Posted on 12/15/2019 1:07:43 PM PST by OKSooner
You might be speaking German now.
Most of the killing was done by an SS unit under the command of Jochen Peiper. Peiper was an ardent Nazi and a real ruthless thorough going bastard who made a name for himself on The Russian Front. He earned the name ''Blowtorch'' for a frightening tactic of the SS which was to lock civilians or prisoners in a barn or a church and setting it on fire. He survived the war and a short prison stint but got his in the end in 1976 when his home was fire bombed. Suspicion had the Bader-Meinhof gang as the culprits but it was never proven. All in all a fitting end for the ''Blowtorch''.
Such was portrayed in the film, "Come and See" (Idi i Smotri)
Im no WW2 historian. I’d like to get someone else’s opinion on what would have happened if Hitler/Germany Army had won the Battle of the Bulge?
The German offensive was about taking back the port of Antwerp, the allied taking of which had greatly increased the ability to bring in the cargo needed to support the vast allied armies. Had the Germans been able to make their timetables, they might have retaken Antwerp and cut our available resources. Since the virtual starvation diet caused by supply bottlenecks (and by Monty) hadn't stopped US forces from rolling right up to Germany, it's difficult to believe that it would have done more than delay the end of the war.
The reason crossroads were important was that the movement of the German vehicles would be bottled up. Those German tanks were really nice, but the roads in France were still largely unimproved, making large formations difficult at best to move to a common destination.
The US Sherman tank, by contrast, for all its supposed problems, was almost ideally suited for war in France -- it was fast and narrow, could slide through hedgerow lanes and those crooked narrow medieval streets in the scenic (or formerly scenic) villages, and take basically any road or cowpath, making it possible to arrive at objectives with massive numerical superiority.
Some time ago I read an anecdote -- a German tank commander had been captured, and was grousing about how his tank was the equal of ten Shermans. The GI guarding him shifted the cigarette in his mouth and said, "that's why we brought eleven."
Pieper chose to live in France after his prison term, an odd choice.
There's an old saying, "old age and guile always prevail over youth and skill." Not too sure that applies to the American kids who fought WWII.
“How do I feel about being rescued by Patton? Well I’d feel pretty peachy, except for one thing. We didn’t need to be f***in’ rescued by Patton! Got that?” - Joe Toye (Band of Brothers)
Pieper was leading a column of 90 tanks.
Members of the 291st Engineer Combat Battalion set up a 37mm anti tank gun in the middle of the road ahead of a bridge. They hit the lead tank, knocking off it’s tread. The tank fired back killing all the Americans.
It was a key moment tho. While the Germans could repair or move the tank, it was blocking the column. It was getting dark so Pieper decided to just stop for the night. During the night, Engineers blew the bridge causing Pieper to curse them.
Peiper was a dirt bag through and through. I go to You Tube a lot and I tear into all the German kids who think the Wehrmacht and the SS were just the greatest thing going. Boy, do I let them have it. And the Russkies too who think they alone won WW2.
While O'Reilly was debating Wesley Clark on his FOX show, Bill once again was short on the facts. Keith Olberman exposes O'Reilly for TWICE claiming that US forces massacred SS German troops in Malmadey [sic] during WW2 when in fact it was the other way around. | Olbermann exposes O'Reilly on Malmedy | Published on Jun 2, 2006
The Germans couldn’t have won in The Bulge. Once the skies cleared they were done for. And the fact that the Bulge really resembled a funnel in that the farther the Germans penetrated, the narrower their front became. What’s truly stupid, if I may say so, is how Eisenhower chose to counter attack. Much the same as six months before in the Falasie Pocket in France where the Germans were surrounded and virtually annihilated they found themselves in a similar situation in The Ardennes. The Germans seemed to have a positive talent for creating salients . And anyone who knows enough about military tactics knows a salient in your enemy’s line can be a dangerous thing.
Basically the Germans had pushed aside Bradley’s First Army
to the north and Patton’s Third Army to the south. Eisenhower could simply have ordered Patton to attack to the north and Bradly to attack south and cut the Germans off. Instead he chose a frontal assault that, ironically caused more American casualties then initial German assault.
Yes, I remember that quote, and he was just full of ****. It wasn't as if he was a damsel in distress, so perhaps he just got all cranked up because the jumpers had done a near-miracle getting into Bastogne, and didn't feel they'd been given sufficient credit. But the relief of Bastogne was necessary, and 3rd Army did it.
They very much could have won it, but they couldn't maintain the speed they needed, because allied command (attribute it to whomever you like) concentrated on restricting German movement via obstructing the bottlenecks (Bastogne being the best known). Even if the Germans had retaken Antwerp, they could never have held onto it long enough to accomplish their objective of starving the US and British (okay, and French) armies.
In a "A Soldier's Story" Bradley noted that the attrition rate of riflemen was enormous, but a massive mobilization was still going on that would have led to a large percentage increase in US troops in Europe if needed, even with the approaching denouement in the Pacific theater.
By the time of the Bulge, the entire southern coast of France was in US hands, opening up additional avenues for shipping in cargo. Ultimately, even a German victory would not have done more than delay the end, and even that wouldn't have been for long.
Sorry but you’re wrong. German generals knew the plan was hopeless and many of them wanted to concentrate all that armor on the Eastern Front. They knew once the weather cleared Allied air power would slaughter them.
Sidebar: I think this is the documentary I watched 3 or 4 years ago, talks about the young, new recruits Hitler threw up against the Red Army advance, to keep it from crossing the river; also has a nice discussion of the last days of the war. Most interesting were the interviews with the Red Army veterans (some in uniform and decorated) talking about their hatred of their own officers, and how they pitied the Germans who were captured and marched off to the gulags.
WW2: German 9th Army (Hitler's Last Army)
There were German generals who didn't believe they could make that kind of time, and they were correct. As I am.
Ooh, nice link!
Plus, he wanted to get out of Dodge [Germany], because the hounds continued to pursue him after the war.
I often wondered if he did a stint in the FFL? Since he was living near other ex-SS men, perhaps they had done stints in the FFL?
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