Editing Omar Bradley (section)

==World War II==
Bradley's personal experiences in the war are documented in his award-winning book ''A Soldier's Story,'' published by Henry Holt & Co. in 1951. It was re-released by The Modern Library in 1999. The book is based on an extensive diary maintained by his aide-de-camp, Chester B. Hansen, who ghost-wrote the book using the diary; Hansen's original diary is maintained by the U. S. Army Heritage and Education Center, at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania.<ref>A Soldier's Story, xxv.</ref>

On 25 March 1942, Bradley, recently promoted to major general, assumed command of the newly activated 82nd Infantry Division.{{sfn|Taaffe|2013|p=76}} Bradley oversaw the division's transformation into the first American airborne division and took parachute training. In August the division was re-designated as the [[82nd Airborne Division]] and Bradley relinquished command to Major General [[Matthew Ridgway]], who had been his assistant division commander (ADC).

Bradley then took command of the [[28th Infantry Division (United States)|28th Infantry Division]], which was a National Guard division with soldiers mostly from the state of Pennsylvania.{{sfn|Taaffe|2013|p=76}}

[[File:Churchill Shooting M1 Carbine.jpg|thumb|right|Major General [[Edward H. Brooks]] observing General [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]], British Prime Minister [[Winston Churchill]] and Lieutenant General Omar Bradley fire [[M1 carbine]]s shortly before the [[Normandy landings]], 15 May 1944. Stood to the far left, wearing a [[peaked cap]], is Major General [[Charles H. Corlett]].]]

===North Africa and Sicily===
Bradley did not receive a front-line command until early 1943, after [[Operation Torch]], the [[Allies of World War II|Allied]] invasion of [[French North Africa]]. He had been given [[VIII Corps (United States)|VIII Corps]] after being succeeded by [[Lloyd D. Brown]] as commander of the 28th Division, but instead was sent to [[North Africa]] to be Eisenhower's front-line troubleshooter. At Bradley's suggestion, [[II Corps (United States)|II Corps]], which had just suffered a great defeat at the [[Kasserine Pass]], was overhauled from top to bottom, and Eisenhower, now the [[Supreme Allied Commander]] of the Allied forces in North Africa, installed Major General [[George S. Patton]] as corps commander in March 1943. Patton requested Bradley as his deputy, but Bradley retained the right to represent Eisenhower as well.<ref>Weigley, p.81</ref>

Bradley succeeded Patton as commander of II Corps in April and directed it in the final Tunisian battles of April and May, with [[Bizerte]] falling to elements of II Corps on 7 May 1943. The campaign as a whole ended six days later, and with it came the surrender of over 200,000 [[Axis powers|Axis]] Germans and Italians.{{sfn|Taaffe|2013|pp=78−79}}

As a result of his excellent performance in the campaign, Bradley was promoted to [[brevet (military)|Brevet]] [[Lieutenant general (United States)|lieutenant general]] on 2 June 1943<ref name="Generals of World War II"/>{{sfn|Taaffe|2013|p=81}} and continued to command II Corps in the [[Allied invasion of Sicily]] (codenamed Operation Husky). The campaign lasted only a few weeks and, as he had in Tunisia, Bradley continued to impress his superiors, Eisenhower most notably, who wrote to Marshall about Bradley:

{{Blockquote|There is very little I need to tell you about him [Bradley] because he is running absolutely true to form all the time. He has brains, a fine capacity for leadership and a thorough understanding of the requirements of modern battle. He has never caused me one moment of worry. He is perfectly capable of running an [[Field army|Army]]. He has the respect of all his associates, including all the British officers that have met him.{{sfn|Taaffe|2013|p=92}}}}

===Normandy 1944===
[[File:Watching operations from the bridge.jpg|thumb|left|Senior officers watching operations from the bridge of {{USS|Augusta|CA-31}}, off Normandy, 8 June 1944. They are (from left to right): Rear Admiral [[Alan Goodrich Kirk|Alan G. Kirk]], Lieutenant General Omar Bradley, Rear Admiral [[Arthur Dewey Struble|Arthur D. Struble]] (with binoculars), and Major General [[William B. Kean]].]]

On 10 September 1943, Bradley transferred to London as commander in chief of the American ground forces preparing to invade France in the spring of 1944. For D-Day, Bradley was chosen to command the [[First United States Army|US First Army]], which, alongside the [[Second Army (United Kingdom)|British Second Army]], commanded by Lieutenant-General [[Miles Dempsey]], made up the [[21st Army Group]], commanded by General [[Bernard Montgomery|Sir Bernard Montgomery]].

[[File:Collinsbradley.jpg|right|thumb|Lieutenant General Omar Bradley (left), Commanding General, U.S. First Army, listens as Major General [[J. Lawton Collins]], Commanding General, [[VII Corps (United States)|US VII Corps]], describes how the city of [[Cherbourg]] was taken. ({{circa|June 1944}})]]

On 10 June 1944, four days after the initial [[Normandy landings]], Bradley and his staff debarked to establish a headquarters ashore. During [[Operation Overlord]], he commanded three corps directed at the two American invasion targets, [[Utah Beach]] and [[Omaha Beach]]. During July he inspected the modifications made by [[Curtis G. Culin]] to Sherman tanks, that led to the [[Rhino tank]]. Later in July, he planned [[Operation Cobra]], the beginning of the breakout from the Normandy beachhead. Operation Cobra called for the use of strategic bombers using huge bomb loads to attack German defensive lines. After several postponements due to weather, the operation began on 25 July 1944, with a short, very intensive bombardment with lighter explosives, designed so as not to create more rubble and craters that would slow Allied progress. Bradley was horrified when 77 planes bombed short and dropped bombs on their own troops, including Lieutenant General [[Lesley J. McNair]]:<ref>James Jay Carafano, ''After D-Day: Operation Cobra and the Normandy Breakout'' (2000); Cole C. Kingseed, "Operation Cobra: Prelude to breakout". ''Military Review''; July 1994, Vol. 74, Issue 7, pp. 64–67, online at EBSCO.</ref>

{{blockquote|The ground belched, shook and spewed dirt to the sky. Scores of our troops were hit, their bodies flung from slit trenches. Doughboys were dazed and frightened....A bomb landed squarely on McNair in a slit trench and threw his body sixty feet and mangled it beyond recognition except for the three stars on his collar.<ref>Omar Bradley, ''A general's life: an autobiography'' (1983) p. 280</ref>}}

However, the bombing was successful in knocking out the enemy communication system, rendering German troops confused and ineffective, and opened the way for the ground offensive by attacking infantry. Bradley sent in three infantry divisions—the [[9th Infantry Division (United States)|9th]], [[4th Infantry Division (United States)|4th]] and [[30th Infantry Division (United States)|30th]]—to move in close behind the bombing. The infantry succeeded in cracking the German defenses, opening the way for advances by armored forces commanded by Patton to sweep around the German lines.

As the build-up continued in Normandy, the [[United States Army Central|Third Army]] was formed under Patton, Bradley's former commander, while Lieutenant General [[Courtney Hodges]], whom Bradley had succeeded as Commandant of the Infantry School, succeeded Bradley in command of the First Army; together, they made up Bradley's new command, the [[Twelfth United States Army Group|12th Army Group]]. By August, the 12th Army Group had swollen to over 900,000 men and ultimately consisted of four field armies. It was the largest group of American soldiers to ever serve under one field commander.

===Falaise pocket===
[[File:General Montgomery with Generals Patton (left) and Bradley (centre) at 21st Army Group HQ, Normandy, 7 July 1944. B6551.jpg|left|thumb|Bradley (center) with Patton (left) and Montgomery (right) at Montgomery's [[21st Army Group]] HQ, Normandy, 7 July 1944]]

[[Adolf Hitler|Hitler]]'s refusal to allow his army to flee the rapidly advancing Allied pincer movement created an opportunity to trap an entire German Army Group in northern France.<ref>Blumenson, Martin, ''General Bradley's decision at Argentan (August 13, 1944)'', University of Michigan Press (1990), pp. 407–413</ref> After the German attempt to split the US armies at [[Mortain]] ([[Operation Lüttich]]), Bradley's Army Group and XV Corps became the southern pincer in forming the ''[[Falaise pocket]]'', trapping the [[7th Army (Wehrmacht)|German Seventh Army]] and [[5th Panzer Army|Fifth Panzer Army]] in Normandy. The northern pincer was formed of Canadian forces, part of British [[General (United Kingdom)|General]] [[Bernard Montgomery|Sir Bernard Montgomery]]'s 21st Army Group. On 13 August 1944, concerned that American troops would clash with Canadian forces advancing from the north-west, Bradley overrode Patton's orders for a further push north towards Falaise, while ordering Major General [[Wade H. Haislip]]'s XV Corps to "concentrate for operations in another direction".<ref>Essame, Herbert, ''Patton: As Military Commander'', Combined Publishing, Da Capo Press, {{ISBN|0-938289-99-3}} (1998), p. 168</ref> Any American troops in the vicinity of [[Argentan]] were ordered to withdraw.<ref>Essame, Herbert, ''Patton: As Military Commander'', p. 168: Bradley was supported in his decision by General Eisenhower.</ref> This order halted the southern pincer movement of Haislip's XV Corps.<ref name="Essame, Herbert p. 182">Essame, Herbert, ''Patton: As Military Commander'', p. 182</ref> Though Patton protested the order, he obeyed it, leaving an exit—a "trap with a gap"—for the remaining German forces.<ref name="Essame, Herbert p. 182"/> Around 20,000–50,000 German troops (leaving almost all of their heavy material)<ref>Blumenson, Martin, ''General Bradley's decision at Argentan (August 13, 1944)'', University of Michigan Press (1990), pp. 416–417: Blumenson concluded that while the failure to quickly complete the encirclement was mainly due to Bradley's actions in halting XV Corps, the result was still a victory, since the German armies that escaped had almost no equipment, tanks, or other weapons.</ref> escaped through the gap, avoiding encirclement and almost certain destruction.<ref name="Essame, Herbert p. 182"/> They would be reorganized and rearmed in time to slow the Allied advance into the Netherlands and Germany.<ref name="Essame, Herbert p. 182"/> Most of the blame for this outcome has been placed on Bradley.<ref>Wilmot, Chester, and McDevitt, Christopher, ''The Struggle For Europe'', London: Wordsworth Editions Ltd., {{ISBN|1-85326-677-9}} (1952), p. 417</ref><ref>Essame, Herbert, ''Patton: As Military Commander'', Combined Publishing, Da Capo Press, {{ISBN|0-938289-99-3}} (1998), p. 182: German General [[Hans Speidel]], Chief of Staff of Army Group B, stated that all of Army Group B would have been completely eliminated if the [[5th Armored Division (United States)|5th Armored Division]] of Patton's Third Army had been allowed to advance, sealing off German exit avenues.</ref> Bradley had incorrectly assumed, based on [[Ultra (cryptography)|Ultra]] decoding transcripts, that most of the Germans had already escaped encirclement, and he feared a German counterattack as well as possible friendly fire casualties.<ref>Blumenson, Martin, ''General Bradley's decision at Argentan (August 13, 1944)'', University of Michigan Press (1990), pp. 410–411</ref> Though admitting that a mistake had been made, Bradley placed the blame on General Montgomery for moving the British and Commonwealth troops too slowly, though the latter were in direct contact with a large number of SS Panzer, [[3rd Parachute Division (Germany)|paratroopers]], and other elite German forces.<ref>Blumenson, Martin, ''General Bradley's decision at Argentan (August 13, 1944)'', University of Michigan Press (1990), p. 412</ref><ref>Jarymowycz, Roman, ''Tank Tactics; from Normandy to Lorraine'', Lynne Rienner, {{ISBN|1-55587-950-0}} (2001), p. 196</ref>

===Germany===
The American forces reached the "[[Siegfried Line]]" or "Westwall" in late September. The success of the advance had taken the Allied high command by surprise. They had expected the German ''[[Wehrmacht]]'' to make stands on the natural defensive lines provided by the French rivers, and had not prepared the [[American logistics in the Western Allied invasion of Germany|logistics]] for the much deeper advance of the Allied armies, so fuel ran short.
 
[[File:Marshall arnold and bradley.jpg|right|thumb|[[Chief of Staff of the United States Army|Army Chief of Staff]] General [[George Marshall]] (center) and [[United States Army Air Forces|Army Air Forces]] Commander General [[Henry H. Arnold]] confer with Bradley on the beach at Normandy in 1944]]

Eisenhower faced a decision on strategy. Bradley favored an advance into the [[Saarland]], or possibly a two-thrust assault on both the Saarland and the [[Ruhr Area]]. Montgomery argued for a narrow thrust across the Lower Rhine, preferably with all Allied ground forces under his personal command as they had been in the early months of the Normandy campaign, into the open country beyond and then to the northern flank into the Ruhr, thus avoiding the [[Siegfried Line]]. Although Montgomery was not permitted to launch an offensive on the scale he had wanted, George Marshall and [[Hap Arnold]] were eager to use the [[First Allied Airborne Army]] to cross the Rhine, so Eisenhower agreed to [[Operation Market Garden]]. Bradley opposed the operation, and bitterly protested to Eisenhower the priority of supplies given to Montgomery, but Eisenhower, mindful of British public opinion regarding damage from V-1 missile launches in the north, refused to make any changes.

[[File:LtGen Omar Bradley, LtGen George Patton, and MGen Manton Eddy.jpg|thumb|left|From left to right: Major General [[Leven Cooper Allen|Leven C. Allen]], Lieutenant General Omar Bradley, Major General [[John Shirley Wood|John S. Wood]], Lieutenant General [[George S. Patton]] and Major General [[Manton S. Eddy]] being shown a map by one of Patton's armored battalion commanders during a tour near Metz, France, November 1944]]

Bradley's Army Group now covered a very wide front in hilly country, from the [[Netherlands]] to [[Lorraine (région)|Lorraine]]. Despite having the largest concentration of Allied army forces, Bradley faced difficulties in prosecuting a successful broad-front offensive in difficult country with a skilled enemy. General Bradley and his First Army commander, General [[Courtney Hodges]], eventually decided to attack through a corridor known as the Aachen Gap towards the German township of Schmidt. The only nearby military objectives were the Roer River flood control dams, but these were not mentioned in contemporary plans and documents.<ref>Whiting, Charles, ''The Battle of Hurtgen Forest'', p. 69.</ref> Bradley and Hodges' original objective may have been to outflank German forces and prevent them from reinforcing their units further north in the [[Battle of Aachen]]. After the war, Bradley would cite the Roer dams as the objective.<ref>Whiting, Charles, ''The Battle of Hurtgen Forest'', p. 44.</ref> Since the Germans held the dams, they could also unleash millions of gallons of water into the path of advance. The campaign's confused objectives, combined with poor intelligence,<ref>Whiting, Charles, ''The Battle of Hurtgen Forest'', p. 44: None of the senior commanders appear to have considered the potential danger to U.S. forces if the Germans released large amounts of water from the Roer dams, flooding the area and channeling U.S. forces into zones heavily defended by the German army.</ref> resulted in the costly series of battles known as the [[Battle of Hurtgen Forest]], which cost some 33,000 American casualties.<ref name="D'Este, Carlo p. 627">D'Este, Carlo, ''Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life'', p. 627.</ref> At the end of the fighting in the Hurtgen, German forces remained in control of the Roer dams in what has been described as "the most ineptly fought series of battles of the war in the west."<ref name="D'Este, Carlo p. 627"/> Further south, Patton's Third Army, which had been advancing with great speed, was faced with last priority (behind the U.S. First and Ninth Armies) for supplies, gasoline and ammunition. As a result, the Third Army lost momentum as German resistance stiffened around the extensive defenses surrounding the city of [[Metz]]. While Bradley focused on these two campaigns, the Germans were in the process of assembling troops and materiel for a surprise winter offensive.

===Battle of the Bulge===
Bradley's command took the initial brunt of what would become the [[Battle of the Bulge]]. For logistical and command reasons, General Eisenhower decided to place Bradley's First and Ninth Armies under the temporary command of Field Marshal Montgomery's 21st Army Group on the northern flank of the Bulge. Bradley was incensed, and began shouting at Eisenhower: "By God, Ike, I cannot be responsible to the American people if you do this. I resign."<ref>Ambrose, Stephen, ''Eisenhower, soldier and president'', New York: Simon & Schuster, {{ISBN|978-0-671-70107-9}} (1990), p. 174.</ref> Eisenhower turned red, took a breath and replied evenly, "Brad, I—not you—am responsible to the American people. Your resignation therefore means absolutely nothing."<ref name="Ambrose, Stephen p. 174">Ambrose, Stephen, ''Eisenhower, soldier and president'', p. 174.</ref> Bradley paused, made one more protest, then fell silent as Eisenhower concluded, "Well, Brad, those are my orders."<ref name="Ambrose, Stephen p. 174"/>

At least one historian has attributed Eisenhower's support for Bradley's subsequent promotion to (temporary) four-star general (March 1945, not made permanent until January 1949) to, in part, a desire to compensate him for the way in which he had been sidelined during the Battle of the Bulge.<ref>D'Este, Carlo, ''Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life'', p. 668</ref> Others point out that both Secretary of War Stimson and General Eisenhower had desired to reward General Patton with a fourth star for his string of accomplishments in 1944, but that Eisenhower could not promote Patton over Bradley, [[Jacob L. Devers|Devers]], and other senior commanders without upsetting the chain of command (as Bradley commanded these people in the theater). A more likely explanation is that as Bradley commanded an Army Group and was the immediate subordinate of Eisenhower, who was promoted to five star rank on 20 December 1944, it was only appropriate that he should hold the next lower rank.<ref>Jordan, Jonathan W., ''Brothers, Rivals, Victors: Eisenhower, Patton, Bradley, and the Partnership that drove the Allied Conquest in Europe '', New York: Penguin Group, {{ISBN|978-1101475249}} (2011)</ref><ref>Patton, G.S. and Blumenson, M., ''The Patton Papers, 1940–1945'', Cambridge MA: Da Capo Press, {{ISBN|0-306-80717-3}} (1974) p. 655</ref>

===Victory===
[[File:The British Army in North-west Europe 1944-45 BU3380.jpg|thumb|right|Allied commanders conference, 11 April 1945. Lieutenant-General [[Miles Dempsey|Sir Miles Dempsey]] (commanding the [[Second Army (United Kingdom)|British Second Army]]); General Omar Bradley (C-in-C 12th Army Group); Field Marshal [[Bernard Montgomery|Sir Bernard Montgomery]] (C-in-C [[21st Army Group]]); Lieutenant General [[William Hood Simpson|William H. Simpson]] (commanding the [[Ninth United States Army|U.S. Ninth Army]])]]

Bradley used the advantage gained in March 1945—after Eisenhower authorized a difficult but successful Allied offensive (on a broad front with British [[Operation Veritable]] to the north and American [[Operation Grenade]] to the south) in February 1945—to break the German defenses and cross the Rhine into the industrial heartland of the Ruhr. Aggressive pursuit of the disintegrating German troops by the [[9th Armored Division (United States)|9th Armored Division]] resulted in the capture of a bridge across the [[Rhine|Rhine River]] at [[Remagen]]. Bradley quickly exploited the crossing, forming the southern arm of an enormous [[pincer movement]] encircling the German forces in the Ruhr from the north and south. Over 300,000 prisoners were taken. American forces then met up with the Soviet forces near the [[Elbe]] River in mid-April. By [[V-E Day]], the 12th Army Group was a force of four armies (First, Third, Ninth, and Fifteenth) that numbered over 1.3&nbsp;million men.

===Command style===
[[File:American World War II senior military officials, 1945.JPEG|thumb|left|Senior American commanders of the European theater of World War II, 1945. Seated, from left to right, are [[William Hood Simpson|William H. Simpson]], [[George S. Patton]], [[Carl Spaatz]], [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]], Omar Bradley, [[Courtney Hodges]], and [[Leonard T. Gerow]];
standing are (from left to right) [[Ralph Francis Stearley|Ralph F. Stearley]], [[Hoyt Vandenberg]], [[Walter Bedell Smith]], [[Otto P. Weyland]], and [[Richard E. Nugent]]]]

Unlike some of the more colorful generals of World War II, Bradley was polite and courteous in his public appearances. A reticent man, Bradley was first favorably brought to public attention by [[war correspondent]] [[Ernie Pyle]], who was urged by General Eisenhower to "go and discover Bradley".<ref>{{cite book |last=D'Este |first=Carlo |title=Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life |url=https://archive.org/details/eisenhowersoldie00dest |url-access=registration |location=New York |publisher=Henry Holt & Co. |year=2002 |isbn=0-8050-5687-4 |page=[https://archive.org/details/eisenhowersoldie00dest/page/404 404] }}</ref> Pyle subsequently wrote several dispatches in which he referred to Bradley as the '''GI's general''', a title that would stay with Bradley throughout his remaining career.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nichols |first=David |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fJbtAAAAMAAJ |title=Ernie's War: The Best of Ernie Pyle's World War II Dispatches |location=New York |publisher=Simon & Schuster |year=1986 |isbn=0-394-54923-6 |page=358 }}</ref> [[Will Lang Jr.]] of ''[[Life (magazine)|Life]]'' magazine said "The thing I most admire about Omar Bradley is his gentleness. He was never known to issue an order to anybody of any rank without saying 'Please' first."

While the public at large never forgot the image created by newspaper correspondents, a different view of Bradley was offered by combat historian [[S. L. A. Marshall]], who knew both Bradley and George Patton, and had interviewed officers and men under their commands. Marshall, who was also a critic of George S. Patton,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Marshall |first=S. L. A. |title=Great Georgie Redone |journal=The Charleston Gazette |volume=4 |date=March 21, 1970 |page=4 |quote=My own view of him [Patton] was that he was touched by the sun, as were [[Orde Wingate]] and [[Stonewall Jackson]]. }}</ref> noted that Bradley's "common man" image "was played up by Ernie Pyle...The GIs were not impressed with him. They scarcely knew him. He's not a flamboyant figure and he didn't get out much to troops. And the idea that he was idolized by the average soldier is just rot."<ref name=genius>{{cite book |last=D'Este |first=Carlo |title=Patton: A Genius For War |location=New York |publisher=HarperCollins |isbn=0-06-016455-7 |year=1995 |page=[https://archive.org/details/patton00carl/page/467 467] |url=https://archive.org/details/patton00carl |url-access=registration }}</ref>

While Bradley retained his reputation as the ''GI's general'', he was criticized by some of his contemporaries for other aspects of his leadership style, sometimes described as "managerial" in nature.<ref>{{cite book |last=Lewis |first=Adrian R. |title=Omaha Beach: A Flawed Victory |url=https://archive.org/details/omahabeachflawed00lewi |url-access=limited |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=0-8078-5469-7 |year=2001 |page=[https://archive.org/details/omahabeachflawed00lewi/page/n277 263] }}</ref> British General [[Bernard Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein|Bernard Montgomery's]] assessment of Bradley was that he was "dull, conscientious, dependable, and loyal".<ref>{{cite book |last=Hamilton |first=Nigel |title=Master of the Battlefield: Monty's Wary Years, 1942–1944 |location=New York |publisher=McGraw-Hill |year=1983 |page=[https://archive.org/details/masterofbattlefi00hami/page/658 658] |isbn=0-07-025806-6 |url=https://archive.org/details/masterofbattlefi00hami/page/658 }}</ref> He had a habit of peremptorily relieving senior commanders who he felt were too independent, or whose command style did not agree with his own, such as the colorful and aggressive General [[Terry de la Mesa Allen, Sr.|Terry Allen]], commander of the [[1st Infantry Division (United States)|U.S. 1st Infantry Division]] (who was relocated to a different command because Bradley felt that his continued command of the division was making it unmanageably elitist, a decision with which Eisenhower concurred).<ref>D'Este, Carlo, ''Patton'', pp. 467–468: Patton recorded that Bradley was "too prone to cut off heads. This will make division commanders lose their confidence."</ref> While Patton is often viewed today as the archetype of the intolerant, impulsive commander, Bradley actually sacked far more generals and senior commanders during World War II, whereas Patton relieved only one general from his command—[[Orlando Ward]]—for cause during the entire war (and only after giving General Ward two warnings).<ref name=genius/> When required, Bradley could be a hard disciplinarian; he recommended the death sentence for several soldiers while he served as the commander of the First Army.<ref>{{cite book |first=French L. |last=Maclean |title=The Fifth Field: The Story of the 96 American Soldiers Sentenced to Death and Executed in Europe and North Africa in World War II |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=42qrmwEACAAJ |location=Atglen, PA |publisher=Schiffer Publishing |year=2013 |isbn=978-0-7643-4577-7 }}</ref>

One controversy of Bradley's leadership involved the lack of use of specialized tanks ([[Hobart's Funnies]]) in the Normandy invasion.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Anderson | first1=Richard Jr. |chapter=Appendix B, A Footnote to History: The "Offer" of A.V.R.E's to the U.S. Army |title=Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall: The 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers on D-Day |location=Mechanicsburg, PA |publisher=Stakpole Books |year = 2009 |isbn=978-0811705899 }}</ref> After the war [[Chester Wilmot]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wilmot |first1=Chester |year=1997 |orig-date=1952 |title=The Struggle for Europe |location=Old Saybrook, CT |publisher=Konecky and Konecky |isbn=1-56852-525-7 }}</ref> quoted correspondence with the developer of the tanks, Major General [[Percy Hobart]], to the effect that the failure to use such tanks was a major contributing factor to the losses at Omaha Beach, and that Bradley had deferred the decision whether to use the tanks to his staff who had not taken up the offer, other than in respect of the [[DD tank|DD (swimming) tanks]]. However a later memo from the 21st Army Group is on record<ref>Brig. Sir Edwin Ottway Herbert, ''US Requirements for British Devices- OVERLORD'', February 16, 1944</ref> as relaying two separate requests from the First Army, one dealing with the DD tanks and "Porpoises" (towed waterproof trailers), the other with a variety of other Funnies. The second list gives not only items of specific interest with requested numbers, but items known to be available that were not of interest. The requested items were modified Shermans, and tank attachments compatible with Shermans. Noted as not of interest were Funnies that required [[Churchill tank|Churchill]] or [[Valentine tank|Valentine]] tanks, or for which alternatives were available from the US. Of the six requested types of Funnies, the Sherman flamethrower version of the [[Churchill Crocodile]] is known to have been difficult to produce, and the Centipede never seems to have been used in combat. Richard Anderson considers that the press of time prevented the production of the other four items in numbers beyond the Commonwealth's requirements. Given the heavier surf and the topography of Omaha Beach, it is unlikely that the funnies would have been as useful there as they were on the Commonwealth beaches.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Anderson | first1=Richard Jr. |chapter=Appendix C, The Funnies and Omaha Beach |title=Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall: The 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers on D-Day |location=Mechanicsburg, PA |publisher=Stakpole Books |year= 2009 |isbn=978-0811705899 }}</ref> The British had agreed to provide British-crewed Funnies to operate with the American forces but were unable to train the crews and deliver the vehicles in time.<ref>{{cite book |last=Caddick-Adams |first=Peter |title=Sand and Steel: A New History of D-Day |publisher=Random House |date=2019 |page=221 |isbn=978-0-19060-189-8}}</ref>