Germany through Western Europe. [1] Indeed, his views changed very little during the entire conflict.

 Wedemeyer tells the story of how he went about writing the plan in chapter V of his Wedemeyer Reports! He and his staff consulted all military departments, industry heads, department statisticians, and other agencies in order to determine the needs of the country. His estimates of the number of men to be mobilized (10 million), the resources needed to equip, supply, train and move this vast new army, and the military hardware such as tanks, airplanes, ships, guns, etc. proved, in almost every instance remarkably accurate.[2] The heart of the plan was the build up of Allied forces in England, and a cross-channel invasion into the heartland of Europe in the summer of 1943, a year prior to the time of the actual invasion. The plan envisioned a massive strike at the industrial heart of Germany, the source of her war making potential.

Wedemeyer, in constructing the Victory Program was obliged in a short period of time, to examine and provide suggested answers to a number of complex problems, such as where the fighting would take place,  how many troops would be required, where they would land, how many cargo ships would be required to transport and maintain the vast numbers of troops to the scene of the staging area and then to the scene of the expected fighting areas, how many airplanes, and tanks and of what type would be needed and how to energize the country’s industrial power in order to produce equipment plus the thousands of other types of war material necessary to properly equip the fighting forces. How many men should be inducted into the fighting forces, and where and how are they to be properly trained was of course critical.  These were just a few of the major questions Wedemeyer would address in the completed Victory Program.

Wedemeyer began by studying mobilization plans from past wars from a number of countries, including the United States. When deciding on the probable number of men to be inducted into the armed forces he concluded from studies of other mobilization plans that approximately ten percent of a nation’s population was the maximum number that could be placed under arms and still leave sufficient manpower to produce the weapons, grow the food, administer the affairs of government, and do all the other things a nation must do during war. The 1940 population of the United States was approximately 140 million, so Wedemeyer initially planned on an armed force of 14 million. The actual figure later accepted by the government was ten million and that estimate proved remarkably close to the number of men who actually were inducted into the armed forces.[3] Wedemeyer  allocated these projections into each of the armed forces, in coordination with the senior heads of the various branches of the service.

Although the Victory Program also provided for estimates of the size of military forces and the amount of material necessary to defeat our other potential enemy Japan, the emphasis at this point, and even after Pearl Harbor, was primarily on defeating Germany. The Pacific was relegated in the early years to a holding and defensive posture.

The Victory Program included a recommendation that the Allies ought to strike early at the industrial heart of Germany, the vulnerable source of her war-making-potential, just as soon as we could muster the strength to secure a foothold in France. By all the estimates it was concluded that the United States would have sufficient material and military strength to accomplish this by the summer of 1943. Accordingly, a key point in the Victory Program was the invasion in 1943 before the Axis had the opportunity to strengthen its North Atlantic defenses. When Germany invaded Russia, on June 22, 1941, the larger portion of the German Army and air force together with her industry and war material was devoted to that effort. By the winter of 1942 it was evident that the German offensive was stalling, and if an invasion into France were to be undertaken in June of 1943, large numbers of German troops, aircraft, and tanks, would be unavailable to resist the proposed invasion.

            The completed document was presented by General Marshall directly to President Roosevelt on April 1, 1942  and he expressed complete satisfaction. Wedemeyer himself had the opportunity on at least one occasion to see Roosevelt with General Marshall during the month of July 1941 for the purpose of discussing the Victory Program. Wedemeyer, as well as Marshall, were satisfied at this time that they had Roosevelt’s complete support for the recommendations contained in the plan, most importantly, the early invasion into France in 1943.

After Pearl Harbor Roosevelt often expressed his wish to have American soldiers engage with the enemy as soon as possible, and it was this desire, aided and abetted by the British, under constant encouragement of Churchill which was to erode Roosevelt’s commitment to the 1943 invasion. However, until after their first encounter with the British planners, both Wedemeyer and Marshall had every reason to believe that they had the President’s support and the invasion would be in Normandy in the summer of 1943. Events would demonstrate otherwise!

            As time went by various adjustments to the estimates outlined in the Victory Program were made in order to take into account changing circumstances, but the basic underlying recommendations for manpower, equipment, armament, and supplies were remarkable accurate.

General Marshall, from the very first expressed his view to the planners that the Battle in Europe could be won only with a large ground force. In this he disagreed with  a small minority of the planners, who in the early stages, shared the British view that a blockade, aid to resistance forces in occupied countries, harassing attacks at various perimeter points, and a powerful air offensive might in themselves be sufficient for a defeat of Germany, or at least a prerequisite to a land attack.[4]

The path that the Victory Program took in the British military planning establishment following its endorsements by the American planners is the subject of the next chapter.

[1] Partners in Command. p. 74.

[2] But see: Greenfield. American Strategy….p. 86 where he notes that the Victory Program estimated the need for 215 divisions to defeat the Axis and Japan. In 1943 General Marshall decided to stop activating divisions. On V-E Day only 89 divisions were active.

[3] One factor that Wedemeyer failed to take into account was that approximately 70% of the armed forces were service personnel never intended for actual combat. This is uniquely American. No other country has anywhere near this high a percentage of service support staff. Greenfield. The Historian and the Army. pps. 66-67. One unforeseen consequence of this phenomenon was that in the last stages of the war (The Battle of the Bulge) the army was critically short of combat troops. Many untrained cooks, clerks, truck drivers  and other service personnel were rushed into combat without adequate training.

[4] Pogue. Ordeal and Hope. p. 158.9.