The breakthrough over the Roer by Abrams would now force von Rundstedt to call off the relief attack and begin maneuvering the 116th and 2nd Panzer Divisions in a desperate attempt to save the entire front west of the Rhine. Schwerin’s 116th moved to confront the incursion over the Roer north of Erklenz, and 2nd Panzer continued north.
Now opposed by a good German Division north of Julich, Abrams had but one reaction—have at ‘em. He was going to throw the whole weight of his division at the 116th, and try to bull his way through. At Julich, CCA of 3rd Armored had battered its way to the old medieval towers of the Hexenturm (Witches Tower) forming the west gate of the city. Restored with rubble after the city was destroyed by fire in1547. The twin circular towers had walls over seven feet thick in places, and were 40 feet tall. They were joined by a great arched gate that was 15 feet wide, and had 17 loopholes for firing crossbows that were now excellent places to mound an MG-42. In modern times the place is now a Medieval hotel, but the guests there in 1942 were the men of the Panzergrenadiers of the 116th.
The other hard point in the city was the old citadel of Julich, built in 1543 for the Duke William V by a n Italian military architect named Alessandro Pasqualini. While imposing, it was not impregnable, and had fallen to siege several times, even after Napoleon improved and modernized its defenses in 1793. The coming of cannon was fast rendering all stone fortifications obsolete, and the American army had guns the old artillery officer Napoleon Bonaparte could have only dreamed of. So if the Germans decided to hold this old fortifications, there was no question that they would soon be destroyed.
In all these engagements, the Allies were a full five months ahead of schedule on the turf where they were now fighting, as they now had achieved a firm presence across the Roer, their eyes now on the Rhine. There would be no surprise attack come the snows of December here. The Germans had thrown their Panzer reserve at Patton, but found the American army a strong, resilient force that reacted swiftly and hit back hard when pressed. Given that Germany was now also fighting another massive Soviet army on the Ostfront , the outcome of the war was going to be inevitable. It was only a matter of time.
What the Americans were now trying to accomplish had played out as Operation Grenade and Operation Lumberjack in the real history, and those battles were fought in February and March of 1945. Montgomery’s Veritible and Varsity had also both been accomplished already by O’Connor during Operation Starfall , and yet, the German army the Allies now fought was perhaps 30% stronger than the one faced by the Allies in the real history, at least in terms of the Panzer Divisions they had available. It was the infantry arm that remained the weak point, and of course the lack of any credible air force to support the troops.
Now both Clipper and Nordland had further weakened the infantry, for it was the slow moving leg divisions that were always the ones caught and cut off by the swift American armored task forces. For the infantry, the entire prospect of war itself had been made a hell on earth by machineguns, tanks, and heavy artillery, not to mention the P-47s.
During O’Connor’s Nordland and Uppercut , the British Tommies in the 43rd Wessex Division had seen the entire horizon lit up by their own opening barrage, then ran forward through the mud into the trees following the course of Bofors 40mm shells that kept up a stream of tracer fire merely to outline the boundaries between battalions. Their own artillery was shredding the ground ahead of them, the enemy shells falling behind them, and streams of tracer rounds outlined the route of their planned advance over ground that had been mined by the enemy. They would endure the enemy counter barrage, mortars, machineguns, seeing friends and comrades blown to pieces, legs blown off, guts exposed, blood spurting in floods from severed arteries. A man you had shared a cigarette with ten minutes before could be found blown in two or three parts, which was enough to shake even the toughest soldiers.
In the real history, [4] a Bren gunner fighting through the Reichswald and beyond in Operation Veritable had dug in a safe fox hole with his mate, then went off to find help for a wounded comrade. He had climbed over a pile of manure, escaped sniper fire, and made it to a relief post to find a stretcher team, only to return and find his Bren team mate missing. They got the wounded man to safety, then the Bren gunner came back to look for his mate, finally finding what was left of him after an 81mm mortar had struck him down. There, calmly munching on the remains of his friend, was a great fat pig. The gunner was so enraged that he opened up on the animal and did not quit until he had emptied two magazines. Then, he was so exhausted and morally shocked by what he had seen, that he simply huddled behind a wall until his platoon commander found him hours later, disoriented, trembling, and stinking of manure.
That was the lot of the infantry, but even after enduring such decrepit and ghastly experiences, the men fought on. They endured. They continued the advance against other men, on the other side of that war, who still had the nerve and courage to stand against them. So when Patton spoke of holding noses and kicking asses, this was what would often result on the ground level, out on the sodden fields, sewn with maiming mines and stirred and churned by enemy MG fire. The men would fight over landmarks like the Hexenturm, or the citadel, suffering and dying, many finding the effort the final gasping experience of their lives. In the end, those small encounters in the great tides of the war meant very little in terms of the overall outcome—except to the men who fought those engagements. The war itself was a seemingly endless string of those black pearls, strung together in a long chronology of misery, suffering and violence.
It has been said that wars are planned by old men, and then fought by young men, many to never grow old….
* * *
The old men on the German side were now considering what to do after realizing that in the last 72 hours they had lost the equivalent of four precious infantry divisions. The front now looked like a great letter J, or a fishhook, extending south from the woods east of Venlo, through Julich, the Hurtgenwald, to the vicinity of the Roer River Dams before it angled southwest to Monschau, and then into the Hertogenwald to Verviers before it bent south again into the Ardennes. That was now the next salient that looked worrisome to the Generals as they studied their maps.
“Manstein believes that we should make an orderly withdrawal behind the Rhine,” said Guderian.
“And what do you believe?” asked von Rundstedt.
“That seems inevitable, but who knows if it will even delay them. We could not stop them on the Loire, or the Siene, or the Meuse. They already have a bridgehead on the Rhine, and though O’Connor was finally fought to a standstill, it took everything we had in the north to accomplish that.”
“And it is taking everything we have here to try and stop the Americans,” said von Rundstedt. “I know you had hoped for much more from Rhinelander , but even if we had reached Maastricht before Patton reinforced his front with reserves, we would not have been able to destroy this American Army. The sound of heavy artillery in Russia is ever at our back, and we look always over our shoulder with every plan we make to try and hold the line here. I said we should have sought terms long ago.”
“That we tried,” said Guderian. “The Allies would not accept a separate peace, and surrender now to the Soviets would be hell for Germany.”
“I’m afraid that is coming in any case,” said von Rundstedt “All we are doing here is fighting for time. Have you heard the latest news concerning the Japanese? Tojo has been removed, and their Admiral Yamamoto is now putting out feelers to see if they can obtain a settlement with the Americans that will give them some face and save another million lives on that side of the planet. I wonder what the Americans will do?”
“Do you think Himmler has any more of those terror bombs he and Volkov were flinging about?”
“I do not know, but I doubt it. The last one certainly hurt them, as did our brief Rhinelander offensive, but I do not think we can kill this beast. In 1940, we were unbeatable. Now look at us. As for Volkov, he is doomed as well, an
d may already be dead. Nothing has been heard of his whereabouts for some time.”
Part X
East Wind
“When the wind is in the east, 'Tis neither good for man nor beast.”
—Old Nursery Rhyme of England
Chapter 28
“If we move east of the Rhine,” said Guderian, “we will at least be able to extricate the Panzer Divisions from holding front line defensive positions. The river provides a good barrier that they cannot just leap over at their whim. It takes time to bridge the Rhine. In places it is 500 meters wide, 1500 English feet.”
“They leapt over it once already, and nearly broke out of the Emmerich bridgehead just now,” said von Rundstedt.
“True, but I would be surprised if Eisenhower plans yet another big airborne operation after what happened to them at Rees. As for the Emmerich Bridgehead, yes, it is always a danger, and must be strongly held, which is yet another reason why we cannot keep all our bulls here to the south locking horns with Patton’s armored divisions. Everything was pulled into the line—even the brigades that made up the Führer Sturm Division , and both of the Brandenburger brigades. To think we once had five brigades in that division at Baghdad, and for some time after. Now look at things.”
“Yes,” said von Rundstedt, “a very hard look indeed. I suppose I can agree that we must build a reserve, and it must be with some of the mobile divisions we now have. If we do get behind the Rhine, we must do so in an orderly fashion. We cannot allow ourselves to be stampeded, because all we will do is lose more infantry. First things first. The 77th, 91st, 352nd and other troops defending as far west as Verviers must be moved east at once. That’s another salient that they could strike at any time, and 2nd Panzer is no longer behind the Monschau Gap. The same must be said for 17th Panzergrenadier Division at Bastogne. I would suggest it move through Luxembourg to our border.”
“Agreed,” said Guderian. “That will shorten the front, allowing us to use fewer divisions to hold it. Realize, however, that if we do move east of the Rhine, we give up Koln and Bonn.”
“We can probably maintain a bridgehead at both,” said von Rundstedt. “The terrain favors that, and when practical and advisable, we then pull out. It would spare the city some very rough handling if we do things that way. Otherwise, should we attempt to make it a Volgograd, it will end up looking exactly like that city when the battle is over, and we will still end up east of the Rhine.”
“I am also in agreement with that.” Guderian was already thinking what would be left of Germany when this war finally ended. Then he thought about Kluge and his denizens from the Germany that would grow from the ashes of the Third Reich.
“What shall we do with Berg and his men?”
“In what sense? I am told he has 40% of his ammunition left.”
“Enough for one good fight, I suppose,” said Guderian.
“Yes, there is the one mobile reserve we still have. I think that brigade must stand in reserve now, and be used in the last extreme. They may only buy us time, but that can be said for the entire army now. It is all about time, and we are paying for it in blood every day. If we can hold on here, just a little longer, we can at least give Germany a Christmas unoccupied by foreign powers—particularly the Russians.”
“Should Berg go east?” asked Guderian.
“No, I think he would be much more useful here. On the Ostfront , his brigade would sting hard, but the bear would hardly notice it.”
“Very well,” said Guderian. “I think we will be able to see them building up for any major crossing effort, and frankly, I do not think they will put all their hopes with the British at Emmerich.”
“That boil grew quite a bit larger this month,” said von Rundstedt.
“Perhaps, but the flooding caused by our demolition of the dykes makes that area quite difficult for them. I think they will try to cross somewhere else.”
“Where?” asked von Rundstedt.
“A good question,” said Guderian, “but if I were planning it, I would want to use a push from the Emmerich Bridgehead as a means of pulling in any local reserve we post there. So I would choose a site close enough to the bridge there so that the two bridgeheads could unite in time. If they try to cross at Duisburg, Dusseldorf, or Koln, then they have those major cities to get through. Even Bonn would be a significant obstacle, assuming we make it so. So I would probably choose this area.” He fingered the map. “They will want to cross at a bend in the river that juts east, so I would say they may have a second look at Rees, or move further south to either Wesel or even this area behind Rheinburg.”
“What about this stretch between Rees and Wesel?” asked von Rundstedt.
“The ground there on the east bank is too sodden. Better at either Rees or Wesel, but not between them.”
Von Rundstedt smiled. “I must tell you that I spoke with Kluge about this, and also with Rommel.”
“Rommel? How is he doing?”
“Much better now, and it took some doing to keep the Field Marshal’s baton in my pocket. He wanted to get right back to business. In any case, Rommel suggested the same two sites, and preferred Rees because of its proximity to Emmerich, and the fact that they will likely clear the west bank there easily. However, Kluge had a little help answering my inquiry.”
“Help? What do you mean?”
“He asked General Berg where the Allies actually crossed. While Berg still says the course of events here is skewed, he told Kluge that Montgomery planned one of his big set-piece battles, and crossed at Wesel, with a combined airborne and river crossing operation on a very large scale.”
“Montgomery? Then he is saying they will relieve O’Connor for this operation?”
“No, I think not. This is what befuddles Berg. He told Kluge that things are all backwards here. Patton was in the south, driving past Metz into the Lorraine area, and the Saarland. It was Montgomery who was calling the shots in the north.”
“Interesting,” said Guderian, “but what happened to O’Connor? He’s been quite a firebrand for the British.”
“Berg said he was captured in north Africa, and held a prisoner in Italy for some time. He finally escaped, and they gave him a single corps under Montgomery.”
“I see,” said Guderian. “Not quite what really happened. What book is Berg reading?”
“Kluge says he swears that was the history he knew, and so do many of his officers.”
“Quite befuddling,” said Guderian. “Who can sort it out? Either Berg is mistaken, or someone has been rewriting the history of the entire war, and that would be no small job.” He smiled.
“But I think he will not have much trouble writing the ending,” said von Rundstedt. “I can see things going only one way, like a train bound to its tracks, and there are fewer and fewer places where we can do anything that matters to change that now. This war can only end one way.”
* * *
After five days of fighting, Operations Clipper and Grenade had already taken two big bites out of the German front, cutting off a force equivalent to nearly five divisions. Unlike the failed German bid to encircle Patton, what this American army cut off, it could also kill.
Patton would continue to press the enemy on every front, looking to exploit any breakthrough. Here and there, at Erklenz on Simpson’s front and north of Julich with the Provisional Armored Division, cracks were hammered into the German defense. In places the Germans tried to stop the attacks with heavy concentrations of artillery, but the Americans would double down on that and bring down hell on those sectors with their guns in reprisal.
The night of October 10, the Germans in the Verviers Salient fired off a barrage of artillery as a parting shot and began to make their withdrawal. This would move the 352nd, 245th and 77th out first, and maps and reports were hastily swept off the tables in Verviers and Spa as the retreat began. As per orders, every gun and vehicle that could be moved would be salvaged.
The 352nd retreated through the quiet streets
of Malmedy, where no trumpet of war had sounded. Yet the wind in the trees and the chill in the cold night air seemed to whisper of battles unfought in this world, but bitterly contested in another. The Germans troops has an eerie feeling as they tramped along, as if the ghosts of hundreds of dead men on either side were watching them. They looked warily at the shuttered windows, eyed the church towers with suspicion, and some looked over their shoulders, thinking the enemy was pressing up on them from behind.
Then the bark of a burly Sergeant would growl to fix their attention forward, and their step quickened in response. Their march was bound for the long bare ridge near the town of Elsenborn, where the Americans had made a gallant and stubborn defense to hold the shoulder of another ill-fated offensive that had never come to pass in this history. Yet it was rustling in the leaves, and in the sound of the boots on the cobblestone streets of the small towns as they marched.
Some places on a battlefield seemed to exert a kind of gravity for war, and Elsenborn Ridge was one of them. That was where the 352nd was going to stop that night, with orders to set up a defensive line and wait for the 245th to pass through. Further south, the 91st was also moving like shadows on the winding roads of the Ardennes. Night patrols from the US divisions in Bradley’s sector would return to report the sound of much movement, and the troops waited tensely in their fox holes, thinking a night attack might be coming. As the hours passed, silence fell over the land, and word was sent up to Bradley at 02:00 that it appeared the Germans were pulling back to the east. To see what he might learn, Bradley got hold of Patton in Aachen to report the movement and see if it was corroborated on that front.
“Looks like you scared them off, Brad,” said Patton, “but they’re hanging tough in my sector. Creighton Abrams gave them a good shove tonight, and we’ll go at them again in the morning. You might want to get some cavalry out to have a look and see what’s going on down there.”
Rhinelander (Kirov Series Book 40) Page 23
