Operation Dragoon - Background

Background

During planning stages, the operation was known as "Anvil", to complement Operation Sledgehammer, at that time the code name for the invasion of Normandy. Subsequently, both plans were renamed, Sledgehammer becoming Operation Overlord, and Anvil becoming Operation Dragoon. An apocryphal story holds that the name was chosen by the British prime minister, Winston Churchill, who was opposed to the plan and claimed to having been "dragooned" into accepting it. Other accounts attest that the operation was named after Draguignan, a city near the invasion site. (See the "Landings" map below.)

Operation Dragoon was controversial from the time it was first proposed. The American military leadership and their British counterparts disagreed on the operation. Churchill argued against it on the grounds that it diverted military resources that were better deployed in the on-going Allied operations in Italy; instead, he favoured an invasion of the oil-producing regions of the Balkans. Churchill reasoned that by attacking the Balkans, the western Allies could deny Germany oil, forestall the advance of the Red Army of the Soviet Union, and achieve a superior negotiating position in post-war Europe, all at a single stroke. At the time Operation Anvil was first considered, the Allied landing at Anzio had gone badly and planning was put on ice.

The operation, now renamed Dragoon, was revived after the successful execution of the Normandy landings, which freed vital amphibious assets. In addition, the Allies were struggling to resupply their growing forces in France, because the Germans had destroyed the port facilities at Cherbourg and a storm had damaged the artificial harbour at Omaha Beach. This made seizure and control of the French ports at Marseilles and Toulon increasingly attractive. The French leaders pressed for an invasion in southern France too. Finally on 14 July 1944 the operation was authorized by the Allied Combined Chiefs of Staff.