Field

The Western Front, 1940–45

The campaign in France in 1940 and the Allied advance on Germany from the west in 1944–45. Both turned on moving large armies across water, so the outcome was inseparable from where you could put an army ashore — and where you could take one off.

2 casesPeriod: 1940–1944

The two cases in this field designed the same strait in opposite directions. Dunkirk in 1940 designed the procedure for getting off; Normandy in 1944 designed the procedure for getting on. Because both moved large armies across water, the outcome turned less on the landing place than on where the enemy believed it was, and on throughput in the rear.

Patterns found in this field

10
A design of deception

Confirm what he already believes, and the real thing looks like the fake.
Normandy: making the real thing look like the fake →
12
A design of what to lose

When losing, abandon what can be remade and carry home what cannot.
Dunkirk: they saved the soldiers and left the army →

A pattern is not a template to apply but a tool for checking conditions. The conditions under which each one fails are set out on the patterns page. The thirteen patterns

Normandy: making the real thing look like the fake

Confirm what the enemy already believes, and the real thing will look like the fake. That is the design of deception.

Pattern: a design of deception

Allied landings succeed Read →

Dunkirk: they saved the soldiers and left the army

When losing, abandon what can be remade and carry home what cannot. That is a design of what to lose.

Pattern: a design of what to lose

The evacuation succeeded; the campaign was lost Read →

Other fields

Napoleonic Wars Second Punic War The Pacific War The Eastern Front The Hundred Years War The American Civil War Japan's Warring States period The Vietnam War The Western Front, 1914–18