Additionally, their extensive telephone and telegraph network meant that radios were no longer necessary for communications, which lessened the effectiveness of Allied Ultra intercepts. It has two squadrons that provide reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition for Stryker brigade combat teams. The firefight was short and fierce with the Shermans fire delaying the Panthers progress. by Lasse 22 Aug 2004, 13:42, Post This created a bottleneck in the German advance. Sixth Panzer Army left the Ardennes and ceded its sector to the Fifth Panzer Army on 22 January, while St. Vith was recaptured by the Americans on 23 January, and the last German units participating in the offensive did not return to their start line until February. [20] These were reinforced a couple of weeks later, bringing the offensive's total strength to around 450,000 troops, and 1,500 tanks and assault guns. British XXX Corps was significantly reinforced for this effort. The infantrymen of the 119th Infantry Regiment poured fire into the Germans as they advanced through the town, yet it seemingly did little to stop the flood. Around 0730 hours the lead Panthers throttled forward and attempted to force the issue. The speed of the advance of the Allies caused several military logistics issues: By December 1944, General Dwight D. Eisenhower (the Supreme Allied Commander on the Western Front) and his staff decided to hold the Ardennes region primarily as a rest area for the U.S. First Army, with limited Allied operational objectives in the area. Because the Ardennes was considered a quiet sector, considerations of economy of force led it to be used as a training ground for new units and a rest area for units that had seen hard fighting. Believing the route open, only to be repulsed with heavier fire than he had experienced in Stoumont, Peiper instructed his men to hold firm and wait for orders. 1, Engineers from the Pionierkompanie and Grenadiers from III./SS-PzGren.Rgt. [174] On 12 January, the Soviets began the massive VistulaOder Offensive, originally planned for 20 January. [36] Hitler believed he could split the Allied forces and compel the Americans and British to settle for a separate peace, independent of the Soviet Union. [184][185], The battle around Bastogne received a great deal of media attention because in early December 1944 it was a rest and recreation area for many war correspondents. [170], Although the Germans managed to begin their offensive with complete surprise and enjoyed some initial successes, they were not able to seize the initiative on the Western Front. As they did so, they were immediately engaged by four Sherman tanks from the 743rd Tank Battalion. The Allies were aware of German weaknesses, although the euphoria of their speedy advance and the amount of information flowing into During the Battle of the Bulge, numerous photos were taken at this location. The amount lost in arms and equipment, of course, was very substantial. The 21.Panzer-Division was still in France when the Allies launched their invasion of Normandy in June of 1944, and the division was thrown into action against the Allied positions as the only Panzer unit to do so on the 1st day of the attack, June 6th. [102], Unlike the German forces on the northern and southern shoulders who were experiencing great difficulties, the German advance in the center gained considerable ground. [148], His comments were interpreted as self-promoting, particularly his claim that when the situation "began to deteriorate," Eisenhower had placed him in command in the north. The German losses in the battle were especially critical: their last reserves were now gone, the Luftwaffe had been shattered, and remaining forces throughout the West were being pushed back to defend the Siegfried Line. Thus Peiper was without reinforcements, ammo or fuel and forced to retreat, escaping by sneaking through the American encirclement, leaving all equipment behind. Both offered stubborn resistance in the face of superior forces and threw the German schedule off by several days. Fierce American resistance on the northern shoulder of the offensive, around Elsenborn Ridge, and in the south, around Bastogne, blocked German access to key roads to the northwest and west that they counted on for success. [111], By 21 December the Germans had surrounded Bastogne, which was defended by the 101st Airborne Division, the all African American 969th Artillery Battalion, and Combat Command B of the 10th Armored Division. In short order, the squadron, minus . If the attack were to succeed in capturing Antwerp, four complete armies would be trapped without supplies behind German lines. On the same day, German Army Group G (Heeresgruppe G) and Army Group Upper Rhine (Heeresgruppe Oberrhein) launched a major offensive against the thinly-stretched, 110 kilometers (70mi) line of the Seventh U.S. Army. In the south, Brandenberger's Seventh Army pushed towards Luxembourg in its efforts to secure the flank from Allied attacks. A Luftwaffe resupply mission went badly when SS-Brigadefhrer Wilhelm Mohnke insisted the grid coordinates supplied by Peiper were wrong, parachuting supplies into American hands in Stoumont. [citation needed] The French (and Belgian) name for the operation is Bataille des Ardennes, 'Battle of the Ardennes'. In France, orders had been relayed within the German army using radio messages enciphered by the Enigma machine, and these could be picked up and decrypted by Allied code-breakers headquartered at Bletchley Park, to give the intelligence known as Ultra. The Americans' initial impression was that this was the anticipated, localized counterattack resulting from the Allies' recent attack in the Wahlerscheid sector to the north, where the 2nd Division had knocked a sizable dent in the Siegfried Line. 5, Hinsley, F. H., "Introduction: The Influence of Ultra in the Second World War", in, Millward, William, "Chapter 1: Life in and out of Hut 3", in, third-deadliest campaign in American history, Wehrmacht forces for the Ardennes Offensive, 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler, 20 July 1944 attempt to assassinate Hitler, 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion, 333rd Artillery Battalion (United States), The 1st SS Panzer Division's Dash Westward, and Operation Greif, Learn how and when to remove this template message, Broad front versus narrow front controversy in World War II, United States Army Center of Military History, the second phase of the Battle of Hrtgen Forest, German occupation of Luxembourg during World War II, "Heeresarzt 10-Day Casualty Reports per Army/Army Group, 1944", "Heeresarzt 10-Day Casualty Reports per Army/Army Group, 1945", "A Brief History of the U.S. Army in World War II", "Explaining the silence surrounding Elsenborn Ridge battle", Review and Recommendation, War Crimes (1947), "Remembering the invisible soldiers of the Battle of the Bulge", "Belgian villagers remember 'Wereth 11' with memorial", "Why the Bulge Didn't Break: Green Troops Grew Up Fast to Become Heroes of Hofen", "The British in the Battle of the Ardennes", "WWII 10th Armored Division in Bastogne by General McAuliffe", "World War II: Pathfinders Resupply 101st Airborne Division Troops in Bastogne Via Daring Parachute Drop", "This Day in History: Monty holds a press conference", http://usir.salford.ac.uk/id/eprint/30779/, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/096834459800500304, "Battle of the Bulge | Summary, Commanders, & Significance | Britannica", "70th Anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge", "Final Campaigns, the Allies enter Germany", "The Battle of Elsenborn December 1944 (Part V)", "Ardennes, Battle of the (Battle of the Bulge)", "Peter Calvocoressi: Political writer who served at Bletchley Park and assisted at the Nuremberg trials", Office of the Chief of Military History Department of the Army, "Oscar Koch: An Unsung Hero Behind Patton's Victories", The Operations of the 3rd Battalion, 395th Infantry (99th Infantry Division) Prior to and During the German Counter-Offensive, 10 November 24 December 1944 (Ardennes Campaign) (Personal Experience of a Company Commander and Battalion Operations Officer), "Montgomery Says Doughboy Courage, Fighting Ability Halted Nazi Drive", "Battle of the Bulge: U.S. ** a ff/ Die Computer-Software-Facfc . German troops in combat near Arnhem. Elated, he ordered his Panthers forward down the road with all possible speed. The Allies defended the Ardennes line very thinly, due to the favorable defensive terrain (a densely wooded highland with deep river valleys and a rather thin road network) and because they had intelligence that the Wehrmacht was using the area across the German border as a rest-and-refit area for its own troops. They were disarmed and, with some other Americans captured earlier (approximately 150 men), sent to stand in a field near the crossroads under light guard. "[125], Infantrymen fire at German troops in the advance to relieve the surrounded paratroopers in Bastogne[m], Americans of the 101st Engineers near Wiltz, Luxembourg, January 1945, U.S. 6th Armored Division tanks moving near Wardin, Belgium, January 1945, The plan and timing for the Ardennes attack sprang from the mind of Adolf Hitler. What crewmen survived poured out of the burning tank and ran for cover. by Lasse 22 Aug 2004, 17:22, Post The perpetrators were never punished for this crime. The General Staff estimated they only had enough fuel to cover one third to one half of the ground to Antwerp in heavy combat conditions. [citation needed][171]. Kampfgruppe Peiper attacked Stavelot on 18 December but was unable to capture the town before the Americans evacuated a large fuel depot. German intelligence had set 20 December as the expected date for the start of the upcoming Soviet offensive, aimed at crushing what was left of German resistance on the Eastern Front and thereby opening the way to Berlin. The British Prime Minister Winston Churchill found it necessary in a speech to Parliament to explicitly state that the Battle of the Bulge was purely an American victory. It included the most experienced formation of the Waffen-SS: the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler. As Prahms Panther rounded the corner of the main road and entered Stoumont, the last remaining American anti-tank gun opened fire. Montgomery wrote about the situation he found on 20 December: The First Army was fighting desperately. The group began moving again at dusk at 16:00 and was able to return to its original route at around 18:00. Americans come out of their defensive positions and surrender to Panzergrenadiers in Stoumont. Kampfgruppe Hansen, during the Third Battle of . [89], The U.S. 99th Infantry Division, outnumbered five to one, inflicted casualties in the ratio of 18 to one. As the Panther crewmen bailed out of their vehicle and took cover in a ditch, they came under intense small arms fire from the buildings in the center of town. Fighting the Allies during the North African campaign of 1942-1943, German Field Marshal Erwin Rommels Afrika Korps (DAK) was resupplied by a concerted air and sea lift effort. [63][32], The attack on Monschau, Hfen, Krinkelt-Rocherath, and then Elsenborn Ridge was led by the units personally selected by Adolf Hitler. Intervention by Montgomery's and Eisenhower's Chiefs of Staff, Maj. Gen. Freddie de Guingand, and Lt. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, moved Eisenhower to reconsider and allowed Montgomery to apologize. What little intelligence they had led the Allies to believe precisely what the Germans wanted them to believe-that preparations were being carried out only for defensive, not offensive, operations. The Panthers began to move forward, albeit cautiously. The 6th Panzer Army was given priority for supply and equipment and was assigned the shortest route to the ultimate objective of the offensive, Antwerp. Their intention was to control the twin villages of Rocherath-Krinkelt which would clear a path to the high ground of Elsenborn Ridge. 29.03.1943 Vapaudenristin Ritarikunta (Finnish Order of the Cross of Liberty), 1st Class with Star and Swords . [citation needed], Senior Allied commanders met in a bunker in Verdun on 19 December. Copy No. [112], Despite determined German attacks, the perimeter held. An incredibly thick blanket of fog hung low over Stoumont and the Amblve valley on the morning of December19. These 30 newly rebuilt divisions used some of the last reserves of the German Army. Their front lines in the west had been considerably shortened by the Allied offensive and were much closer to the German heartland. [187] E. J. N. Rose, head Air Adviser in Hut 3, read the paper at the time and described it in 1998 as "an extremely good report" that "showed the failure of intelligence at SHAEF and at the Air Ministry". David Eggenberger cites the official name as Ardennes-Alsace campaign, and describes this battle as the "Second Battle of the Ardennes". 560 was assigned to Kampfgruppe Kuhlmann (12. Yet despite the lack of losses, the American Shermans began to withdraw due to the heavy German tank fire. [179] This was an important step toward a desegregated United States military. Taking Peipers orders to heart, Poetschke dismounted his vehicle, grabbed a panzerfaust and personally threatened to shoot any man who did not move forward immediately. info@nationalww2museum.org It is not the lack of roads as much as the lack of almost anything else on which to move that matters. Liddell Hart and the Weight of History; by John Mearsheimer; pages 8-9, 203-204; Cornell University Press; 2010; A Very Special Relationship: Basil Liddell Hart, Wehrmacht Generals and the Debate on West German Rearmament, 1945-1953, by Alaric Searle; War In History 1998 5: 327; published by SAGE for the University of Salford, Manchester; "Liddell Hart and the Mearsheimer Critique: A 'Pupil's' Retrospective" (PDF); Strategic Studies Institute. by Grant Stephensen Fri Nov 08, 2002 2:16 am. [27] With the Allies stalled, German Generalfeldmarschall ('Field Marshal') Gerd von Rundstedt was able to reorganize the disrupted German armies into a coherent defensive force. He began his career conducting oral histories and research for HBOs miniseries The Pacific and holds the distinction of being the first historian hired by the Museums Research Department. Among them were Volksgrenadier ('People's Grenadier') units formed from a mix of battle-hardened veterans and recruits formerly regarded as too young, too old or too frail to fight. At Cheneux, the advance guard was attacked by American fighter-bombers, destroying two tanks and five halftracks, blocking the narrow road. The positions of the Allied armies stretched from southern France all the way north to the Netherlands. by Timo 22 Aug 2004, 13:49. One wounded crewman, either Prahm or the driver of the Panther who lost his leg, rolled down the back of the tank and crawled into a garden along the road, where he was met by German paratroopers, who attempted to shield him from fire. But the VI Corps AAR for January 1945 puts its total losses at 14,716 (773 killed, 4,838 wounded, 3,657 missing, and 5,448 nonbattle casualties); and Albert E. Cowdrey and Graham A. Cosmas, "Infantrymen fire at German troops in the advance to relieve the surrounded paratroopers in Bastogne. )[6] T.N. Near the center of town, the SS Panzergrenadiers stopped and collected themselves. As they did, the Panthers continued their advance on the flanks of town while at the same time the German paratroopers and Panzergrenadiers pushed through the center of the town clearing house after house. This offensive, known as Unternehmen Nordwind (Operation North Wind), and separate from the Ardennes Offensive, was the last major German offensive of the war on the Western Front. Training time, equipment and supplies were inadequate during the preparations. The Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler barracks in Berlin, 1938. Eisenhower wanted Montgomery to go on the counter offensive on 1 January, with the aim of meeting up with Patton's advancing Third Army and cutting off German troops at the tip of the salient, trapping them in a pocket. Kampfgruppe Peiper. To solve the problem of the 90mm in the middle of town, the Germans decided to go cross-country. By the beginning of February 1945, the lines were roughly where they had been in December 1944. An Abteilung was not an ad-hoc formation like a Kampfgruppe, and it was much smaller than a dmi-brigade, too. Peiper Obersturmbannfhrer Kdr Kampfgruppe Peiper / SS-Panzer Regiment 1 "LSSAH". Preceded by bombardments from artillery and aircraft, German armies poured across their western borders. Model, commander of German Army Group B (Heeresgruppe B), and von Rundstedt, overall commander of the German Army Command in the West (OB West), were put in charge of carrying out the operation. Between 63,222 and 103,900 of these men were killed, missing, wounded in action, or captured. ----security company with 120 men. Many thanks to my friend James for getting it. SS-Oberfhrer Mohnke ordered Schnellgruppe Knittel, which had been designated to follow Hansen, to instead move forward to support Peiper. Battle of the Bulge. SS-Sturmbannfhrer Knittel crossed the bridge at Stavelot around 19:00 against American forces trying to retake the town. [128], After officers of the regular German Army attempted to assassinate him, Hitler had increasingly trusted only the Nazi Party SS and its armed branch, the Waffen-SS. German paratrooperstend to one of Prahm's wounded crewmen as Prahm's Panther burns in the background. The deployment and distribution of the divisions of the Wehrmacht and subordinate units of allies one day before the Allied air invasion near Arnhem on 17 September 1944 and the stabilization of the Western Front after the break-out of the Allied armies from Normandy. This drastically reduced their supply problems despite Allied control of the air. Apr 5, 2016 - This German soldier, whose face is now one of the most famous images from the Battle of the Bulge, is generally believed to be Walter Armsbrusch, a member of the 2nd Company, 1st SS Panzergrenadier Regiment, 1. As squadron commander, it was his job to inspect the battlefield and the aftermath of the attack afterwards, which he did at low altitude. Of the two bridges remaining between Kampfgruppe Peiper and the Meuse, the bridge over the Lienne was blown by the Americans as the Germans approached. I positioned British troops as reserves behind the First and Ninth Armies until such time as American reserves could be created. Dupuy, David Bongard, and Richard Anderson list battle casualties for XXX Corps combat units as 1,462, including 222 killed, 977 wounded, and 263 missing to 16 January 1945 inclusive. [95] They had little time to establish any unit cohesion or train together. Peiper and Knittel both faced the prospect of being cut off. While the German offensive toward the Meuse had ground to a halt by the end of December, they still controlled a dangerous salient in the Allied line. Patton, realizing what Eisenhower implied, responded, "Hell, let's have the guts to let the bastards go all the way to Paris. Next is looking across the massacre site toward the cross roads the road to Ligneuville runs left to right. Many historians have written about the famous Buffalo Soldiers of the all-Black 92nd Infantry Division, who fought with distinction during World War II. SS-Panzergrenadier Regt 1 "LSSAH". The Schnee Eifel battle, therefore, represents the most serious reverse suffered by American arms during the operations of 194445 in the European theater. The objective was the "Baraque Michel" crossroads. The German tanks along the road leading to Stoumont came under heavy American tank fire from Stoumont and the nearby village of Roua. A trucking system nicknamed the Red Ball Express brought supplies to front-line troops, but used up five times as much fuel to reach the front line near the Belgian border. [27], Field Marshal Montgomery's Operation Market Garden had achieved only some of its objectives, while its territorial gains left the Allied supply situation stretched further than before. 6 Battle Describing (2) 6 Bearded (12) 6 Before the War (17) 6 Birthday (2) 6 Bunker (1) 6 Camera (4) The Kampfgruppe was stationed at Falaise, some distance to the south of Caen on D-Day and was only able to put in a counter-attack against the Allied bridgehead late in the afternoon. After turning to other pressing issues, his staff reminded him that they should reply to the German demand. T.N. Post Further Allied pressure out of Marche finally led the German command to the conclusion that no further offensive action towards the Meuse was possible.[117]. [88], In La Gleize, Peiper set up defenses waiting for German relief. [39] The plan banked on unfavorable weather, including heavy fog and low-lying clouds, which would minimize the Allied air advantage. As the German infantry continued their push, Peipers artillery dropped smoke in the field to the east of town to cover the advance of the Panthers that had earlier deployed there. [199] The citation covered troops in the Ardennes sector where the main battle took place, as well as units further south in the Alsace sector, including those in the northern Alsace who filled in the vacuum created by the U.S. Third Army racing north, engaged in the concurrent Operation Nordwind diversion in central and southern Alsace launched to weaken Allied response in the Ardennes, and provided reinforcements to units fighting in the Ardennes. The Germans could field a total of 55 understrength divisions. To Peiper's south, the advance of Kampfgruppe Hansen had stalled. He followed this with a Panzer attack, gaining the eastern edge of the town. Brigadefhrer Hugo Kraas (from 13 November 1944 - 8 May 1945) 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment Hitlerjugend, Standartenfhrer Kurt Meyer (until 14 June 1944), Obersturmbannfhrer Karl-Heinz Milius (from 14 June 1944) II. "Initial" is the sum total of all unit rosters of the respective combatants at the point at which those units entered the battle, while "Final" reflects the state of those units on 16 January 1945. Photos from the early days of the German offensive are few and far between, but here are some shots taken on December 16, 1944 throughout the Western Front by U.S. Army Signal Corps photographers. [159], However, American historian Stephen Ambrose, writing in 1997, maintained that "Putting Monty in command of the northern flank had no effect on the battle". [104] By late Christmas Eve the advance in this sector was stopped, as Allied forces threatened the narrow corridor held by the 2nd Panzer Division. Montgomery, refusing to risk underprepared infantry in a snowstorm for a strategically unimportant area, did not launch the attack until 3 January. [190] Lucas and Calvocoressi noted that "intelligence staffs had been too apt to assume that Ultra would tell them everything". This included SS-Gruppenfhrer (Major General) Kurt Meyer, commander of the 12th SS Panzer (Armor) Division, captured by Belgian partisans on 6 September 1944. More importantly, they had also recaptured the roads leading in and out of it, cutting Peiper off from the rest of the 1st SS Panzer Division. Hitler rejected this. By this time, it was palpable to virtually the entire German leadership including Hitler himself that they had no realistic hope of repelling the imminent Soviet invasion of Germany unless the Wehrmacht was able to concentrate the entirety of its remaining forces on the Eastern Front, which in turn required that hostilities on the Western and Italian Fronts be terminated. Its newest and most powerful tank, the Tiger II heavy tank, consumed 2 US gallons of fuel per mile (470 litres per 100 km), and the Germans only had enough fuel for an estimated 90 to 100 miles (140 to 160km) of travel, not nearly enough to reach Antwerp.[66]. [120] First, Third, and Seventh Armies suffered a total of 17,000 hospitalized from the cold.[119][l]. The 90th would later be thrust into the American counter-attack and ended up fighting around Bastogne. 1-1 IW m-M Vi ii j|\ Nr. [140] Command of the U.S. First Army reverted to the U.S. 12th Army Group on 17 January 1945,[141] and command of the U.S. Ninth Army reverted to the U.S. 12th Army Group on 4 April 1945. During the liberation of France, the extensive network of the French Resistance had provided valuable intelligence about German dispositions. [181], The Germans officially referred to the offensive by the codename Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein 'Operation Watch on the Rhine', while the Allies designated it the Ardennes Counteroffensive. Somewhere between 65,000-125,000 Germans troops were killed, wounded, captured or missing during those furious six weeks of fighting. Columns of armor and infantry that were supposed to advance along parallel routes found themselves on the same roads. German historian Hermann Jung lists 67,675 casualties from 16 December 1944 to late January 1945 for the three German armies that participated in the offensive. At the Arcadia Conference, held in Washington, DC, from December 24, 1941 to January 14, 1942, the Western Allies agreed to a Germany First policy to govern global strategy, but the question where to engage Germany, and when, remained unsettled. The Fifth Panzer Army under General Hasso von Manteuffel was assigned to the middle sector with the objective of capturing Brussels. [90] Historian John S. D. Eisenhower wrote, "the action of the 2nd and 99th Divisions on the northern shoulder could be considered the most decisive of the Ardennes campaign."[91][92]. German units assembling in the area were even issued charcoal instead of wood for cooking fires to cut down on smoke and reduce chances of Allied observers deducing a troop buildup was underway. 22 Aug 2004, 17:22, Post the perpetrators were never punished for this.. A bunker in Verdun on 19 December about German dispositions tanks from the 743rd tank Battalion out! Regt 1 & quot ; refusing to risk underprepared Infantry in a for... The operation is Bataille des Ardennes, 'Battle of the Waffen-SS: the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte Adolf... Kampfgruppe Peiper / SS-Panzer Regiment 1 & quot ;, outnumbered five one. Considerably shortened by the Allied armies stretched from southern France all the way north to the middle of,. 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