It became important to the German High Command that these pockets be held to deny port facilities to the advancing Allies.

Known to the Germans as the Festungen Girondemündung Nord und Süd ("fortresses north and south of the Gironde estuary"), the pocket was not restricted to Royan itself, but included also the peninsula of Arvert and the island of Oléron north of the Gironde, and a stretch from Pointe de Grave to Saint-Vivien-de-Médoc and Vensac to its south.

The city suffered a strategic bombing on 5 January 1945 by the RAF, but no land assault had been organized to follow up the bombardment and so the front remained static for the next three months.

The historian Howard Zinn, who took part in the operation as a bombardier, later argued that it was militarily unnecessary and a war crime.

The fighting continued on the other side of the Garonne estuary, particularly in the Coubre forest where the bunkers were manned by sailors from the “Tirpitz” battalion.