The Battle of the Bulge

¶ … Battle of the Bulge

The Second World War has given birth to numerous impressive battles in which the Allies and the Russians were struggling to push the Nazi war machine back. Europe had been in a state of crisis ever since Hitler's attack on Poland in 1939. Matters seemed to get better as the Allies entered the war and the Nazis had encountered difficulties for the first time in the war. However, Hitler would not quit so easily and he decided to launch the Ardennes Offensive (also known as the Battle of the Bulge).

Europe had been a warzone with almost every country on the continent being involved in the fighting. Germany appeared to be invincible as it went on attacking every major country that stood in their way to victory.

Hitler initially meant to create more "living space" for the Germans by exterminating all of the weaker races and by making room for those that came from a "pure breed." His obsession had caused the death of millions of innocent people. In spite of originally being reluctant from entering the war, the Allied forces chose to intervene as they've learned of the horrors happening under the Nazi regime.

The Allies had led an offensive campaign of great proportions against Germany on the 6th of June, 1944. The day in which the American, the British, and the Canadian armies landed on the shores of Normandy is known as D-Day. Hitler did not expect such an attack and he received a psychological blow when he saw that his dreams had been falling apart. France had not been the only place in which the Germans had encountered difficulties in 1944. In the east, the loss of the battle of Stalingrad in 1943 had been a foremost hit for the Germans. The Russians had been advancing and Hitler had feared that they would soon enter Germany.

The Allies had been rapidly advancing on the territory occupied by German forces due to intelligent attacks which took the Germans by surprise. Strong German armies had been defeated within days by the Allies.

The city of Antwerp and its surrounding docks had been a major blow for the Germans. Hitler felt that something urgently needed to be done in order to regain the city. According to Patrick Delaforce, the remaining German armies that had the task to stop the invaders had been both weakened and outnumbered by the Allied forces. The Allies had been extremely confident that the war would be won in a matter of months, and, from analyzing the rapidity of their advance, their predictions seem logical.

The Allies did not have much time to be happy, for Hitler had been constantly using V1 and V2 rockets to bomb England. The civilians living there had been in horror as they watched thousands dies as a result of the bombing. As summer came, the Allied military had also encountered difficulties because they didn't have enough resources to continue their advance towards the heart of Germany.

The fact that the Allies had only overtaken two ports, and, that they had been on enemy territory, contributed to worsen their advance. Nothing had been sure at the time and the Allied generals also seemed to be aware that the Germans would last over the winter.

Hitler did not accept that the war had turned and that now his country had been the oppressed one. He blamed his generals for any mishap that was happening on the front. By this time he had lost faith in his inferiors and he had been certain that everybody wanted to kill him.

The war in the West had been led by Field-Marshal Guenther Hans von Kluge, who came to replace former leaders Rundstedt and Rommel. On the 20th of July several influential members of Hitler's staff had planned to murder the ruler of Germany. The plan had failed as Hitler had only been slightly wounded by the bomb intended to murder him. The Fuhrer's loyal men rapidly engulfed those that had been part of the plot and executed them. Hitler later found out that Kluge knew of the scheme and summoned him back to Germany. Moreover, he suspected that Kluge wanted to negotiate surrender with the enemy. As a result, Hitler quickly ordered that general Kluge should be replaced with Field-Marshal Model. Kluge never made it back to his leader because he preferred to commit suicide instead of accepting being murdered by Hitler's men.

The battle had been going strong both in the West and in the East and Hitler had to send his troops in both places in order to enforce the German defensive. His SS generals had attempted to make their Fuhrer realize that all available German forces should be used in the defensive and they strongly disapproved the thought. However, their leader considered this to be a sign of weakness from behalf of his men. Model had been put in charge of the situation because he had been an extraordinary military leader and one of Hitler's favorites. However, not even Model's experience had been enough to same Germany. The German army had experienced significant loses and its once great Panzer divisions had now been reduced to a handful of men and tanks.

The rest of the world, and even numerous people from the Nazi party had been convinced that Germany will be defeated shortly. If Hitler had had any logic at the time he would have gathered all of his forces in Germany. or, better off, he would have stopped any additional bloodshed by surrendering and ending the war. However, Hitler had lost his minds due to the pressure inflicted on him by the fact that his army had been losing precious ground. According to Alan Axelrod, the Fuhrer ordered that his military would fight till the last man standing. "he reinforced his thinning lines with underage boys and overage men. Although the Germans continued to retreat, resistance was always fierce." (Axelrod)

The Nazi leader did not want to surrender, and he considered the circumstances to be just an unfortunate phase in the war. He had been sure that his troops would eventually succeed in crushing the enemy forces. In spite of listening to his subordinates and reinforce his defenses, he began to plan a secret counter-attack of large proportions. The people from his personal staff had been surprised to see that their ruler had lost his minds. Eye-witnesses claimed that the Fuhrer had been in a terrible stage mostly because of the assassination plots that have been led against him.

Germany's enemies, the Allied forces, had been commanded by Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar N. Bradley (12th U.S. Army Group), Courtney Hodges (1st U.S. Army), "http: Anthony McAuliffe (101st Airborne), George S. Patton, and Bernard Montgomery.

One thing that Hitler knew had been that the Allied air-force had been extremely effective in destroying Nazi forces. Thus, he issued a campaign that would happen in bad weather, so that the Allied plans would lose their efficiency. He kept the campaign in utmost secrecy by only revealing the plans to his closest military leaders. Hitler chose the campaign to bear the name of "Operation Autumn Fog," because the time in which he wished his troops to act would be one with a high probability of bad weather. Germany would be the only one involved in the operation with all of her early allies having either surrendered or broken their alliances with the Nazi state.

The Allies were starting to feel the lack of more routes which would help the military by making it easier for the troops and their resources to travel. Field Marshal Montgomery decided to concentrate his powers to the capturing of three important bridges and thus he launched Operation Market Garden. He took this decision in favor of using his troops in order to stop and eliminate the German Fifteenth Army which had been retreating from the Pas de Calais. In spite of having made significant advances into enemy territory, Montgomery had failed from reaching his goal, as the necessary bridge from Arnhem had not been captured.

In spite of the fact that they had to retreat, the German army had been lucky because this meant that the supply lines would be shorter, and as a result supplies would come in to the front faster. Also, the Allies had been kept in place by the unfavorable terrain which they had to cross in order to get to their enemies. The American President saw that Churchill and Montgomery had been going through hell as they intended to advance. He felt that the quickest solution to ending the war had been to support Eisenhower with fresh troops that would assist him in entering Germany and putting an end to the Nazi regime. Eisenhower, however, had come across troubles because of Field Marshall Gerd von Rundstedt who managed to bring Eisenhower's forces to a halt. Eisenhower realized that despite having lost both men and territory, the German army did not lose their spirits.

The Allied leaders all believed that all that the enemy could do at the time had been to wait for them to come. Montgomery and Eisenhower had been positive that the Nazis lacked both the petrol and the men to lead an offensive campaign.

Anyone else could agree with them at the time as it had been known that Hitler had lost most of his resources along with the loss of his allies. Furthermore, the world had been aware that Hitler had lost influence in Germany and that the bombing attempt had also crushed his confidence in his own men.

Nevertheless, Hitler managed to get together an impressive number of soldiers and resources. During the last months of 1944, his army seemed to have recovered and it appeared to be ready to lead an offensive. The Fuhrer knew that this had been his last chance of winning the war because there would be no more men to recruit or resources to use in case if he lost his men and his supplies.

Hitler's plan had been to use all of the military power available for "Operation Autumn Fog." The operation involved having the troops sent to the Black Forest and Ardennes hills where they would catch the enemy by surprise. Later on, Hitler's troops would head to the north of Belgium to Antwerp where they would break vital Allied lines.

The plan had been devised alone without any advice from his military staff. In fact, his military advisors all rejected the plan claiming that it would be useless to lead such a campaign instead of defending Germany. Hitler didn't listen to those that had been more experienced in such matters and decided to do as he planned. At the time the Fuhrer had been convinced that he had been the only person in his staff that had been thinking straight. One additional reason for why Hitler insisted that a counter-offensive would be launched had been that he only had two options: victory or death.

The chance that Hitler got to raise his army had been owed to the difficult terrain that the Allies had to use and to the success that Rundstedt and Model had had. In spite of Rundstedt's achievements, he did not believe in a German victory. Hitler believed that Germany's losses had been partly owed to the fact that some of his military leaders didn't believe in victory.

The Fuhrer did not want to think about a defensive plan, nor did he want to enforce his positions on the eastern front. He believed that his offensive would bring him back on the right track. He expected that the Allies to break up after his operation in Antwerp would be successful. A great mistake from behalf of Hitler was that he underestimated the English and the American forces. He thought that both armies would quickly leave the war after the Germans would push them back. In his mind, the Russians had been much more experienced in the military than the Allies.

Hitler's plan made some sense at the time because everybody knew that a defensive campaign would only postpone the outcome of the war. In addition to that, Antwerp had been one of the perfect places weak enough for one to attack to capture. The Allies did not expect any offensive, and, if Hitler managed to capture the port of Antwerp, they would have received a major blow at their supply lines.

Conversely, in case Hitler would have eventually take-over the port of Antwerp, the victory would be short-lived. The Allies would have been affected by the occurrence, but their military power had been too big to be seriously influenced by such an incident. Hitler's generals had lost any determination to intervene and advise their Fuhrer by the time. They only acted because of the respect that they had for their leader and because they feared that they would not be murdered just as the others that disobeyed Hitler's orders.

By the beginning of December Hitler had collected twentyeight divisions for the Ardennes attack and another six for the thrust into Alsace which was to follow. The main brunt of the offensive was to be carried by two panzer armies, the Sixth S.S. Panzer Army under Sepp Dietrich and the Fifth Panzer Army under Manteuffel, which between them disposed of some ten armoured divisions."

The German offensive was to be lead by Field Marshal Rundstedt who received the planning with great secrecy and with the order that he should not intervene in any way with the schedule. Hitler wanted full control of the situation, and, therefore, he moved his HQ to Bad Nauheim just behind the Western Front. The Autumn Fog Operation is an example of how a dying nation can rise and strike with great force against some of the most powerful states in the world without anyone expecting it to do so.

Hitler raised some of the men that were part of his last army with the help of Goebbels and Himmler, that both used psychological methods to convince the German people to join the military.

The Germans had been aware that a campaign of such proportions could not be kept from the enemy intelligence. Consequently, Hitler created a distraction, the 25th Panzer Army, which had been intended to fool enemy forces into thinking that the Germans had had other plans. Part of Hitler's plan to confuse the enemy had been the English-speaking German soldiers dressed as American soldiers sent on enemy territory with the purpose of spreading misinformation.

The Waffen-SS had been designated by Hitler to be in front of the offensive with SS-Obergruppen fuhrer Joseph "Sepp" Dietrich, Field Marshal Hasso von Manteufel, and General Erich Branderberger being in charge of the troops.