Posted on 12/16/2019 4:31:38 PM PST by OKSooner
This writer's attempt to discuss The Battle of the Bulge, seventy five years hence. Particular interest is given to the first three days. After that, well... let's see how it goes.
Thank you to all who take an interest, and who choose to post. Much edifying information has been posted to the Prologue and Day 1 threads.
The situation being what it was, Pieper started his mission with about one quarter of the fuel that was estimated to be needed. Also, especially having been outfitted with the new King Tiger tanks, Pieper had reservations about the roads he was assigned to travel on his way from Aachen on the border between Germany and Belgium, to the Meuse.
On the first day of battle, Pieper was held up by at the Belgian village of Lanzerath. Elements of the Wehrmacht third parachute division, or fallschirmjager, were assigned to clear the way to the Belgian village of Lanzerath, but 18 men of the Intelligence and Reconnaissance Platoon, 394th Regiment, US 99th Infantry Division, along with four artillery observers blocked the route for 16 hours before they were captured by Wehrmacht paratroopers. This small unit action came to be known as The Battle of Lanzerath Ridge.
Because of this, Pieper's kampfgruppe didn't start moving significantly west until the second day, December 17th. So he started behind schedule. As Pieper moved west toward Honsfeld, his kampfgruppe (battle group) captured an American fuel depot and acquired more fuel, which is believed to be about 50,000 gallons. His progress west continued to be slowed by small units of American soldiers who shot and disabled leading tanks on narrow roads, blew bridges up, and other delaying actions.
It was on this day, December 17th, 1944, that Kampfgruppe Pieper, just beginning its armored advance westward across Belgium, encountered a column of 84 American artillery observers near the village of Malmedy. The Americans were captured, lined up in the snow, and mowed down with machine gun and small arms fire. The American's bodies became frozen, and remained where they were until a time near the end of The Bulge, when the area was retaken by the Americans.
American soldiers were sent to exhume the bodies from the snow with shovels. As they were working, a column of German prisoners, being marched off to captivity by American troops, passed by on the same road that Pieper's men fired from as they murdered the Americans.
The American soldiers stopped digging and just looked at them.
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Pieper did not complete his mission. The further west he went, the more he was frustrated by small units of American troops who sacrificed themselves to cause him misery. More bridges were blown, more tanks got shot up in spots that caused the narrow roads to be impassible until they were removed.
Eventually Kampfgruppe Pieper, having lost some tanks and other vehicles and having taken some casualties, ran out of fuel, ammunition, and food.
Pieper gave the order to abandon the vehicles, and led his men back to Germany on foot.
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After the war, Pieper was sentenced to a German prison for 12 years for war crimes, presumably those committed in the USSR and in Belgium. After his release from prison, he worked for a time for both Volkswagen and Porsche before moving to eastern France.
In 1976, Pieper's French home was firebombed and he died in the fire. The German Bader-Meinhof gang was suspected, but no one was ever able to prove anything.
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Meanwhile, the Wehrmacht advance continued: Objectives were Weiler, Holzthum, Hosingen, Marnach, and Heinerschied, Luxembourg, all on the line of attack to Bastogne. In the north, the crossroads at St. Vith were equally threatened, with the Wehrmacht moving in from the east. American command was desperately trying to make much out of little, and hold the advance long enough that Bastogne and St. Vith could be fortified with sufficient forces including armor and artillery.
The 28th Division, particularly the 110th Regiment, along with some attached units including artillery, was being sacrificed. Two battalions of the 110th were deployed thinly across the 7 to 10 mile front of attack, with the third battalion held back as a reserve force under the command and at the disposal of the division commander, a man named General Cota. Being deployed so thinly, there were no defensive positions in depth. American infantrymen continued fighting and dying.
American artillery continued firing, sometimes not displacing from position until after they had come under direct attack from the Germans and had to use their 105 howitzers in direct fire against German tanks and infantry. On at least one occasion an American artillery unit was involved in hand to hand fighting as they were set upon by German infantry. American command continued sending whatever reinforcements they could against the Germans. Some written history has not been particularly kind to Colonel Hurley Fuller of the 110th Regiment. The criticism most commonly offered is that reinforcements were never organized into a discrete fighting force, but were sent into battle in a desperate piecemeal fashion, only to become target practice for the German tanks and infantry.
(Reference: To Save Bastogne, Robert Phillips and The Bitter Woods, John S. D. Eisenhower, Alamo in the Ardennes, John C. McManus)
The US combat soldier could and did fight as an isolated small unit. Germans didn’t show the same abilities. Given ammo and a vantage of position, they did something that was a miracle. They held till the weather cleared some. Around the world the Axis Powers learned to fear US combat soldiers. We still show the world, we ain’t no easy road.
2LT Lyle Bouck received the DSC in 1981 for his leadership at Lanzerath. The other members of his platoon also received long delayed awards. Here is an accurate article about his I&R Platoon’s actions at Lanzerath. Also, he turned 21 years old on the day of his capture.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lanzerath_Ridge
American soldiers of that era were great.
To give the devil his due, the Japs and Germans were about as brave as any.
True. Sometimes we have to remember our enemies to remember out accomplishments. Germany invaded the world and came close to winning. Stupid leadership ended their chance at attainable goals.
SACRED to the MEMORY of the BRAVE men who were KIA, WIA & DoW at The Battle of the Bulge & served in combat in all of our USA’s wars.
Yours, TMN78247
USA, Retired
I frequently see it written that the German soldier of WW2 was less than effective fighting in small units or when they were cut off from the direction of higher leadership. But even in the very battle being discussed small groups of fallschirmjaegers raised Cain behind American lines, To say nothing of the Eastern Front where German troops were almost always outnumbered, out supplied and outgunned by the Russians in the second phase of the war but nonetheless inflicted disproportionate casualties. Throughout the Bocage, the Bastogne, into Germany, the Germans were on the ropes logistically, having been bled of a huge portion of their male population, they had to be able to fight effectively in smaller groups, with less weaponry and equipment.
My father was an artillery sergeant in The Belgium salient when the Bulge blew up. His unit lost their artillery pieces when they could be withdrawn in time, continued to fight as riflemen. Unit was awarded a unit citation for their actions. He never talked much about what happened.
“Germans were about as brave as any.”
They were loaded with drugs ... all Meth heads.
Yep. When the walking wounded fallout and draw ammo. It’s Alamo time. It’s a good thing Patton’s men were hard as hell and the weather lightened up. Malmedy, Bastogne, Ardennes, all names that deserve a listen. At the same time, we had troops fighting in the Pacific. It requires remembering. IMO.
“I frequently see it written that the German soldier of WW2 was less than effective fighting in small units or when they were cut off from the direction of higher leadership.”
Yeah I don’t know that I’d believe that either. In my dad’s opinion the Germans were extremely capable and he saw plenty of them, from north Africa through the end of the war.
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