The plan for the Fourth Army during the Third Battle of Ypres (31 July – 10 November 1917), was to mount Operation Hush, an amphibious invasion of the Belgian coast. Once the Germans had been pushed back from the Passchendaele–Westroosebeke ridge and an advance begun on Roeselare and Torhout, the XV Corps would mount the coastal operation. As the Ypres fighting became bogged down, the Fourth Army divisions were drawn off as reinforcements until the army was effectively disbanded.
The Fourth Army was reformed in early 1918—once again under Rawlinson—following the virtual destruction and subsequent disbanding of the Fifth Army during the German offensive known as Operation Michael.
April 1918–March 1919 General Sir Henry Rawlinson[6]
Second World War
In the Second World War, no Fourth Army took the field but as part of the deception plans Operation Cockade and the later Operation Fortitude North, the Germans were encouraged to believe that a Fourth Army had been established with its headquarters in Edinburgh Castle and was preparing to invade Norway. The selection of the inactive Fourth Army was likely very deliberate because of its combat history during the First World War. That diverted and kept German units away from the real invasion zone in Normandy. In the subsequent Operation Fortitude South, the Fourth Army, with different units, was presented as part of the fictitious First United States Army Group (FUSAG) in its threat to the Pas-de-Calais.[7] After Operation Market Garden, the Fourth Army was notionally intended to conduct Operation Trolleybar, an amphibious assault upon the coast of the Netherlands and later along the German coast. It was to involve a landing by the phantom 76th Infantry Division until the deception was ended in January 1945.
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