In the south Allies Progress in Italy has greatly slowed with only two major attacks in August.  The Americans managed to drive back a German Corpse pushing a wedge into the double line of German fortifications, but not breaking through it.  During the second half of August the Americans and CEF pinch out a German salient to the east of the wedge reducing to cadre strenth the two infantry and one panzer grenadier division that defended the position and forcing the defenders to retreat northward. With an line an intact line of fortification remaining and another one being built behind it Marshall Kesselring is optimistic he can hold the Allies south of Florence until the fall weather turns the landscape to mude.

In France the Allies continue to place pressure on the German forces containing the ever expanding beachhead.  In Normandy, the British drive the German defenders out of Caen with heavy losses, but not before the German engineers destroy the port.  Another British attack southward against a weak spot in the German line goes horribly wrong  with the attackers been forced to retreat with heavy losses, the first British failure of the campaign.  The Americans continue their push along the coast taking Boulougne at the beginning of August.  The German defenders manage to withdraw just to the east of the city leaving the harbor a smoldering wreck.  The Germans respond by patching holes in their line and reinforcing weak spots, but the estern end of the line is getting thinner as it gets longer and the state of the French rail network means only a trickle of reinforcements are reaching that end of the line.  The German command is increasingly relying on stripping garrisons out of the Norman and Breton ports to make good.  In the second half of August the Germans get hit hard at both ends of the front. the Americans smash a German infantry corps south of Boulougne leaving a dangerous gap in the German lines that an American armored corpse promptly occupies.  The German 83rd Corps, which has occupied territory after the July counterattack against the American beachhead, was evicted from the captured territory, but managed to withdraw to the south.  On the British twin attacks push back one defending corps and smash a reinforced division to the west of Caen.  These attacks along with the massive flow of reinforcements to the beachhead may well signal it’s time for the Germans to abandon western France