For the first invasion of the Axis’ home turf, Patton commanded the new Seventh U.S. Army, including Bradley’s II Corps. Patton welcomed the chance to assert U.S. military might. Initially scheduled to land on the island’s northern coast and capture Sicily’s capital Palermo, American troops expected to go on the offensive in Sicily. But Montgomery favored a less dispersed landing to the south and in the end, his plan won out. Patton still expected Seventh Army to make its mark. But to Alexander, it was clear that ‘Eighth Army would have the glory of capturing the more obviously attractive objectives of Syracuse, Catania, and Messina . . . .’

Subscribe Today

• Did you enjoy our article?
• Read more in American History magazine
• Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!!!
 

From the outset Eighth Army strategy left little room for Patton to operate, and Montgomery essentially imposed his will on Alexander. Montgomery reasoned that if the Americans could simply ‘hold firm against any action from the west I could then swing hard with my right with an easier mind. If they draw enemy attacks on them my swing north will cut off enemy completely.’ Two days later, Alexander transferred use of Highway 124 to Montgomery. ‘They gave us the future plan of operations,’ Patton wrote bitterly, ‘which cuts us off from any possibility of taking Messina.’

Patton considered himself, with good reason, ‘the best damn ass-kicker in the U.S. Army,’ but he accepted this outrageous decision without a protest. This was not the time to raise a fuss. For the moment he saved his invective for his diary. ‘Ike has never been subjected to air attack or any other form of death. However, he is such a straw man that his future is secure. The British will never let him go.’

Yet Patton did not simply give up Highway 124 with a smile. He slyly secured authorization to expand the American perimeter west. Patton had his eyes set on Palermo, and, ultimately, Messina. The next day Patton and Major General Lucien K. Truscott, who headed up the 3rd Infantry Division, discussed a westward reconnaissance in force toward Agrigento and Porto Empedocle. Truscott felt that Alexander would not object to such a move, and Patton, Truscott wrote, ‘with something of the air of the cat that had swallowed the canary, agreed . . . .’ Patton had his foot in the door and he meant to swing it open.

On July 16 Alexander issued another directive that positively infuriated Patton. The order stipulated that Montgomery’s Eighth Army would advance on Messina on three fronts. The Americans were officially left with the distasteful task of protecting Montgomery’s left flank. Alexander lamely authorized Seventh Army ‘to capture Agrigento and Porto Empedocle’–something Truscott had done that very day. Patton blamed Montgomery. ‘Monty is trying to steal the show,’ he wrote to his wife, Beatrice, ‘and with the assistance of Divine Destiny [Eisenhower] may do so . . . .’

Patton had had enough. Alexander clearly had no intention of assigning Seventh Army anything other than mop-up duty in Western Sicily, while Montgomery’s Eighth marched to Messina and glory in the east. Patton felt his superior lacked ‘any conception of the power or mobility of the Seventh Army.’ On July 17 he climbed aboard a B-25 and flew to 15th Army headquarters in Tunisia to confront Alexander. Patton told the army group commander in no uncertain terms that he wanted his army unleashed. He explained ‘it would be inexpedient politically for the Seventh Army not to have equal glory in the final stage of the campaign.’ Patton asked for authorization to drive north to split the Axis forces and to clear out remaining resistance in the west. Alexander agreed, providing Seventh Army hold a crucial road network near Caltanissetta in the center of the island. ‘If I do what I am going to do,’ Patton confided to his diary, ‘there is no need of holding anything, but ‘it’s a mean man who won’t promise,’ so I did.’

Patton wasted no time putting his new plan into action. He created a Provisional Corps under the command of Major General Geoffrey Keyes, his deputy commander, and sent it northwest towards Palermo while Bradley’s II Corps set out for the north coast, knifing across the island’s center through tough German defenders. Facing light resistance from largely dispirited Italian troops, Keyes’ troops ‘moved so fast that often the German and Italian 88s [88mm anti-tank guns], which they captured en route, had not been pointed around or set up to shoot against them.’ On July 22 Truscott’s Division entered Palermo after covering an astonishing 100 miles in just 72 hours. Wild celebrations and ebullient Sicilians greeted the Americans. Support for Italy’s Fascist Dictator Benito Mussolini was nowhere to be seen. The next day the 45th Division of Bradley’s II Corps reached the coast at Termini, 25 miles to the east. Until he took matters into his own hands, Patton wrote in his diary, ‘Monty was trying to command both armies and getting away with it.’ Now Seventh Army was making its mark.

Help HistoryNet by bookmarking to