promise and rarely left the place that he knew and loved.¹

His fondness for home was but one among many manifestations of the war's impact on Greene. The horrors he had witnessed in Europe tempered any nostalgia he may have felt for this period in his life. Yet, there were certain aspects of his military experience he recalled with pride. Whenever the ordeal of earning a living in the racially-charged environment of postwar America began to overwhelm him, he could reflect upon (perhaps with a mixture of satisfaction and irony) the role he played in helping the nation to win the most important armed conflict of the 20th century.

Most African Americans who served in the armed forces during World War II were, like Greene, non-combat troops. Their task was to render support to combat units, to work in the supply operations — loading and unloading food, equipment, and ammunition as well as transporting these essential items to dumps near the front —and to serve in ordnance units.² Black men generally chafed at assignments to thes service units, because such duty did not reflect their idea of what it meant to soldier. Ernest Myers, who saw duty as a truck driver with the 3214th Quartermaster Service Company, says that black soldiers desired the opportunity to show that black men "were combat ready . . . We wanted to make an impression for the people back home."³ But the country — still unconvinced of the ability of black soldiers as fighting men, despite incontrovertible evidence of valor in previous wars — consigned the bulk of black soldiers to service units. Ironically, it was these men who proved invaluable to the Allied effort, and whose performance forever altered the image of the non- combat soldier.

Both Greene and Myers were among the thousands of African Americans involved in the most legendary of support activities during the war — they served with units that operated along the Red Ball Express. One of the largest logistical operations before the preparations for Desert Storm almost fifty years later, Red Ball was linked to the June 6, D-Day invasion on the Normandy beaches and the allied drive across France in the summer of 1944. Operation Overlord, as the invasion plan was codenamed, proceeded slowly and with devastating loss of life; but by the end of July, the Allies had penetrated the German lines and had them on the run. Once the breakout occurred, the First Army and General George C. Patton's Third Army advanced swiftly across France — so swiftly that by mid- August Allied forces were beginning to experience difficulty in keeping the ground forces adequately supplied. In its attempt to cut off the German supply lines, Allied bombing had seriously damaged the French rail system. The Germans, too, exacerbated the problem by sabotaging the system as they fled the Allied Forces. The inability of supply to keep up with need threatened to slow, if not halt, Patton's advance.

Hence, on August 25, the Allies implemented a program which would allow the armies to continue their advance across France. The plan consisted of a one way, restricted highway that was used exclusively for the hauling of supplies — POL (petroleum, oil, and lubricants), ammunition, food and other essentials — to the First and Third Armies. The express operated twenty-four hours a day, even under adverse conditions. The route formed a loop with the northern road, leading to dump sites forward, and the southern, to be used for trucks returning to the rear. The initial route was from St. Lo in the Normandy area, to the La Loupe-Dreux-Chartes triangle, just west of Paris. After trucks picked up cargo from base depots established near Normandy beaches, the supplies were dispatched from St. Lo and shipped in convoys. The route and the trucks were marked with a red ball, from which the operation derived its name.⁴

As the First and Third Armies advanced, the need arose to extend the supply line farther east. Hence, on September 10, the Red Ball highway was extended to Soissons (and ten days later to Hirson) in its effort to supply the First Army, and to Sommesous to supply the Third Army. Some trucks were dispatched beyond these official drop-offs, and traveled as far east as Verdun and Metz.⁵ At its greatest length, the Red Ball Express extended for 750 and 670 miles round trip in support of the First and Third Armies, respectively.⁶

In the eighty-two days during which the Express operated, the truck companies moved an impressive amount of supplies. The target tonnage was 75,000, to be delivered by September 1. The operation was extended when it fell short of that mark. The Allies lso agreed to keep it running a bit longer, because rail services still were not fully functional. At the end of the Red Ball program on November 16, tonnage reached 412,193⁷ As many as 140 truck companies were assigned to Red Ball, and on an average day 899 trucks were sent forward.⁸

The Army found personnel for Red Ball within the truck companies scattered throughout the Communications Zone. It used every truck company available for line of communications hauling; others were taken from infantry units and from beach and port facilities.⁹ Approximately 73 percent of truck companies in the Motor Transport Service of the European Theater were African American. Consequently, the majority of the units in Red Ball were black companies.¹⁰

Duty with the Red Ball operation left an indelible impression on the African Americans who served, beginning with their arrival on the Normandy beaches. Alphonso Campbell, who served as a Master Sergeant with the 520th Quartermaster Group, recalls that his unit landed ten days after the D-Day invasion, early enough to "still smell the stench of the dead."¹¹> Former PFC Myers also remembers the carnage that accompanied the amphibious assault. When his unit landed, "bodies were still floating in the water . . . and land mines" remained a serious threat to the soldiers.¹²

These were not combat troops, but the duty was dangerous and the responsibility awesome. In the first phase of the operation, when they trucked supplies no farther west than the Seine River, they were allowed to use full headlights at night and were permitted to dispense with other blackout precautions. But when the route was extended in the second phase, drivers were required to use "cat-eyes" because of the possibility of sniper attacks and German bombing. Cat-eyes were special headlights that cast a dim beam directly onto the highway and hence made the convoy a more difficult target. Recognizing the inherent danger of the operation, the army equipped some of the trucks in each convoy with 50-caliber machine guns, and the soldiers carried carbines.¹³> Deliveries sometimes placed these men perilously close to the front.

Greene recalled an instance when he was required to step over dead enemy soldiers once his unit had arrived at their drop-off point. Just as vivid was his recollection of witnessing one of the noncommissioned officers in his company severely injured after accidently triggering a land mine near a truck Greene had been repairing. ( He later named his oldest son in honor of that man). Red Ball units also had to guard against hijackers who sought to seize their cargo, either for their own personal use or for sale to the black market. Stragglers were especially vulnerable to these kinds of assaults.¹⁴

Strict rules governing the operation of the Red Ball Express made the task even more arduous. Regulations required drivers in the convoys to maintain 60-yard distances between trucks, to refrain from passing, and to observe a speed of no more than 25 miles per hour. Convoys were allowed to halt for ten-minute breaks at exactly ten minutes before each even hour. When a truck became disabled, the driver was required to exit the convoy, attempt to repair the vehicle, and if failing this, wait until ordnance units arrived to repair it. They were not expected to catch up with their group, but rather to wait for the next convoy hauling similar supplies.¹⁵

The Army expected the convoys to "Keep 'em Rolling," whatever the weather conditions or circumstances. Consequently, the demands of the operation eventually took their toll on the men and equipment of Red Ball. Driver fatigue and inadequately maintained vehicles produced a formula for disaster. Accidents occurred frequently, exacerbated no doubt by insufficient rest and sleep. Some sources indicate that drivers averaged 36 hours at the wheel without sleep; bivouac areas established at the halfway point along the route apparently were inadequate.¹⁶ Desperate for rest, a few resorted to sabotaging their vehicles or managed to get "lost" near towns. They generally found their way back to their units the following day. Maintenance of the trucks strained the operation as well. Tires and vehicles wore out quickly and often; many of the breakdowns that occurred along the route were repaired by mechanics who almost became accustomed to working in the rain and mud.¹⁷

Recognizing the arduous, unglamorous, and dangerous character of the Red Ball assignment, the Army implemented a program intended to build morale among the personnel of this very critical operation. Servicemen's papers like Stars and Stripes and Yanks did their part by publishing accounts of Red Ball activities. One such article described the valor with which these men served:

Truck drivers have worked 20 hours a day, and when their trucks zigzagged, they stopped, splashed water on their faces and drove on . . . They got the supplies to the front and if necessary, they died with their hands on their wheels . . . They carried their duffel bags with them and slept on piles of ruins which had scarcely cooled from the heat of battle.¹⁸

Near the end of the operation the Army implemented plans for a "Red Ball Circuit", a series of shows and entertainment for the soldiers who drove the Express route. Jeep shows consisting of three performers with a jeep and a trailer carrying a small generator, a public address system and a musical instrument were organized. The Red Ball operation ended before the shows could be fully organized, but the idea of entertainment for the troops survived. Two shows were eventually organized and "dispatched to Channel Base Section" where they were performed for troops in the Transportation Corps.¹⁹

The supply efforts of the men of the Red Ball Express hastened the day of final victory for the allies in Europe. The exceptional progress of the First and Third Armies could not have occurred but for the extraordinary effort of these service troops. Yet, the literature on these men is sketchy. In reviewing both the published histories of operations in the European Theater and the archival materials, one does not readily get a sense of the extent to which this particular program depended for its success on black soldiers. To the military these were simply men who performed a service, albeit an invaluable one. But to Emanuel Greene, Ernest Myers, Alphonso Campbell, and the other black men who served with them, their duty with the Red Ball Express proved the valor and worth of black soldiers in a way that was as definitive as the service rendered by any other units in World War II.

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Endnotes

¹ The authors are indebted to the family of Emanuel Greene for information regarding his military experiences. They would also like to thank Russell J. Parkinson of the U.S. Army Center of Military History for his gerous sharing of materials on the Red Ball Express.

² For discussion of black men in service units during World War II, see Ulysses Lee, The Employment of Negro Troops, United States Army in World War II (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, 1966).

³ Interviews with Ernest Myers, June, 1993, Capitol Heights, Maryland.

⁴ The use of the red ball symbol had originated before the war as a method of marking railway service that had high priority status. It was also easier for drivers to see this symbol at night. The bulk of the literature on the Red Ball Express is to be found among the official histories published by the U.S. Office of Military History Department of the Army and the archival materials on military activities during World War II at the National Archives, Suitland, Maryland Branch. For published histories under the U.S. Army in World War II series of the Office of Military History see especially: Roland G. Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies: The Europe Theater of Operations, 2 Vols. (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, 1953); Joseph Bykofs and Harold Larson, The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas, (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, 1957); Martin Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit: The European Theater of Operations(Washington, D.C.: The Office of the Chief of Military History, 1961).

⁵ Bykofsky and Larson, The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas, p. 334.

⁶ H. H. Dunham, "U.S. Army Transportation in the European Theater of Operations, 1942-1945,". Prepared by the Historical Unit, Office of Chief of Transportation, Army Service Forces, June, 1946, p. 221. Photocopy provided by U.S. Army Center of Military History.

⁷ Roland Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 2, p. 137.

⁸ Ulysses Lee, p. 633; See also History of G-4, Communications Zone, European Theater of Operations, Section III, Supply by Road, Air and Water, pp. 3 and 13, provided by U.S. Army Center of Military History.

⁹ H. H. Dunham, p. 222; Normandy Base Section - Histories, "The Red Ball Express," RG 332, Entry 281,National Archives, Suitland.

¹⁰ Ulysses Lee, The Employment of Negro Troops, p. 633; Albert Furr indicates that approximately 67 percent of personnel in Red Ball were black. See Furr's Democracy's Negroes: A Book of Facts Concerning the Activities of Negroes in World War II (Boston: House of Edinboro, 1947), p. 92-101.

¹¹ Interview with Alphonso Campbell, June, 1993.

¹² Interview with Ernest Myers, June, 1993.

¹³ Ibid. See also H. H. Dunham, "U.S. Army Transportation in the European Theater of Operations," p. 221; and "The Red Ball Express," p. 13.

¹⁴ "Transportation Corps. Historical Reports, August 1944-May 1945," p. 10. Normandy Base Section — Histories, RG 332, Entry 596B.

¹⁵ "The Red Ball Express," p. 48; Roland Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol 1, p. 560.

¹⁶ Martin Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 690; See also John D. Silvera, The Negro in World War II (New York: Arno Press, 1969).

¹⁷ Ibid.; "Transportation Corps, Historical Reports," p. 16.

¹⁸Excerpts from Yanks. Provided by the U.S. Army Center of Military History.

¹⁹" History of Normandy Base Section: D-Day to VE Day," p. 215, RG 332. After the war, Red Ball soldiers were recalled in the 1946 Broadway musical entitled "Call Me Mister," written by Harold Rome.

On the Road to Victory: The Red Ball Express

David P. Colley

"Keep them Rolling"; 82 Days on the Red Ball Express

More than 6,000 trucks kept gasoline and other vital supplies rolling in as American troops and tanks pushed the Germans back toward their homeland.

It was dusk, somewhere in France in the autumn of 1944. A jeep carrying a first lieutenant in charge of a platoon of trucks crested a hill. Instinctively, the young officer scanned the horizon for enemy aircraft that sometimes swooped in low for strafing runs. The skies were empty. But as far as the eye could see, ahead and to the rear, the descending night was pierced by specks of white and red light–cat eyes, the blackout running lights of hundreds of trucks that snaked along the highway.

The huge convoy stretching from horizon to horizon was part of the Red Ball Express, the famed trucking operation in the European Theater of Operations (ETO) in the late summer and fall of 1944 that supplied the rapidly advancing American armies as they streamed toward the German frontier. Chances are that most Americans have never heard of the Red Ball Express. In the hundreds of films about World War II and in all the books about the conflict, it gets little mention. Yet the Red Ball may have contributed as much to the defeat of Germany as any other land operation. Certainly without the Red Ball, and its sister express lines that went into operation later in the war, World War II in Europe might have dragged on even longer, and the extraordinary mobility of the U.S. Army would have been drastically limited.

The Red Ball was created to supply the American combat units that were pushing the Germans back to their homeland. In the first few weeks after the Normandy invasion, the Allies made little progress against the disciplined and stubborn enemy. Some in the military even feared a return of trench warfare as the Germans continued to blunt each thrust the Allies launched while attempting to break out of their Normandy beachhead.

Then, in late July, the German front cracked. American forces rushed toward the Seine River in pursuit of the German Seventh Army. But the Allied high command had not anticipated the rapid German retreat. They had expected the battle for France to be a slow, steady roll-up of the enemy’s divisions.

The original plans called for Lt. Gen. George Patton, Jr.’s newly formed Third Army to turn westward to clear the Brittany ports while Lt. Gen. Omar Bradley and British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery pushed the Germans eastward across the Seine. Because of the precipitous German retreat, however, Bradley gave Patton permission to wheel some of his forces eastward toward Paris.

If Patton and Bradley could outrun the Germans, the American Twelfth Army Group could trap the enemy between Normandy and the Seine. The reduction of the Falaise pocket northwest of Paris, in which some 100,000 German soldiers were surrounded, 10,000 killed and 50,000 captured, demonstrated how vulnerable the Germans were.

The key to the pursuit, however, was supplies. Modern armies guzzle gas and expend ammunition in vast amounts. As the charging Americans pummeled the Germans, U.S. forces began to run out of needed materiel.

"On both fronts an acute shortage of supplies—that dull subject again!—governed all our operations," General Bradley wrote in his autobiography, A General’s Life. "Some twenty-eight divisions were advancing across France and Belgium. Each division ordinarily required 700-750 tons a day—a total daily consumption of about 20,000 tons."

Ironically, the Allies were victims of their own military successes and strategy. For months before the D-Day assault on June 6, Allied air forces had roamed the skies across northern France destroying the French rail system to prevent Field Marshal Erwin Rommel from supplying his forces on the coast after the Allied invasion came. But if the railroads were made useless for the Germans, they would be equally useless for the Allies. To add to the problem, the Germans still held the Channel ports of northern France and Belgium, notably Le Havre and Antwerp, so most of the supplies to the advancing merican armies came over the invasion beaches on the Normandy coast.

Soon, Patton’s tanks were grinding to a halt, not from enemy action, but because there was no gasoline. On an average day, Patton’s Third Army and Lt. Gen. Courtney Hodges’ First Army consumed a total of 800,000 gallons of gas. But there was no logistical system in place to deliver sufficient quantities.

It was in these desperate days of late August 1944 that the Red Ball Express was conceived during a 36-hour brainstorming session among American commanders. Its name came from a railroad phrase—to "red ball" something was to ship it express —and from an earlier Red Ball Express in Britain that rushed supplies to the English ports during the early days of the invasion. The second Red Ball operation lasted barely three months, from August 25 through November 16, 1944, but by the end of those critical months the express line had established itself firmly in the mythology of World War II. More than 6,000 trucks and their trailers transported 412,193 tons of supplies to the advancing American armies from Normandy to the German border.

What is most often overlooked about the Red Ball Express is that three-quarters of all Red Ball soldiers were African American. The U.S. Army was segregated during World War II, and black troops were most often relegated to service units— many served in the Quartermaster Corps. They served in port battalions, drove trucks, worked as mechanics, and served as "humpers" who loaded and unloaded ammunition and supplies. When the Red Ball was formed, it was the African-American troops in large measure who performed admirably and kept the express line rolling.

The need for supplies was so great that the Red Ball reached its peak performance within the first five days of operation. On August 29, some 132 truck companies, operating 5,958 vehicles, carried 12,342 tons of supplies to forward depots— a record that went unmatched during the next 14 weeks of the operation’s existence. The Red Ball Express was a classic American "can-do" response to a problem that might have proved insurmountable in another army.

There were not enough trucks or drivers in the established Quartermaster truck companies to supply the advancing armies. Before the invasion, the Army’s Transportation Corps estimated a need for 240 truck companies to sustain an advance across France. It also requested that the bulk of these units be equipped with 10-ton flatbed semitrailers. But there weren’t enough of the flatbeds. When the Normandy assault was made, the Army had authorized only 160 truck companies for the operation, and most of those would be supplied with trusty 6-by-6s, GMC 21/2-ton trucks.

The Army had to find more trucks and drivers. Infantry units, artillery units, anti-aircraft units—any units that had trucks—were raided, and many of their vehicles were formed into provisional truck units for the Red Ball.

Any soldier whose duties were not critical to the immediate war effort was asked to become a driver. Normandy was a staging area where arriving infantry divisions bivouacked for several weeks before being sent to the front. Their ranks were combed for drivers, and many infantrymen signed up for temporary duty (normally about two weeks) on the Red Ball, rather than endure the mud and boredom of their encampments. Most of those temporary troops were white.

One of the volunteers, Phillip A. Dick, a scout corporal with Battery A, 380th Field Artillery, 102nd Division, had never driven a truck before. But that did not present a problem for the Army. Dick, like so many others, was given a few hours of instruction and told he had qualified.

"Everybody was stripping gears, but by the time we got back to the company area we could make the trucks go," Dick recalls. The motto of the Red Ball, "tout de suite" (immediately), could have come from a French phrase adopted by the Americans as they rushed to defeat the Germans. "Patton wanted us to eat, sleep and drive, but mostly drive," remembers John O’Leary of the 3628th Truck Company.

The first Red Ball convoys, however, quickly bogged down in the congestion of civilian and military traffic. In response, the Army established a priority route that consisted of two parallel highways between the beachhead and the city of Chartres, just outside Paris. The northern route was designated one-way for traffic outbound from the beaches. The southern route was for return traffic. As the war moved past the Seine and Paris, the two-way loop route was extended to Soissons, northeast of Paris, and to Sommesous and Arcis-sur-Aube, east of Paris toward Verdun.

Staff Sergeant Chester Jones with the 3418th Trucking Company remembers the story of one soldier who was missing for several days with a jeep. His excuse for being AWOL was that he had gotten on the Red Ball priority route, had been sandwiched between two 6-by-6 trucks, and could not get off the highway for 100 miles.

The story is undoubtedly apocryphal, but it contains elements of reality. All civilian and unrelated military traffic was forbidden on the Red Ball route, and the military police (MPs) and the drivers rigidly enforced that rule. The Red Ball convoys often gunned down the middle of the highway to avoid mines on the shoulders, and would stop for nothing. One Red Ball veteran recalls a small French car sneaking onto the Red Ball highway and getting trapped between two barreling trucks. The lead truck suddenly braked for a rest area, and the car was smashed when the following truck failed to stop in time.

The Army went to great lengths to establish control over the newly formed Red Ball highway. The mimeographed sheets of rules of the road are some of the most enduring artifacts of the operation. David Cassels, a warrant officer junior grade with the 103rd Quartermaster Battalion, recalls, for example, that trucks were to travel in convoys; each truck was to carry a number to mark its position in the convoy; each convoy was to have a lead jeep carrying a blue flag; a "cleanup" jeep at the end bore a green one; the speed limit was 25 mph; and trucks were to maintain 60-yard intervals.

Nevertheless, the exigencies of a fast-moving war turned everything upside down. The real story of the Red Ball Express was often more like a free-for-all at a stock car race.

"Oh boy, do I remember that Red Ball gang!" laughs Fred Reese, a former mechanic in an ETO ambulance unit. "They were a helluva crew. They used to carry ammunition boxes twice as high as the top of the truck and when they went down the highway they swayed back and forth. They had no fear. Those guys were crazy, like they were getting paid for every run."

Drivers quickly learned to strip the trucks of their governors, which sapped the overloaded vehicles of power on grades and prevented them from maintaining a steady and much higher speed. The governors were slapped back on for inspections.

The longest delays on the Red Ball usually occurred when trucks were loaded at the beachhead or at depots. If they waited for a convoy to assemble, they could be delayed for hours. Many trucks went out alone or in small groups without an attending officer to keep the vast supply line going. The men drove night and day, week after week. Exhaustion was a companion closer than the assistant driver, who most likely was asleep, awaiting his turn at the wheel. One Red Ball veteran recalls once being so exhausted he could not keep driving. But the convoy could not stop. He and his assistant driver switched seats as the truck rolled along.

Falling asleep was a major problem on the Red Ball. When trucks drifted out of the convoy, it usually meant a driver had fallen asleep at the wheel. Robert Emerick with the 3580th Quartermaster Truck Company was barreling along in a convoy when suddenly he felt a bump and heard blaring horns. He had nodded off and was careening off the roadway aimed right at a concrete electrical pole. He swerved back onto the road just in time.

At night, trucks drove with their cat eyes—white in front, red in back—to avoid detection. "You’d be watching those damned little blackout lights. It drove you blind. It was like hypnosis," recalls Emerick.

When convoys were stalled for short periods, the drivers dozed, their heads slumped over the steering wheel. A jolt from the truck in front, backing up to tap the front bumper of the truck behind, was the signal that the convoy was once again on the move.

(from left to right) T. Sgt. Serman Hughtes, T. Sgt. Hudson Murphy, Pfc. Zaariah Gibbs. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

There were commanders who went by the book. A 21/2-ton truck would carry no more than a 5-ton load and that was that. Prior to the Normandy invasion, the Transportation Corps authorized trucks to carry twice their normal load. That helped compensate for the lack of trucking, but one layer of 105mm and 155mm artillery shells put the truck over the weight limit. "People would laugh when they saw us driving with so few shells," Emerick recalls. Most Quartermaster officers, however, ignored weight restrictions and sent the trucks out overloaded.

The armies were so desperate for gasoline and ammunition that they sometimes sent out raiding parties to commandeer Red Ball trucks and "liberate" their supplies before the trucks got to a depot. Charles Stevenson, a lieutenant in the 3858th Quartermaster Gas Supply Company, remembers being stopped by a colonel on the Third Army front who demanded he turn over his truckloads of jerrycans full of gas.

"You don’t move until we get those cans," the colonel barked.

"We fussed, jumped up and down and cussed that colonel and raised hell and damned everybody around," Stevenson says, but the colonel was unmoved. Ultimately, the convoy was left with only enough gas to get back to the company area.

Often the front was moving so fast that Red Ball drivers never found their destination. It was not uncommon for drivers to hawk their loads to anyone interested. They always found takers. Most often, trucks carried supplies from one depot to the next, dropped them and returned. From the advanced depots more trucks picked up the supplies and carried them farther or to the front lines. Shortly after the breakout from Normandy, it was not uncommon for Red Ball trucks to drop ammunition at artillery positions within a few miles of the front line. One Red Ball veteran remembers driving right up to a stranded Sherman tank and passing jerrycans of gas to the crew while the Germans were within shouting distance.

If gasoline was gold, cigarettes, rations and sugar were jewels to the French. Black marketeering was rampant as some drivers delivered whole loads to anyone willing to buy. Convoys always posted guards around the trucks to prevent the war-weary French and profit-minded American troops from taking anything not tied down.

Even drivers not involved in theft took what they wanted from the loads. They sometimes took a jerrycan here and there to sell to the French. A 5-gallon jerrycan brought $100 on the French black market.

One Red Ball veteran recalls kicking ration boxes off the truck to feed demoralized MPs who had not been relieved for days and had no rations. But the MPs were always watching for pilferage. Usually they were stationed at intersections to ensure the convoys stayed on course, or they directed traffic at blown bridges or through the narrow streets of villages such as Houdan, where medieval timbered houses crowded the main, winding thoroughfare. Large, rectangular signs with huge red balls in the center kept the convoys rolling on the right roads when the MPs were not around. And convoy directors always carried maps to their destinations.

Engineers constantly patrolled the roads to repair damage. Ordnance troops manned wreckers such as the Diamond T Prime Mover, strong enough to wrestle even a disabled tank back to a repair depot. Red Ball drivers were instructed to pull over and wait for the wreckers when their trucks broke down. If the mechanics could not make repairs on the spot, they pushed or pulled the trucks to a maintenance depot.

The Red Ball trucks took tremendous beatings. Batteries dried up, engines overheated, motors burned out for lack of grease and oil, transmissions were overstressed, bolts came loose, and drive shafts fell off. In the first month of operation, Red Ball trucks wore out 40,000 tires. General wear and overloaded trucks were the biggest reasons for the heaps of truck tires awaiting rehabilitation at repair depots. Most of the tires were retreaded and recycled, and they often came back from the repair depots glued and taped together. Treads also came loose, and sometimes the inside dual tire in the rear blew out and caught fire from friction as the truck rolled on. One major cause of the damage done to tires was the hundreds of thousands of ration tins carelessly disposed of along the highways—the sharp metal edges tore into the rubber.

Red Ball trucks were often brought to a standstill by water in their gas. Proper maintenance required that the gas line filter on the fire wall between the engine and cab be purged of water at regular intervals, but few drivers paid attention to that regulation. Condensation was the principal cause of water in the gas, but sabotage was also a factor.

German prisoners of war were aware that the Achilles’ heel of the 6-by-6 was water in the gas, and POWs were frequently used to load supplies in the rear areas and to gas up the trucks. More than one veteran remembers watching POWs dragging jerrycans, with caps wide open, through snow and rain in a deliberate effort to contaminate the gas.

POWs often were loaded into the backs of the trucks on the return trip from forward area depots. So, too, were expended artillery casings, jerrycans, and sometimes the bodies of American soldiers killed in action. Transporting the dead was a particularly dreadful task. Red Ball drivers remember the pervasive odor of death that took days to dissipate. The truck beds had to be hosed down, but even a thorough cleansing often failed to wash away the blood and grime that oozed down through the cracks in the wooden truck beds.

Convoys made regular stops in rest areas where trucks could be serviced, Red Cross girls served coffee and doughnuts, and cots were sometimes available for a few hours’ rest, particularly if another team of drivers continued on with the trucks. The rest areas also served food, but the drivers became proficient at eating C rations on the road. Robert Emerick remembers the same bland diet of hash, stew or beans—always cold. He craved a good hot meal. Drivers sometimes wired C-ration tins to the exhaust manifolds of their trucks to heat the rations. Emerick tried this once and forgot to remove the tin—which eventually exploded. "What the hell have you been doing under this hood," roared the motor pool sergeant when Emerick returned the truck for maintenance.

Red Ball drivers seldom were involved in combat, but there was the ever-present danger of being strafed by Luftwaffe fighters that occasionally streaked overhead. First Lieutenant Charles Weko remembers being in a convoy caught by German fighters. Weko at first believed the brittle clatter of machine guns was someone flinging stones at corrugated metal. Suddenly realizing the danger, he bailed out of his vehicle and scattered with hundreds of other startled truckers. Many of the trucks had a cab emplacement for a .50-caliber machine gun, and some were equipped with the weapons. Merle Guthrie, an infantryman from the 102nd Division who drove for several weeks, was in a convoy that was strafed. The men jumped to the machine gun and brought down one German.

There were many tales of close encounters with the enemy—some rather far-fetched. One report told of 13 Red Ball gasoline tankers barging through a burning French village to get their loads to Patton’s tanks, ignoring the possibility that their cargoes might explode. Another was of a nocturnal convoy slowing for MPs ahead in the road only to discover they had gone too far—the MPs were German.

The drivers were expected to wear helmets and carry rifles, but the helmets generally wound up on the floor next to the rifles. Some drivers also sandbagged the floors of their cabs to absorb mine blasts. The Germans were said to be sneaking in at night, planting mines and stringing piano wire across the roadways. Many Red Ball jeeps were equipped with angle-iron hooks designed to snag the wire before it decapitated the occupants. These hooks were needed because the jeeps and trucks sometimes drove with their windshields down, particularly near combat areas, where a fleeting glint off windshield glass could bring down a hail of German artillery fire. Also, dust was often so thick it coated windshields.

The U.S. Army tried to keep troops segregated, but there were moments of friction. One veteran remembers an African-American unit barreling down the highway and trying to pass a convoy of white drivers. A game of chicken ensued, and the white drivers whiplashed their trucks and trailers into the center of the roadway to prevent the African Americans from getting by. Whites and African Americans were urged not to mingle during off-duty hours. "You accepted discrimination," recalls Washington Rector of the 3916th Quartermaster Truck Company. "We were warned not to fraternize with whites for fear problems would arise." The races were sufficiently separated that even today some white veterans of the Express are unaware that most of the drivers on the Red Ball were African Americans. Emerick recalls informing a soldier that he was a Red Ball driver. The soldier looked at him incredulously and asked why he was not black.

The Red Ball Express was officially terminated on November 16, 1944, when it had completed its mission. New express lines with different designations were being formed, some for specific tasks. The White Ball Express, for example, was established in early October 1944, with routes extending from Le Havre and Rouen to the Paris area.

Other routes included the Little Red Ball, which carried priority supplies from Normandy to Paris; the Green Diamond Express, which moved supplies from Normandy to railheads 100 miles inland; the Red Lion Express, which supplied the 21st Army Group in Belgium; the ABC Express Route (AntwerpBrusselsCharleroi), which carried supplies from the port of Antwerp to depots 90 miles inland; and the XYZ Route, the last long-haul trucking operation, which carried supplies across Germany in the final weeks of the war.

Although its days were few, the Red Ball never really died. Its name and mystique were so embedded in the history of World War II, even during the war, that most of the men who drove trucks, even well after the route’s demise, always believed they were on the Red Ball. The other express lines became mere footnotes in history. Welby Franz, a trucking company commander who later became president of the American Trucking Association, arrived in France from Iran in February 1945. He still believes his unit was on the Red Ball. "That’s what we were all told," he says. Part of the confusion stems from the fact that the Transportation Corps issued a patch that included a red ball, to commemorate the Red Ball Express, centered on a yellow shield. Franz’s men were issued the patch in April 1945.

The Red Ball was successful in large part because Americans understood the strategic value of the motor vehicle that already was playing a critical role in the growth and development of their country. The U.S. Army had also learned the value of motor transport in warfare early in the century. During the 1916 punitive expedition against Pancho Villa, General John "Blackjack" Pershing’s force found that the truck was vastly superior to the horse in a war of maneuvers. With minimal maintenance, trucks could supply Pershing’s force 24 hours a day.

In 1919, the U.S. Army dispatched a cross-continental convoy to test the efficiency of the truck as the mainstay for supplying a fast-moving army. One junior officer on the expedition who was impressed by the potential of motor transport was Lieutenant Dwight D. Eisenhower. The tactical and strategic importance of the truck was not lost on the future supreme commander of Allied forces in Europe.

The Red Ball also was possible because of the awesome industrial might of America. During the war, the United States mass-produced millions of military vehicles. More than 800,000 21/2-ton trucks were manufactured in the United States during the war. No other army during World War II had as many trucks, and America supplied hundreds of thousands to Allied armies, including more than 395,000 to the Red Army alone.

It was the truck as much as the tank that enabled the U.S. Army to become the premier mechanized force in the world during World War II. Many believed that honor went to the Wehrmacht, but even as late as 1944 the Germans relied heavily on horse-drawn wagons. Incredibly, the Germans employed more than 2.8 million horses to supply their legions during the war. Without the truck, American tanks would have been immobilized and U.S. troops would have slogged across Europe barely ahead of their supplies.

A generation after World War II, Colonel John S.D. Eisenhower, a veteran of the European war and son of the supreme Allied commander in Europe, wrote: "The spectacular nature of the advance [through France] was due in as great a measure to the men who drove the Red Ball trucks as to those who drove the tanks." Colonel Eisenhower concluded, "Without it [the Red Ball] the advance across France could not have been made." As the saying of the day went, "Red Ball trucks broke, but didn’t brake." *

First-time contributor David P. Colley is a resident of Easton, Pa. Further reading: The United States Army in World War II, Logistical Support of the Armies, by Roland G. Ruppenthal; and Overlord, by Thomas Alexander Hughes

The Red Ball Express Past Lessons for Future Wars

By Chrisopher Carey, PhD

Military Review: The Professional Journal of the U.S. Army 1922-2023, (March - April 2021)

Soldiers from the 4185th Quartermaster Service Company (left to right), Pvt. Harold Hendricks, Staff Sgt. Carl Haines, Sgt. Theodore Cutright, Pvt. Lawrence Buckhalter, Pfc. Horace Deahl, and Pvt. David N. Hatcher, load trucks with rations bound for frontline troops September 1944 in Liege, Belgium. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

If the adage that militaries prepare for the next war by studying the last war holds true, the U.S. Army should tread carefully in its preparation for future sustainment operations. After all, the Army has not sustained a large-scale combat operation (LSCO) since Operation Iraqi Freedom in the early 2000s, and that was neither against a near-peer threat nor in a denied theater. Instead of focusing on the last fight, the more pertinent historical example for sustainers comes from the European theater of operations (ETO) during the Second World War. In preparation for future operations, the Army needs to examine the valuable sustainment lessons of the Red Ball Express. At each phase of its development, the Red Ball Express revealed the importance of enablers, the value of improvisation, and the challenges inherent in relying on existing infrastructure during a LSCO.

From Operation Bolero to the Red Ball Express

Unlike other operations during World War II, Allied planners were not rushed to prepare for the invasion of occupied France. Operation Overlord, the invasion of Normandy in June 1944, began two years earlier with the buildup of U.S. troops and supplies in the United Kingdom. Known as Operation Bolero, Allied leaders hoped to amass more than a million soldiers in 1942 capable of invading the European continent by 1943.¹ In January 1942, American military cargo started flowing into the United Kingdom by sea and air. Shipments increased in the second half of 1943, and by early 1944, the United States was sending more than a million tons of supplies per month to the British Isles in preparation for a cross-channel invasion.

In preparation for the sustainment effort ahead, officers of the two-year-old Transportation Corps planned a major exercise to work through the challenges associated with moving massive amounts of supply from English ports to French depots.² The exercise sought to simulate the terminal and distribution operations planned for France across a 480-kilometer stretch of the United Kingdom.³ Scheduled to last several weeks, the exercise was ultimately scrapped because of a lack of personnel, equipment, and time. The cancellation meant sustainment units would not get a final large-scale rehearsal before arriving on French soil.

Following the successful D-Day invasion in early June, sustainment operations were soon slowed by poor weather conditions and determined German defenders. Just weeks after landing, severe storms hit the Normandy coast, wrecking one of the Allied mulberries and forcing a four-day closure of sections of the beach.⁴ Capturing the coastal city of Cherbourg was an important Allied objective after D-Day, but entrenched German forces held for over three weeks and destroyed most of the port infrastructure before surrendering. With severe damage to Cherbourg’s valuable harbor, sustainers had little option but to send supplies over the French beaches.

After establishing a lodgment in France, Allied forces initiated a series of offensive operations in July designed to break out of Normandy. Operation Goodwood, a British and Canadian thrust, contained Nazi defenders and allowed U.S. units as part of Operation Cobra to break through German lines. In early August, German forces counterattacked near Mortain, France. Adolf Hitler’s gamble failed and resulted in the German Seventh Army’s entrapment near Falaise. As enemy positions across France collapsed, Allied forces rushed to exploit the disintegrating German lines.

The short lines of communication from the Normandy coast to the front line had been manageable at first, but the offensive success of the Allied breakout created immediate sustainment challenges. As lines stretched, logistics suffered from poor movement control and a lack of storage depots for the rapidly accumulating supplies arriving en masse.⁵ Without these, the distribution of supplies became haphazard. Not designed to handle heavy equipment and military vehicles, the French road network was quickly overwhelmed by Allied traffic. Despite their preparation, U.S. Army planners failed to properly account for the numerous enablers such as military police (MP), engineers, and movement control teams, all of which were required to sustain the blistering operational tempo in France.⁶ If mission-essential supplies failed to reach the front, the Allied offensive across France would be forced to culminate while German defenders were still retreating.

An American truck convoy halts at a makeshift service station 7 September 1944 for servicing and a change of drivers near Saint Denis, France. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

Creating the Red Ball Express

The breakout from Normandy in late July and early August 1944 exceeded Allied expectations. The offensive was so successful that Allied Army groups were over two hundred days ahead of what planners had estimated.⁷ This success strained sustainment operations, which had to deliver food, ammunition, and fuel along an ever-lengthening supply line. Just keeping troops fed became a full-time effort. For instance, a single division in 1944 required thirty-five tons of field rations per day.⁸ Ammunition and fuel were also critical to sustaining the breakout. On 5 August, seventy-two thousand tons of ammunition were ordered south of the Normandy beaches.⁹ A week later, the petroleum, oil, and lubricants (POL) required by Third Army doubled from three hundred thousand gallons to six hundred thousand gallons per day.¹⁰

During the First World War, when armies had limited motorized capabilities, railroads were the primary mode for transporting supplies on the European continent. But American forces could not rely on trains in 1944 because Allied air forces had systematically targeted bridges and rail networks to prevent German reinforcements from reaching Normandy on D-Day. At the time, large-scale aerial supply was considered impractical, although crucial supplies like food and POL were airlifted throughout the European campaign with varying degrees of success.¹¹ Supply via barge was another option, but this was only possible in secured areas of operation with waterways and required the use of heavy machinery such as cranes.

In preparation for their forthcoming offensives, the U.S. First Army and Third Army both sought supply depots near La Loupe, a town southwest of Paris.¹² In late August, the communications zone logistics officer requested one hundred thousand tons of supplies be transported from Normandy to the triangular area between the French towns of Chartres, La Loupe, and Dreux by 1 September.¹³ There was optimism that a rail line from Laval to Paris could be repaired and used for this massive undertaking.¹⁴ However, understaffed engineer units had not been given enough time to restore the track, so trains were only capable of hauling eighteen thousand to twenty-five thousand tons under that timeline.¹⁵ The inability to use rail lines meant logistics planners had to find another way to move the remaining seventy-five thousand to eighty-two thousand tons of equipment and supplies.¹⁶

"Unlike combat units, rear echelon units were often disproportionately African American, as exemplified by the Motor Transport Service, which was composed of approximately 73 percent African American soldiers in the European theater of operations."

With limited time and few options, planners turned to motor transportation. The Motor Transport Division operated a mixture of 2.5-ton cargo trucks, 5-ton cargo trucks, and 10-ton semitrailers.¹⁷ These were primarily made by General Motors Company, Dodge, and Ford.¹⁸ Logisticians had been advocating for the design of a system around semitrailers as their heavy load capacity and the ease by which trailers could be transferred between tractors made them ideal for operations in the ETO. Officers estimated maximum efficiency could be achieved with a ratio of three semitrailers per one tractor-trailer.¹⁹ However, mass production and deployment of the larger trailers was not possible until later in the war, so the 2.5-ton cargo truck, known as the “deuce and a half,” became the workhorse of the Red Ball Express. With supply needs increasing at the front, Red Ball operations commenced on 25 August 1944.

Life on the Red Ball Express

At the beginning of World War II, the Army, like much of the United States, was racially segregated. Targeted recruitment of Black Americans increased as the nation encountered the heavy demands of a truly global war. By the summer of 1944, nearly seven hundred thousand Black soldiers were serving in the U.S. Army.²⁰ Yet, Black soldiers were generally relegated to noncombat units regardless of their desire to serve at the front. For example, out of the 29,714 soldiers who landed at Omaha Beach on D-Day, only five hundred were African American.²¹ Unlike combat units, rear echelon units were often disproportionately African American, as exemplified by the Motor Transport Service, which was composed of approximately 73 percent African American soldiers in the ETO.²² These soldiers would fill the ranks of the Red Ball Express.

The name “Red Ball Express” was not a new term in the transportation world, as it originated from railroad slang for “express freight.”²³ In France in 1944, the Army appropriated a red ball classification symbol that was placed on cargo, vehicles, road signs, and uniform patches. Since D-Day, logistic units and their enablers had been plagued by a shortage of soldiers because the deployment of combat troops took precedence over service troops.²⁴ Desperate to fill billets for two-person driving teams, the Army sought volunteers from combat and noncombat units already on French soil. Experience behind the wheel was preferred but not deemed essential.

Even before arriving in France, Allied planners recognized that many French roads were not wide enough to support two-way traffic when using large military vehicles. To overcome this problem, Red Ball planners created a closed loop system of one-way travel. Officially, the Red Ball Express route started at Saint-Lô, but drivers were often forced to pick up materials as far north as the harbor at Cherbourg. When Red Ball operations began, convoys delivered supplies to U.S. Army depots located between the French cities of Dreux, Chartres, and La Loupe. A convoy support center was established near the town of Alencon because it was the midpoint on the route, and the area could be accessed by both outbound and inbound traffic.²⁵ At Alencon, drivers could refuel, rest, and conduct unscheduled maintenance.

The Red Ball Express route was a one-way highway that was only open to its drivers. To prevent confusion, all vehicles on the route had to be clearly marked with Red Ball discs on the front and rear.²⁶ For efficiency, convoys were organized with a minimum of twenty vehicles and separated at fifty-five meter intervals unless operating in congested areas. Although drivers rarely adhered to the rule, the speed limit was set at twenty-five miles per hour.²⁷ Convoy commanders were officers and were generally positioned in the trail, while a noncommissioned officer led the convoy from the head.²⁸

Convoys on the Red Ball Express were not permitted to stop except for a ten-minute break that occurred ten minutes before each hour.²⁹ Driving teams were expected to be back on the road at the hour mark. After six hours of consecutive driving, soldiers were authorized a thirty-minute break for food, but these stops did not occur in urban areas. To meet the massive supply demands of the front, Red Ball operations were to run nonstop. Drive teams would often skip their breaks to save time and were known to switch drivers without stopping their vehicles. When operating at night, low-beam headlights were permitted west of the light line but not allowed near combat zones to avoid targeting by German artillery or aircraft.

Five days after Red Ball’s inception, 132 companies composed of nearly 6,000 vehicles delivered 12,300 tons of supply in one day.³⁰ This feat represented Red Ball’s single-day record for tonnage delivered. In spite of this accomplishment, Red Ball was unable to meet its target of 82,000 tons by 1 September.³¹ However, Allied planners extended the Red Ball mission after rail operations also failed to deliver the quota. By 5 September, the Red Ball Express had exceeded its original goal by delivering 89,000 tons to the La Loupe, Dreux, and Chartres triangle.³² With few other options available in France, sustainers were forced to extend Red Ball operations through the fall.

Soldiers load trucks with combat rations in preparation for a convoy to the front line 21 December 1944 in the European theater of operations. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

Running on Fumes

During the offensive across France, sustainment units were challenged to keep pace with the demanding operational tempo. Tremendous amounts of POL were needed to sustain U.S. mechanized units. By the end of August, the U.S. Armies in northern France were consuming eight hundred thousand gallons of gasoline per day.³³ Early plans relied on the construction of three pipelines out of Normandy to support frontline forces, but this effort proved unfeasible. By August, work on the three-pipeline system was cancelled and service units focused instead on the construction of one primary pipeline.³⁴

With vehicles in constant need of petroleum at the front, the Red Ball Express began delivering Motor Transport 80 octane (MT 80) and Aviation 100 octane (AV 100). When fuel tankers were unavailable, POL products were transported in fifty-five gallon drums, which weighed nearly one hundred pounds empty.³⁵ Petroleum was often distributed in the five-gallon gas can known among soldiers as the “jerrican.”

Adopted from a German design, one jerrican weighed ten pounds empty and forty pounds full.³⁶ In 1944, fifty cans could fit in a one-ton trailer, 250 in a five-ton cargo space, and five hundred fit in a ten-ton semitrailer.³⁷ The United States had twelve million jerricans before D-Day, but because fuel depots were high-value targets for the Germans and because jerricans were often inappropriately discarded by soldiers, sustainers expected to lose eight hundred thousand of them per month starting in August and September. By October, Quartermaster units were short 3.5 million jerricans, forcing the War Department to seek production at home and abroad.³⁸

With POL at a premium, Red Ball convoys were under standing orders to depart with full fuel tanks and transport enough gasoline for an entire round trip.³⁹ To build fuel stores in forward areas, five additional jerricans were added to each logistics package and included on all Red Ball vehicles. No other supply class was given similar priority. From June to December 1944, Motor Transport Services hauled 423,000 tons of POL, much of which was stored in five-gallon jerricans.⁴⁰

The Red Ball Goes East

Liberated by the Allies in late August 1944, Paris became a hub for Allied sustainment. Returning Paris to Allied control provided an immeasurable morale boost to the war effort, but the French capital was also a major burden because its sizable population now relied on the military logistics network for basic supplies. As frontline soldiers marched on, the Red Ball Express altered its supply route extending its lines east of the French capital on 10 September. Red Ball’s expansion was significant for the sustainment effort as average round trips reached nearly one thousand kilometers.⁴¹

As the lines of communication stretched, sustainment leaders sought ways to improve efficiency and reduce the burden on both Red Ball operators and vehicles. Unlike northwest France, Allied bombers spared the rail network east of Paris. By late September, sustainers had established terminals and transfer points near Vincennes and Fontenay-sous-Bois.⁴² At these transfer points located at the outskirts of Paris, Red Ball trucks would drop their cargo, and under U.S. military supervision, French workers loaded the supplies onto trains for further movement.

Supporting the U.S. First Army in the north and Third Army in the south, Red Ball officially extended its route well beyond Paris to Hirson and Sommesous. Unofficially, drivers pushed their movements even further east to the cities of Verdun and Metz.⁴³ Convoys struggled with the new round trip that was now over 1,600 kilometers.⁴⁴ An uncharacteristically rainy autumn made shallow creeks nearly impassible, bloated rivers washed out bridges, and flooded fields could no longer be used for resupply. Difficult weather conditions added to the growing list of Red Ball problems.

Red Ball Challenges

The extension of the Red Ball Express toward the German border stretched an already shaky system. During the first phase of the Red Ball Express, drivers operated from the advanced section of the communications zone into field armies’ rear areas.⁴⁵ However, as the front continued to move further east, the second phase required passage through multiple sections of the communications zone to reach these areas. Communication failures and poor unity of effort hampered distribution and overall efficiency. These challenges required sustainers to improvise and adapt to meet demands at the front. One after action report declared that “orthodox supply procedures had been abandoned.”⁴⁶

A lack of enablers (a challenge from Red Ball’s inception) continued to plague Red Ball operations as Allied progress extended the lines of communication. For example, engineer units in France were in such high demand that they were often shuttled between First Army and Third Army.⁴⁷ The situation became so grave that the War Department deployed inexperienced stateside units to Europe to complete engineer training in rear areas.48 The dearth of engineers slowed construction on France’s rail network, which in turn added to the heavy load already shouldered by the motor transport service.

(Map by H. Damon, taken from Roland G. Ruppenthal’s Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume 1: May 1941–September 1944)

The loading and unloading process was another problem for sustainers. Early on, sustainers in the ETO had organized convoys into groups of forty vehicles. However, a lack of personnel and material handling equipment made loading and unloading so many vehicles far too time consuming.⁵⁰ Even after reducing the size of convoys to twenty vehicles, it could take from twelve to forty hours to load all of the cargo.⁵¹ Communications breakdowns frequently resulted in drivers getting lost or unloading at the wrong spot. Another systemic problem was poorly planned depots and transfer sites.⁵²

Maintenance remained a constant struggle for the duration of the Red Ball mission. At one point in September, twenty-seven truck companies, totaling approximately one thousand vehicles, went without maintenance for several days.⁵³ Not only did this violate well-established maintenance protocols, it seriously jeopardized operational readiness. On the return route between the towns of Chartres and Saint-Lô, no vehicle maintenance support was available at all. The lack of maintenance took a toll on engines and wheels. At one low point, American drivers had abandoned eighty-one loaded vehicles on the side of the road between Vire and Dreux.⁵⁴ Ignoring preventive maintenance intervals shortened the lifespan of vehicles, reduced lift capacity, and ultimately threatened future operations.

Under constant pressure to deliver, convoy discipline suffered, particularly in regards to speed limits and maintaining intervals. Red Ball mechanics would remove governors to allow an increase in the vehicles’ top speed. Even with convoys ignoring speed limits, some grueling round trips took Red Ball soldiers over fifty-three hours to complete.⁵⁵ Exhaustion and fatigue overwhelmed drivers. The prolonged pace of Red Ball was so demanding that even in teams of two, drivers often fell asleep behind the wheel. Accidents were a regular occurrence caused by burnout, speeding, poor road conditions, and collisions with unauthorized traffic.

A road patrol wrecker (right) pulls an overturned truck back on its wheels circa 1944 to haul it to the nearest heavy-automotive maintenance depot along the Red Ball Express route in the European theater of operations. Damaged trucks were repaired at once and put back into service. If a truck was damaged beyond repair, it was immediately replaced. (Photo by Lawrence Riordan/U.S. Army)

Although conducting a desperate, theater-wide defense, German ground and air forces remained a constant threat to convoys. As part of its retrograde, the Wehrmacht deployed snipers in urban areas and laid minefields along French roads. Having lost air superiority to the Allies, outnumbered Luftwaffe pilots avoided dogfights against Allied squadrons but targeted vulnerable supply lines and depots whenever possible. When delivering to forward positions, Red Ball drivers often encountered enemy resistance. Sustainers were forced to defend themselves, their vehicles, and their transfer sites.

Despite these internal and external challenges, the Red Ball Express delivered crucial supplies day after day. After conducting major operations for eighty-one consecutive days, the Red Ball Express was discontinued because reports indicated that rail and barge facilities were available east of Paris and the use of liberated harbors, like Antwerp, could shorten supply lines. From 25 August to 16 November, the soldiers of the Red Ball Express hauled more than four hundred thousand tons of supplies at a rate of over five thousand tons a day.⁵⁶ On most days, nine hundred vehicles would depart toward combat zones covering 1.5 million ton-miles.⁵⁷ By Thanksgiving 1944, the Red Ball Express completed more than 121 million ton-miles in only a matter of months.⁵⁸

From Red Ball to the XYZ

In addition to the Red Ball Express, several other Allied supply routes were established in the ETO such as the Little Red Ball Express, the White Ball Express, the Red Lion Express, the ABC Express, and the XYZ Express route. Of these, the XYZ Express route was the most transformative as it incorporated numerous lessons from the earlier Red Ball Express to provide continuous and responsive sustainment. One of the last hauls of the war, the XYZ Express route supported the final offensive into Germany. The name for the operation was devised as part of a three-phased system: Plan X required eight thousand tons per day, Plan Y required ten thousand tons per day, and Plan Z required twelve thousand tons per day.⁵⁹ Although trains were finally alleviating the stress on motorized transport in eastern France, logisticians anticipated rail networks inside the German border would not be serviceable because of damage caused by Allied bombing and enemy sabotage.

Adopting lessons learned during the Red Ball Express, the Motor Transportation Service provided the U.S. First, Third, Seventh, and Ninth Armies with either a provisional highway transportation division or a quartermaster group. Although not divisions in the traditional sense, the 6956th, 6957th, and 6958th Highway Transport Divisions (Provisional) and the 469th Quartermaster Group were task-organized to support their respective armies.⁶⁰ These sustainment units were equipped to travel three hundred kilometers past the Rhine River.⁶¹ Sustainers prepared to haul twenty-four thousand tons each day, but daily tonnage capability was expected to decrease slightly as units moved deeper into the German heartland.

Beginning on 25 March 1945, the XYZ established four supply routes originating from Belgium, Luxemburg, and France.⁶² Not only did this improve survivability for individual convoys, but it also ensured continuous support in the event one of the routes had to be temporarily closed. By the middle of April, the four U.S. armies were supplied well inside German territory. Unlike the early days of the Red Ball Express when fuel was often shipped via jerricans in 2.5 ton trucks, the XYZ Express incorporated tanker companies capable of delivering four thousand tons of POL per day.⁶³ Benefiting from its thirty-four companies of ten-ton semitrailers, the 6957th Highway Transport Division (Provisional) was capable of supplying the Third Army with ten thousand tons of supplies and a million gallons of POL per day.⁶⁴ The entire operation was aided by the repair of rail lines west of the Rhine, which alleviated pressure on the convoy system.

The XYZ’s coordination and synchronization across all levels of war enabled Allied forces to fight deep into the heart of Germany. In three months, the XYZ averaged close to 13,000 tons per day, delivering a total of 870,000 tons.⁶⁵ After “Victory in Europe,” the motor transportation service considered the XYZ Express one of the most successful operations of the war. These achievements would not have been possible without the experience garnered during the Red Ball Express.

Trucks from different units draw cans of gasoline 7 February 1945 from one of the storage fields in the quartermaster depot. After the five-gallon “jerricans” were washed, they were refilled from tankers on the beachheads and returned to the quartermaster depot. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

Conclusion

The Red Ball Express is an outstanding example of the challenges associated with sustaining LSCO. Even with years to plan and prepare, Allied sustainment units encountered serious challenges in France in 1944. After a pre-invasion exercise in England was cancelled, sustainment operations had to be executed in the combat zone without the benefit of a large-scale rehearsal. Although sustainers wanted to deploy a system that utilized a series of semitrailers, they were forced to rely on the smaller vehicles that were readily available in the ETO.

Like their German counterparts, Allied planners had been shocked by the speed of the breakout and offensive across France. While combat troops raced through the French countryside, each victory had consequences for the sustainers who were forced to expand their operations to keep pace. Allied success led to the creation of the Red Ball Express as a short-term solution. Motor transportation was the only viable option since supplies by rail, barge, and air were incapable of meeting the heavy logistical demands.

The sustainment situation on the ground became so desperate that volunteers were needed to fill out units. This was partially the result of combat units garnering deployment preference over sustainers. Operating on one of the longest routes in the ETO, many of the volunteer drivers had no experience in motor transportation, and some had never driven a truck before. The advancing Allied forces would have been forced to culminate without supplies, so the Red Ball Express went from being a short-term solution out of Normandy to a nonstop, open-ended mission across France. Plagued by poor infrastructure and the lack of enablers, the logistics network came perilously close to the brink of collapse. By the end of the Red Ball Express, exhaustion was causing a breakdown in morale and discipline. Vehicles were discarded along routes, supplies were sold on the black market, and drivers were dying in enemy attacks and roadway accidents.

U.S. drivers nap or relax on boxes of ammunition and other equipment 10 October 1944 during the delivery of supplies to a forward area in France. The supply train is one of the Red Ball convoys that constituted an endless chain of trucks operating to and from the front on one-way roads. The highways were marked with Red Ball priority signs and were reserved for urgent supplies. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

As a result of learning from the successes and failures of the Red Ball Express, Army planners initiated several changes before the XYZ Express drove into Germany. One of the most significant improvements was the decision to attach veteran transportation divisions to each Army, thereby providing continuous and responsive support. The XYZ Express proved so successful that it became the sustainment standard for future operations.

Today’s sustainers must prepare to meet similar challenges to those experienced on the Red Ball Express. As the Army continues to transition away from persistent, limited-contingency operations and prepares for the potential for large-scale combat, it is imperative that the sustainment community recognizes and trains for the demands this will place on the transportation and distribution network. Planners must conduct detailed analysis and careful force tailoring to ensure the appropriate mix of enablers are available to facilitate integrated and responsive sustainment. Leaders must build adaptable organizations capable of improvising to account for both immature theaters and the degraded infrastructure commonly associated with large-scale combat. Embracing these realities and preparing for them will yield a decided advantage to Army sustainers on the twenty-first-century battlefield.

Notes

¹ Gordon Harrison, The European Theater of Operations: Cross-Channel Attack (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office [GPO], 1951; repr., 1989), 19.

² See General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps (Frankfurt, Germany: Headquarters, U.S. Forces, European Theater, 1945), 3. The War Department established the Transportation Corps in 1942.

³ Roland G. Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1: May 1941-September 1941 (Alexandria, VA: Saint John’s Press, 1995), 559.

⁴ Report of Operations: Final After Action Report, 12th Army Group, Vol. 1, Summary (London: Headquarters, 12th Army Group, 31 July 1945), 21.

⁵ Ibid., 22.

⁶ Ibid., 95.

⁷ Charles MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign (1963; repr., Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 2001), 4.

⁸ Martin Blumenson, The European Theater of Operations: Breakout and Pursuit (Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 1961), 691.

⁹ Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 558.

¹⁰ Ibid.

¹¹ Report of Operations, 22.

¹² Ibid.

¹³ Joseph Bykofsky and Harold Larson, The Technical Services: The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas (1957; repr., Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 1973), 331.

¹⁴ Report of Operations, 96.

¹⁵ Service units, which were responsible for missions such as vehicle maintenance and rail reconstruction, were deployed to France at a much slower rate than combat units.

¹⁶ There is disagreement between Bykofsky and Larson in The Technical Services on page 331 and Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, on page 558.

¹⁷ Loren Ayers, “Truck Loading Reference Data,” Headquarters European Theater of Operations, U.S. Army, Office of the Chief of Transportation, Motor Transport Division, March 1944, 1.

¹⁸ Ibid., table X-A.

¹⁹ General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps, 15.

²⁰ Ulysses Lee, Special Studies: The Employment of Negro Troops (1966; repr., Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 1970), 415.

²¹ Ibid., 637–38.

²² Ibid., 633.

²³ World War II Exhibit, Ground Transportation, U.S. Army Transportation Museum, Fort Eustis, VA, 24 July 2019.

²⁴ Report of Operations, 21–22.

²⁵ Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 563.

²⁶ Headquarters, European Theater of Operations, United States Army, Standing Operating Procedure No. 53: Red Ball Motor Transportation Operations, 2 December 1944, 3.

²⁷ Ibid., 2.

²⁸ Ibid.

²⁹ Ibid., 3.

³⁰ Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 560.

³¹ Traffic control personnel were sent to the wrong towns, which led to lost convoys and time.

³² Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 560.

³³ Blumenson, The European Theater of Operations, 691.

³⁴ Report of Operations, 23.

³⁵ Ayers, Truck Loading Reference Data, 13.

³⁶ Ibid.

³⁷ Ibid.

³⁸ Roland G. Ruppenthal, The European Theater of Operations: Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 2: September 1944-May 1945 (1959; repr., Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 1969), 202–3.

³⁹ Standard Operating Procedure No. 53: Red Ball Motor Transportation Operations, 3.

⁴⁰ Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 331.

⁴¹ General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps, 34.

⁴² Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 334.

⁴³ Ibid.

⁴⁴ General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps, 34.

⁴⁵ Ibid., 23.

⁴⁶ Report of Operations, 92.

⁴⁷ Ibid., 83.

⁴⁸ Ibid.

⁴⁹ Standard Operating Procedure No. 53: Red Ball Motor Transportation Operations, 1.

⁵⁰ General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps, 35.

⁵¹ Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 565.

⁵² General Board, Motor Transport Service as a Permanent Part of the Transportation Corps, 34-35.

⁵³ Ruppenthal, Logistical Support of the Armies, Vol. 1, 565.

⁵⁴ Ibid.

⁵⁵ Lee, Special Studies, 663.

⁵⁶ Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 334.

⁵⁷ Lee, Special Studies, 663.

⁵⁸ Ibid.

⁵⁹ Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 337.

⁶⁰ Ibid., 338–39.

⁶¹ Report of Operations, 97.

⁶² Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 337.

⁶³ Report of Operations, 97.

⁶⁴ Bykofsky and Larson, The Technical Services, 337.

⁶⁵ Ibid.

Operation Overlord

by Gen. George C. Marshall

Logistics Vol.1. No.2. January 1946

IT was resolved at Casablanca to resume amassing in the United Kingdom as quickly as possible the force necessary to invade Western Europe. This build-up was to be one of the most tremendous logistical undertakings in military history.

It required provision for the transportation, shelter, hospitalization, supply, training, and general welfare of 1,200,000 men who had to be embarked in the United States and transported across the submarine infested Atlantic to the United Kingdom. The hospital plan alone, for example, called for 94,000 beds in existing installations, conversions, and new construction. The program was later increased by tent accommodations for 30,000 more beds. Living quarters had to be furnished for the assault forces and their supply troops. There had to be provision for 20,000,000 square feet of covering, storage, and shop space, and 44,000,000 square feet of open storage and hard standings. Parks for 50,000 military vehicles were planned; 270 miles of railroad had to be constructed. More than 20,000 railroad cars and 1,000 locomotives were to be shipped to the United Kingdom. The Air Force required 163 fields, seven centers for combat crews and replacements, accommodations for 450,000 men, and 8,500,000 square feet of storage and shop space.

Two-thirds of the vast program of air installation required new construction by British and United States engineers. At the same time the invasion operations required detailed planning for the installations we would have to build once ashore in France — hospitals, depots, shops, railroads, pipelines, and bridging materials. There was stored in the United Kingdom, for example, all the construction materials necessary to rehabilitate completely the port of Cherbourg, the destruction of which was inevitable.

By July 1943 the flow of materiel from the United States to Britain had reached 753,000 tons a month which later was to increase to 1,900,000 tons in the month preceding the attack. It was necessary to construct and to allocate from existing resources a total of 3,780 assault craft of various types and 142 cargo ships. A great many of the assault craft were oceangoing vessels.

At the time of the QUADRANT Conference at Quebec in August 1943, there had been but a single United States division in the United Kingdom and our trans-Atlantic shipping effort was concentrated on filling the heavy requirements of the Mediterranean campaign. By late August 1943, shipping was partially released from this heavy commitment and troops again began to pour into the British Isles. On D-day, 6 June 1944, the strength of the United States Army in that theater was 1,533,000; in the interim an average of 150,000 men had been transported each month.

The build-up of this force, together with a corresponding accumulation of supplies of all kinds, involved a tremendous job of transportation, and special credit must be given to the Navy for its vital part in the undertaking. An enormous administrative task was also involved, since facilities for quartering and training such large forces had to be provided within the limited area of the United Kingdom. The efficiency of the pre-invasion build-up is exemplified by the speed with which units landing in Britain were provided with their essential arms and equipment. Through a system of pre-shipping and storing, the Army Service Forces were able to have equipment distributed and waiting for each unit on, its arrival. Within a maximum of 30 days after debarking, divisions were fully equipped for action.

The beaches of Normandy were chosen for the assault after long study of the strength of German coastal defenses and the disposition of German divisions. The absence of large ports in the area was a serious obstacle, but it was offset in some measure by the relative weakness of the German defenses and elaborate construction in Britain of two artificial harbors to be emplaced off the beaches.

In spite of the lack of a major port, the build-up in the beachhead was completed late in July. The armies were still dependent on beachhead supply for their sustenance. Even with unseasonable bad weather which severely damaged and almost destroyed one of the two artificial port installations and halted unloading operations many times, an average of some 30,000 tons of supplies and 30,000 troops were handled every day. These achievements, without precedent in history, were not anticipated by the German defenders.

On 25 August the 2d French Armored Division of the First U. S. Army entered Paris, as the battered remnants of the German army which had defended the Normandy coast fell back north of the Seine. The Germans had suffered at least 400,000 casualties, of which more than 200,000 were prisoners of war. The units which had escaped destruction were forced to abandon the major portion of their equipment.

As the enemy withdrew he had left behind substantial garrisons to defend the critical seaports: Brest, St. Nazaire, Lorient, Dieppe, and LeHavre. In order to prevent the Allies from developing habor facilities to sustain the advance of the gathering millions, the Germans freely expended thouśands of men to make the supply problem difficult if not impossible of accomplishment.

Despite these obstructions, by 5 September (D+90) 2,086,000 Allied troops and 3,446,000 tons of stores had been put ashore in France. This was an outstanding logistical achievement, but nevertheless we were still in urgent need of additional ports if we were to support adequately the fast-moving offensive across France that was operating on a dangerously thin supply basis. Many divisions had a very limited supply on hand.

On 5 September the Ninth U. S. Army under the command of Lt. Gen. William H. Simpson began operations under the 12 th Army Group for the reduction of Brest and other French ports, where four German divisions were bottled up. Dieppe fell on 31 August; LeHavre on 1 1 September; Brest on 19 September. The most strenuous efforts were made to put these ports into operating condition. Tonnage began moving through Dieppe on 7 September and through LeHarve on 9 October. Brest was too heavily damaged and too distant from future fields of operations to justify immediate reconstruction.

As the Allies approached the German border, supply lines were stretched to the limit and the marching columns of the armies were maintained only by the full use of air transportation, fast double-lane, oneway truck routes, such as the famous Red Ball Express from the Normandy beaches to Paris, and other emergency measures. Logistical difficulties now began to slow down the advance. Time was needed for the opening of additional ports and for the relaying and repair of hundreds of miles of French railroads.

The following extract from a report by General Eisenhower indicates the severity of the campaign in France and illustrates the tremendous needs of our armies during this campaign, in addition to the routine consumption of gasoline and rations:

Losses of ordnance equipment have been extremely high. For instance, we must have as replacement items each month 36,000 small arms, 700 mortars, 500 tanks, 2,400 vehicles, 100 field pieces. Consumption of artillery and mortar ammunition in northwestern Europe averages 8,000,000 rounds a month. Our combat troops use up an average of 66,400 miles of one type of field wire each month. (The AEF during the entire First World War expended less than 10,000,000 rounds of artillery and mortar ammunition.)¹

The ports of southern France were vital to the U. S. Seventh Army and the French First Army in the Southern Group of Armies. Toulon and Marseille were in operation late in September. Since then 14 divisions were moved through Southern French ports, in addition to an average daily unloading of over 18,000 tons of supplies. Two railways were placed in early operation, including the double-track main line through Lyon and Dijon, and thousands of tons of supplies moved daily over these lines and by truck to forward railheads. Port capacities and transportation facilities were sufficient to meet the requirements of the entire Southern Group of Armies and also to assist in the supply of the Central Group of Armies until the defense of the water entrance to Antwerp was reduced.

After the port of Antwerp became operational, it handled on an average of over 25,000 tons of stores daily, despite the V bombs. This tremendous increase in our over-all port capacity made it unnecessary to devote more precious time and manpower to reopen the shattered ports in Brittany, which, although now in our hands, were much more distant from the front lines than Antwerp.

Having overcome the acute shortage of port facilities, the primary bottleneck in the supply line then became transportation from the port supply dumps to the frönt lines. To improve this situation our Engineers, Transportation Corps, and other supply troops in Lt. Gen. J. C. H. Lee's communications zone performed miracles in repairing and building railways, operating large high-speed truck convoys, and extending fuel pipelines from the ports and terminals of 16 cross-Channel pipelines to the forward areas.

AS the Siegfried Line was approached, and the port and enlarged transportation facilities became adequate, General Eisenhower advised the War Department that tactical plans for the final assault of this fortification required greater ammunition resources than those provided, and requested a maximum production effort in the United States. He forecast the expenditure of some 6,000,000 artillery and 2,000,000 mortar shells monthly in order to reduce the Siegfried Line. In this countryan urgent demand was made for maximum production; fast rail and water transportation was utilized to make shipments direct from the production lines to the gun positions, and rationing to less active theaters, as well as stabilized fronts in the European theater itself, became rigid. Only by these measures was it possible to serve the thousands of guns behind the major assault efforts and secure an adequate supply of ammunition for the final battles against Germany.

The powerful Wehrmacht disintegrated under the combined Allied blows, and the swift advances into the mountains of Austria and Bohemia had prevented the establishment of an inner fortress. Surrounded on all fronts by chaos and overwhelming defeat, the emissaries of the German government surrendered to the Allies at Reims on 7 May 1945, all land, sea, and air forces of the' Reich.

Note

1. Extracts from the 1945 Biennial Report of the Chief of Staff of the U. S. Army to the Secretary of War.

Stright Down our Alley

by Captain Douglas M. Jacobs, Office, Director of Operations, OCT

Army Transportation Journal, Vol. 1. No. 1. February 1945

U.S. Army trucks driving through watery roadway. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

"WHEN Hitler put this war on wheels, he ran it straight down our alley." General Somervell said that two years ago, but it wasn't until the invasion of France that the truth of his remark became self-evident. Then, with the Germans staking their main defense effort on holding the ports and their railheads, and later, by systematically destroying them, the initial burden of supplying the Allied armies in the field was placed on highway transportation.

The tremendous accomplishment of planning, building, installing, and operating the artificial harbors which made the successful invasion of France possible, had its counterpart in the organization and operation of the highway transport system which supplied the armies as they battled out of the Normandy peninsula and pushed the enemy back to the German border at an unprecedented rate of speed.

Because the movement of huge quantities of cargo over American highways is usual, and because the type of equipment used in such hauls is recognized for its fine performance all over the world, there was a tendency to accept as commonplace the movement of supplies by highway in the theaters of operation. Actually, it has not been an easy task. It has required all the ingenuity of experienced highway transportation workers serving in the Army to develop a system which achieves high efficiency in supply movements regardless of the problems which may be met.

To some extent, the well-publicized achievements of the Red Ball Express, and of the Green Diamond and White Ball Express routes in France and Belgium, have glamorized the activities of the Transportation Corps in highway transportation. But, except for those whose work it is, few know that these achievements were made possible by men who learned much from earlier truck operations in this war, which, although more limited in scope, were no less decisive. For while our military highway transportation system in France was the result of German defensive plans and methods, it was actually developed in numerous other operations, including those on the Burma Road, in Iran, North Africa, and Italy.

The Red Ball Express was discontinued on November 13. 1944, its mission accomplished after 81 days of operation. During that time it carried more than half a million tons from the coast for 700 miles across France to supply the armies pursuing the Germans. Without it, there could have been no such pursuit, and the liberation of France would have been delayed. At its peak, the Red Ball Express hauled 9,000 tons of supplies a day, long before that, however, the experience which made such an achievement possible was gained, in part, in the Persian Gulf Command, where hauls of 650 miles cross country which rises from sea-level to over 8,000 feet, and where temperatures range from 140° F. in summer to 20 below zero in the winter. It was gained in North Africa when Rommel broke through our lines at Kasserine Pass and destroyed the rail facilities, and when 2,000 trucks took up the task of supplying our forces and accomplished it successfully. More of such experience was gained when 1,150 trucks moved 4,000 tons of rations in three days from Casablanca to eastern Algeria, returning with prisoners of war, and running non-stop schedules each way, and again in Italy where as many as 11,000 vehicles per day have moved over blacktop highways.

The Ledo Road, which will connect the railroad system in India with the old Burma Road and provide an overland route from Calcutta to the China battlefields, is almost completed. Already several thousands of tons a month are being moved forward to support the road construction and combat operations in North Burma. Soon vital tonnage will start to flow by highway into China. This will be one of the longest and most difficult trucking operations ever undertaken. At present, highway transport is operating in China east of Kunming, picking up tonnage flown over "the hump" and carrying it forward 400 miles to supply General Chennault's 14th Air Force. Although this is the toughest road that ever confronted truck operators, Transportation Corps officers have succeeded in moving a heavy tonnage, utilizing limited and untrained personnel and operating worn-out Chinese trucks, supplemented by light equipment which has been flown in.

None of these accomplishments would have been possible, of course, were it not for the men and women of the American automotive industry who built the equipment, and those who operated the big truck fleets, built and maintained our highway system, and developed the regulation of traffic which, in peace time, moved in greater quantities and at higher speeds than anywhere else in the world. It is upon this firm base that our military highway transportation system is built.

Although "line of communications" hauling, such as that performed by the Red Ball Express and similar operations in North Africa and Europe, is more spectacular, other highway transportation is equally important. "Port clearance" by truck moves millions of tons of supplies from port areas to dumps and depots, while "static operations" transport huge quantities in short hauls from camps and depots to railroad loading points, and from the ends of railroad lines to other dumps and depots.

Much highway transportation in the earlier days of the war was performed by truck companies allocated to specific installations, each of which operated with individual fluctuations in vehicle requirements. The present tendency is to concentrate all highway transportation under the Transportation Corps in order that centralized control may be exercised and transport reassigned at will according to the operational requirements of the theater. Today, the Transportational Corps řš providing the leadership, the planning and supervision which are essential to the efficient operation of highway transportation under the most difficult circumstances, and which will be even more necessary with the growing importance of the India, Burma, China areas and in the Pacific area as operations are extended.

Among the many important developments in military highway transportation during thé present war, one of the most important has been that affecting movement control and traffic direction. For, no matter how good the equipment, nor how willing or efficient the maintenance and driving personnel, the fact remains that highway transportation is limited by road capacity. Because Transportation Corps officers have developed efficient systems of picking up cargo and routing it on precise schedules to avoid interference and to achieve maximum movement, the limitations normally imposed by the condition and availability of highways have been minimized in the theaters of operation.

The Transportation Corps has been active not only in designing and putting into operation systems for the efficient management of highway transportation, but also in designing efficient types of vehicles to handle cargo. The truck-tractor and semitrailer, for example, now being procured in the greatest quantities for the European Theater of Operations, is a Transportation Corps development. This unit has more space for cargo than die common oversea military railway gondola freight car. A standard 21/2-ton truck has been redesigned by the Transportation Corps to provide almost twice the normal cargo space on the same chassis.

These improvements in equipment are paralleled by similar improvements in operating techniques which the speed and the volume of movements while actually saving substantial amounts of manpower.

U.S. Army trucks inline at a port. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army)

What the Transportation Corps has done in the field of highway transportation it has not accomplished alone. Without the technical assistance and personal effort of those in the other services, it would have, been impossible. Those who build and repair the highways, direct the traffic, string the telephone wires, repair and maintain the equipment, feed the drivers, and care for the sick and injured, have all helped to make our military highway transportation what is today. Above all, the human valor which goes into the seemingly unromantic job of moving supplies has been the decisive contribution. It is this quality which led Sgt. Irwin Swerdlow to write, of the Red Ball Express, in YANK:

"Since D-Day the real American secret weapon on the Continent has been two hands frozen to the steering wheel—white hands and black hands—driving 200 to 300 miles in a single day to get gasoline and ammunition and gasoline and rations and more gasoline to the armies of Patton and Hodges.

"Truck drivers have worked 20 hours a day, and when their trucks zigzagged, they stopped, splashed cold water on their faces and drove on. They carried their duffel bags with them and slept on piles of ruins which had scarcely cooled from the heat of battle. For months they went without mail.

"But they got the supplies to the front, and, if necessary, they died with their hands on their wheels."

Intensified operations in Italy, on the Continent, in China, and Burma, are definitely related to our ability to move supplies through the ports and overland to points where they are needed. This is the job in which the highway transportation must do its important part. And the experiences of the past have demonstrated that highway transportation will come through. To quote Sgt. Swerdlow again: "The men of the TC always do."

The Battle of the Ports

One battle that hastened V-E Day

by Irwin Ross

Transportation Corps, United States Army, and former editor of "Threshold"

Current Histoy, Vol. 8, No. 46, (June, 1945)

When Le Havre was captured in mid-September, the port was completely destroyed. Repairs began immediately. By December 2, Le Havre was handling more tonnage than before the war. Another triumph had been scored in the Battle of the Ports.

From D-Day on, the Battle of the Ports had a decisive influence on the Allied campaign in western Europe—an influence no less important for being generally overlooked. The Germans did not stake everything on preventing a beachhead, or beating it back once it was established. One of their primary aims was to block our flow of supplies, causing our armies to bog down and fafl easy prey to their counter-attack. To accomplish this aim, the Germans tenaciously hung on to the continental ports until long after we expected to capture them, and then systematically destroyed all harbor installations before surrender. As an extension of the same strategy, the Wehrmacht wrecked railroad track, bridges, marshalling yards in their retreat across France.

It was a realistic strategy. It was bested only by superior organization, resources and on-the-spot improvisation. At the outset, the Transportation Corps employed ingenious beachhead operations to make up for the lack of ports. Once we took the ports, the lag in the Allied timetable was overcome by unorthodox repairs and harbor operations the like of which had never been seen. In moving supplies from the ports to the armies, trucking systems unparalleled in military history replaced the damaged railroads. When the railroads got into operation, the rule books had to be tossed out and the GI hogheads were soon hauling more materiel than the trucks.

The German strategy was defeated to the extent that our armies last summer were able to sweep the Wehrmacht out of France and Belgium. But the Germans were partially successful: the delays in capturing the ports, the difficulties in transporting supplies across France, meant that sufficient material reserves were not on hand to allow the armies to break through the West Wall before the Germans had time to stabilize the front.

The Germans held the initial advantage. They first knocked our schedule askew at Cherbourg, the Nazi garrison holding out in the forts rimming the outer harbor until June 27. Not until the end of August was there a rebuilt wharf onto which a ship could unload. Brest, which withstood the pounding of naval guns, aerial bombardment and the assault of three American infantry divisions, did not fall until late in September. It was so heavily damaged that no estimate was given as to when repairs could be completed. Lorient and St. Nazàire held out to the end ; they were known as the "forgotten front."

The capture of the major ports of Le Havre and Rouen was also delayed, and once again Transportation Corps officials faced arduous repairs before operations could reach their normal level. In September, Antwerp was quickly captured, and for once the Germans did not have time to wreck the port. But Antwerp could not be used until the Nazis were blasted out of their positions at the mouth of the Scheldt estuary—which in the end involved a murderous seaborne attack by British Marine commandos against a well-forti-fied garrison of 7,000 Nazis. When it was over, the Allies were finally in complete control of Antwerp, but much time had to be consumed in minesweeping and dredging before the port could operate.

II

The beaches won the first round of the Battle of the Ports. These two strips of sand, which were intended to handle the initial American supply load, were continuously forced to boost their tonnage goals—to compensate, first, for the delay in opening Cherbourg and, later, for the lack of other ports.

The success of the entire invasion depended on the beaches. Port operations that normally proceed in the quiet, sheltered waters of a harbor—with wharves, railroad spurs and huge dockside cranes ready at hand—had to be carried on from the open sea across an unprotected stretch of sand. High winds and an unruly surf were frequent hazards. The Germans added mines, submarines, bomber planes.

On June 8, when the first transportation soldiers waded ashore from their landing craft, their initial job was to help the engineers clean up the beach. The cleared away mines, corpses, wrecked guns, vehicles, landing craft. And then operations started.

Lacking the shore-line deep water of a harbor, the ships dropped anchor far out from the beach. Landing craft, barges, amphibious trucks called "ducks" pulled up to the freighters and received the cargo that Port Battalion stevedores slung over the shipsides. Landing craft and ducks made it into shore under their own power, the barges were towed and beached by tugboats. At a transfer point close to the waterline, the cargo was reloaded onto trucks, and the trucks sped away to dumps further inland. The Germans bombed and strafed the beaches long after the land fighting had moved out of range.

On the water there were other problems: small cargo craft running afoul of half-submerged hulks of sunken boats, striking mines, losing their way among the ships at night.

Coordination and control of operations were difficult to achieve. To unload as many ships as possible, the disposition of stevedores, trucks, and small craft had to be carefully coordinated. Traffic jams were a constant problem at transfer points and dumps. The boats and vehicles worked twenty-four hours a day, strained under overloads, had to be quickly repaired if they broke down.

At one of the beaches an ingenious artificial harbor was partially built, but it was destroyed by storm before it could be completed. Over-age vessels and huge concrete caissons were sunk to make a breakwater. Pierheads weighing 1,000 tons supported floating causeways that ran out from the beach. The completed harbor would have been as large as Gibraltar. But the hurricane of June 20 wrecked the piers and causeways, stopped all operations for three days, and left as much debris strewn over the beach as on D-Day. It was impossible to reconstruct the artificial harbor in sufficient time. The breakwater, however, cut the fury of the waves and remained of permanent value. What equipment could be salvaged from the wreck was turned over to the British, who had a similar artificial harbor at Arromanches which was better protected and had managed to withstand the storm. Despite the hurricane, by the time Cherbourg was captured on June 27, more than 200,000 tons of cargo had rolled in over the two beaches. The initial supply battle had been won.

The German strategy had received its first major set-back. The Wehrmacht had gambled that we could never move such a huge volume of tonnage directly off the seas. But the beaches themselves could not indefinitely sustain the American armies—deep-water harbors were an imperative necessity.

III

The second round in the Battle of the Ports involved the struggle against German demolitions at Cherbourg, Rouen and Le Havre. At all three cities the process of getting the port back into operation was essentially the same. The Germans had strewn mines in every direction, blocked channels by sinking every ship in sight. They destroyed wharves, rail spurs, warehouses, roads, telephone lines.

The German demolitions would have succeeded in their purpose if operations had to await the completion of repairs. Instead, we adapted beachhead methods to harbor work and were able to bring in cargo as soon as the Navy swept the waters of mines. That, in brief, is the secret of Allied success in opening the ports.

Once the waters were safe, ships entered the harbor and anchored in mid-stream. Ducks, and barges towed by tugboats, ferried supplies from ship to shore. Starting with a tiny trickle, tonnage figures gradually mounted day by day.

Meantime, the Navy and the Engineers carried on repairs. Months after Cherbourg, Rouen, Le Havre admitted their first ships, the ports continued to be improved and enlarged. The waters were cleared of sunken craft and wharves were repaired, in order that ships could tie up and unload directly onto land—a method that immensely speeds up the discharge of cargo. To move the cargo from the port area, roads and railroad track had to be repaired. At the same time, bridges, telephone and radio communication, electric power lines needed to be built.

That is just the rough outline. The same pattern held for southern France, where Marseilles, captured August 28, supplied the American 7th Army. But each port presented a different set-up. Rouen, for instance, had been badly damaged by both enemy demolitions and Allied bombing, yet the quayside was left in relatively decent shape. At Cherbourg, the first port captured, the pre-war tonnage capacity had to be greatly increased, for in peacetime Cherbourg had been a passenger rather than a cargo port. With the delay in capturing the other ports, Cherbourg and the beaches had to carry the whole burden of supplying the American armies on the continent.

To meet the demands placed on Cherbourg, soldier and civilian stevedores worked around-the-clock. Night operations at the bassin a flot in the heart of the city proceeded under the bright glare of dozens of powerful floodlights. Emergencies continually had to be met by improvisations. Even after the Navy had cleared the waters, mines remained a hazard to large and small craft.

In Le Havre, the engineers faced possibly their biggest harbor repair job. Once again, the Army paid the price of wide-spread Allied bombardments which had been devastatingly effective.

In one month, over 1,000,000 long tons of supplies were put ashore on the continent—at the beaches, Cherbourg, Le Havre, Rouen and Antwerp. But victory in the Battle of the Ports necessarily involved more than successful unloading and port clearance. Supplies had to be fed to the armies in the field. In July and August, all cargo entered France at Cherbourg, the beaches and a few small ports close by. The Germans considered it impossible for the Allies quickly to extend their fighting lines from supply bases so far in the rear. But we did just that.

After the St. Lo breakthrough on July 25, the Battle for France developed into a war of movement on the grand scale, covering more territory in shorter time than the Germans did in 1940. Our armor advanced so rapidly that the dumps had to remain in their original location in Normandy. Supplies had to move over ever more elastic transport lines to reach the front.

At first, truck movements were rather haphazard. A convoy of trucks would roll into a supply dump, get loaded up and be flagged down the road. Their destination: a forward army supply dump. The men were on the go for two, three, four days at a time, eating K-rations, occasionally pulling over to the side of the road to catch a little sleep. Sometimes, when they arrived at their destination, they found that the dump had moved. Off they went again. The armies got their supplies, but the system was chaotic, wasteful. As the transport lines kept extending, it became imperative that a more orderly method be instituted

The result was the Red Ball Express, which began operations on August 24. Four times the length of the Burma Road, it was the greatest military truck haul in history. Thousands of vehicles—each bearing the round red disk signifying priority cargo—and eleven thousand drivers, 60 per cent of them Negro, worked the Red Ball. From start to finish, it was a carefully organized, precisely regulated operation. Red Ball took over a two-road high way network running across France. Traffic moved one-way—forward to the front on one road, return on the other.

Red Ball was an immediate success. A few days after it began, cargo moved to the front increased forty per cent. During its 81 days of operation, over 500,000 tons of supplies were hauled.

While Red Ball supported the American thrust toward the German border, the railroads were gradually getting up steam. By mid-September, they were moving more cargo than Red Ball—10,000 tons a day as against 6,000. But before army railroadmen could reach this figure, they had to solve a multitude of complex problems. Wreckage left by German demolitions and Allied bombing was the first obstacle to be overcome. Before any trains could run, tracks, yatds, bridges had to be repaired. Captured equipment needed to be rehabilitated—for the Americans had little else in the way of engines and rolling stock when they first arrived. Meantime, the program of ferrying engines and cars from England to France—conceived as early as 1942 by Major General Frank S. Ross, Chief of Transportation in the European Theater—had to be coordinated with the progress of operations, for captured' stock was inadequate to do the whole job required of the railroads. At the same time, repairs had to go forward on communication lines, fuel and water points—necessary adjuncts to any smoothly functioning railway system.

The first trains running in July and August, while they did not carry anywhere near the total tonnage of the Red Ball, frequently played a crucial part in the advance—for they hauled top-priority cargo in support of specific engagements. The trains followed close behind the crews repairing the lines. They needed little more than a piece of track to run on.

While the early trains were pioneering a new chapter in the history of American railroading, the Engineers were busy on repairs, and the Navy was carrying increasing amounts of railway equipment across the Channel. In the first six months of the invasion, the Engineers rebuilt more than 4,500 miles of double and 2,000 miles of single track. As for the ferrying program, it was initially delayed by the tardiness in capturing Cherbourg and the difficulties in rebuilding it. That obstacle overcome, more than 20,000 railway cars were transported to the continent. They were prefabricated in the United States, shipped in knocked-down sections to England, assembled there by the army railroads who later ran them in France and Belgium. More than 1,300 steam and diesel locomotives also came to England from the States. After the invasion, both engines and cars were ferried to France on LST's, barges, and "sea-trains"—large freighters built to carry railway stock.

IV

By the time Rouen and Le Havre opened, it was evident that we had won the Battle of the Ports so far as the campaign in France was concerned. The long term advantage lay with the Allies, for the new ports greatly shortened supply lines. Their possession assured our final triumph in the battle. In February, we were able to launch a large-scale offensive into the heart of Germany.

The transportation picture in the spring of 1945 was altogether better than in the previous summer. The ports were larger, the supply lines shorter. Antwerp, although subject to incessant attack by V-bombs, was able to handle prodigious amounts of tonnage ever since it hit its stride. The railroads had time to get completely organized. Half of the French inland waterways system was open to traffic by January, further relieving the burden ontrucks and rails.

On the Red Ball highway, the round trip between Normandy and the front ran up to , 1,000 miles. Using Le Havre and Rouen, the trip to the southern front was cut by 300 miles, that to the northern by as much as 800 miles. As a consequence, it was possible to end Red Ball on November 13. The Green Diamond run, from supply bases in Normandy to railheads in Brittany, was also discontinued.

Meantime, the beaches greatly decreased operations and most of the minor ports in Brittany and Normandy closed down. Cherbourg no longer handled any appreciable amount of high priority cargo. The railroads were now sufficiently repaired to haul the bulk of supplies originating in Normandy.

Expansion of motor transport instead occurred on the White Ball route, which ran from Rouen and Le Havre to railheads in Paris and points east, and on the ABC (American, British, Canadian) highway, which linked Antwerp and Liege. The White Ball, in operation from early October until late December, was run along the same lines as the old Red Ball Express. By mid-November, it was hauling over 3,000 tons a day. The ABC route—American-operated but running through territory controlled by the British and Canadians—was a distinct innovation. Only ten-ton tractor-trailers were used, which allowed much more tonnage to be carried by less equipment than would have been the case with the two and a half ton trucks. In its 117 days of operation, ending March 26, ABC hauled a total of 244,924 tons of supplies.

With the opening of the Rhine offensive in March, the ABC run was ended, and a new truck haul—Operation XYZ—was begun to supply the armies as they drove deep into Germany. On the seventh day of operation, a figure of 12,000 tons a day was reached. XYZ was thus moving twice the amount of supplies as Red Ball.

As for the railroads, the period following the opening of the additional Channel ports was one of continual consolidation and mounting tonnages. In September, 10,000 tons a day were hauled; January saw the daily tonnage rate top 43,000; in early April, tonnages on a peak day hit 129,000. Railroad conditions returned so far to normal that many lines were delegated to native railroaders for operation, with the proviso that military cargo got top priority.

The Battle of the Ports on the western front ended only with V-E Day, for supply problems continued to the last as our armies plunged deeper into Germany. Germany's surrender means a shift of the Battle of the Ports from Europe to the Pacific.