Pressure

 I have just seen the highly dramatic WW2 film Pressure, a rich drama re-telling the narrative of the D-Day landings in June 1944. D-Day was pivotal to the Allies' war effort and involved legions of UK and US forces mustering for a secret seaborne invasion of Nazi-occupied France. The actual date for the assault was naturally Top Secret and the choice of when exactly to go, rested on the shoulders of General    Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander. He in turn needed a favourable weather forecast before proceeding, and looked to Churchill’s chief army meteorologist, James Stagg, for detailed favourable climate information. Any miscalculation could result in tens of thousands of sailors, soldiers and airmen; a heavy burden on everyone involved but especially so on Stagg, as Operation Overlord was launched.

Landing craft,Omaha Beach, June 6th 1944.

James Stagg, as played superble by Andrew Scott, is shown to be clearly under pressure as he arrives at Southwick House, the Hampshire manor house serving as Operation Overlord's bustling command   centre. When the film begins, there are only three days to go before the projected attack begins and Stagg seems rather late in the day in arriving where the action is. His support staff of weather analysts 

Irving Krick in 1935.

have already been charmed by his handsome U.S. counterpart, Irving Krick, (Chris Messina), an ebullient extrovert who entertains everyone with his carefree boogie-woogie piano playing and his sunny tales of Hollywood. Krick’s casual, attractive confidence contrasts strongly with Stagg’s meticulous, cautious, data-driven approach.

James Stagg

Eisenhower, too, is unimpressed with Stagg and his theories, as is Monty [UK Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery.]  They, together with the various military heads who are all fixated on a June 5th launch date, see the blue skies and sunshine overhead as positive signals and are disinterested in, indeed, dismissive of, Stagg’s reservations over the two threatening storm fronts hovering over the Channel.  Stagg’s reserved, almost dour, personality does not help his case, though one person, Captain Kay Summerby, an Irish nurse and Eisenhower’s newly promoted aide-de-camp, is a potential ally. Persuading the UK war machine to hold fire and, crucially, risk losing the element of surprise, is a lonely and unpopular task for Stagg and the film underlines his uncertainty and anxiety, amplified by his worries over his pregnant wife in London whom he cannot contact owing to a communications blackout. This contributes to the claustrophobic atmosphere already in place in the cramped rooms of Southwick House where almost all of the action takes place, though this is widened from time to time with historic footage showing the immense scale of Operation Overlord.

Kay Summersby 1944

                                                                           

         Footnote

Maureen Flavin Sweeney

Planners of the Normandy landings in June 1944 focussed on the specific overlap of the tides, the time of day and the phase of the moon, all joint conditions satisfactory for just a few days each month. A full moon would provide the best illumination for pilots and paratroopers, as well as the highest tides. Military planners placed the landings before dawn, mid-way between the tides with the tide coming in, as this would improve visibility of obstacles on the beach while minimising the time the men would spend exposed in the open.

Eisenhower tentatively selected 5th June as the day for the assault. However, at 13.00 hours on 3rd June, 21 year old Maureen Flavin Sweeney [Irish postmistress also responsible for weather observations] became the first to observe the severe storm approaching Europe across the Atlantic. Despite Ireland's official neutrality during WW2, the Irish Meteorological Service shared their information with the Allies and Mrs Sweeney received a phone call from Stagg's office asking for the readings to be checked again. She re-ran the tests and confirmed the results.

British forces landing on Normandy 
beach, early June, !944.
Operation Overlord begins.

Stagg met Eisenhower on the evening of 4th June and using Sweeney's observational data, he and his team predicted that the weather would improve enough for the invasion to proceed on 6th June. The next available dates with the required tidal conditions would not be until two weeks later from 18-20th June. Such delay would have meant recalling men and ships already in position and would have increased the chance that Axis intelligence [the Nazis] could detect the invasion plans. After much discussion with other senior commanders, Eisenhower decided that the invasion, Operation Overlord, should go ahead on the 6th June. Subsequently, a major storm battered the Normandy coast from 19th-22nd June which would have made the putative delayed beach landings impossible.

The title, Pressure refers to both the psychological and the meteorological!.

Ike and Monty. 1944.