There were several desperate battles to capture harbours, all of which were pyrrhic victories with large military and civilian casualties only to find the Germans had wrecked the port facilities. This pattern was repeated time and again. Finally, the port of Antwerp was captured mostly intact, but it still required the clearing of Walcheren island, which was done in the Battle of the Scheldt (Nov 1944). Taking the ports was costly with little benefit, so the Allied supplies kept coming through Normandy until Antwerp finally opened in late 1944.
In the rapid Allied advances made in 1944, many German garrisons were simply ignored. These Festungen could be cordoned off by Allied troops and left alone, effectively neutralizing each one. This was done at several locations in France, including St Nazaire, Quiberon, Lorient, the Channel Islands, and Dunkirk.
The Dunkirk , though, was proving particularly troublesome: the nature of the terrain was ideal for a defender. The town was surrounded by rivers and canals, each of which could
