Under unrelenting Allied pressure, the 7th Army was slowly forced back through the hedgerow country in Normandy. Finally, in Operation Cobra in late July 1944, the 7th Army's weakened left wing was flattened by a massive Allied aerial bombardment and then assaulted and broken by the US 1st Army. Armored exploitation of this rent in the front lines by US units forced a German retreat and then an unsuccessful counter-attack which culminated in the 7th Army being nearly wiped out in the Falaise Pocket.