Historically High - The Red Ball Express - Patreon Exclusive

Episode Date: February 6, 2026

The Red Ball Express was the life line of supplies that kept the allies going after the D-Day landings. The Allies had no port in mainland Europe capable of bringing in the supplies needed right after the invasion. Enter the Red Ball Express, a literal army of trucks and drivers moving an almost unimaginable amount of ammo, fuel, etc to the allied armies as they moved to push the Germans out of France. Support the show Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Bonus time. Oh yeah, who's ready for the good shit? Not that it's all not great. We are on Patreon, but we were about to be going Patriot off with the Red Ball Express. That's right. I think what, okay, so this one was on the radar for a while. Oh, yeah. But we did the episode on Verdun and the Sacred Way came out.

The Secret Way. The Secret Way. They just take away And it just Steered us right back into this And the Red Ball Express is insanely interesting It's got my logistics juices flowing

But it is the prime example Of why Of how logistics win wars And why they aren't so important We always talk about it and everything But in the fog of listening To everything we talk about with war At its very base core

you know, requirements for success, you got to have, what do they say, troops run on their stomachs, armies run on their stomachs? Yep. And when you have mechanized stuff, the stomach is the gas tank as well. The Red Bull Express might be the most American war strategy that's ever been. Because in a time when things in Europe are moved by rail so frequently because their train system are so, they're so great. The United States was at a point in time when we didn't quite have the rail systems up, but we had built roads to send trucks to every place on God's green earth. You know how during the Cold War, Berlin was east and west, and you saw communism, capitalism, right against each other. This was showing you the stark,

contrast in how things were delivered between the two countries. Like you just said, wide open spaces in the United States where stuff was having to be spread by road. It was such a vast distance that we had main rail connecting lines to like certain routes, like three across maybe the United States, where the entirety of Europe was just a lattice network of railways. So while the German army was what was considered a mechanized army, in reality, most of it was. was being powered by horses. I think they said 80% of the movements by the German army were still by horses. So in their heads, they're thinking of themselves, if someone can't use the railways,

they have to move stuff in the same method. We move stuff. And when it came down to the Red Ball Express, the United States was just like, oh, no, we have a way of doing this. It may not be the sexiest way, but it's going to be. insanely effective.