The Allied landings in Normandy on June 6, 1944, marked the beginning of the German defeat in France. Mitcham recaptures the taste of the Wehrmacht in 1944 as the thin grey line in Normandy finally snapped, the 5th Panzer and 7th Armies collapsed, and the survivors fled the Allied steamroller in a mad dash back to the Reich. From the reactions of the soldiers in the field to military decisions at the highest levels, this is the story of the Western Front from a German perspective. While finally bringing the Allied juggernaut to a halt on the borders of the Reich itself, this brief success would only delay the inevitable. Fighting hedgerow to hedgerow in the pitted Normandy countryside would delay the Allied advance and make each small victory a costly one. Western forces would achieve their first strategic objective, the port of Cherbourg, but they would find it reduced to rubble, a result of the best-planned demolition in history. Hitler's "fortress" policy would finally have a positive effect on some German operations. Still, the Allies did benefit from the involvement of Field Marshal von Kluge in the ongoing anti-Hitler conspiracy. However, at a critical point the liberation of Paris would divert valuable Allied troops from the pursuit, allowing many German soldiers to escape to fight another day.