John C. McManus (7:26)

The Germans have proven much more resilient, maybe, than the Allies had thought. There was a great deal of hope that maybe in the wake of the attempt on Hitler's life in July, that maybe the Nazi regime is on the verge of a total collapse. Of course, this was over optimistic. The Germans were resilient enough and tough enough to hang in there. But also the Allies are running into serious logistical problems. It wasn't that they didn't have the stuff, but they couldn't get it to where it needed to be on the front because the road net was so damaged in northern Europe and the port cities, whatever few we controlled were too far away from the battle area. And so, you know, that robs the armies of some level of momentum. Plus, the losses had been pretty heavy and would continue to be so. So it's always harder to fight an offensive battle than a defensive battle. And so I think the Germans kind of take advantage of that by the latter part of the fall.

Dan Snow (8:15)

So the Allies were up against it and Hitler felt that there was at least a sliver of opportunity. In late 1944, he had three choices. He could surrender, which meant that he would end up imprisoned, on trial and hacked. He could fight a defensive battle. It might prolong the eventual outcome of the war, but probably wouldn't change it. Or he could attack. And he did have offensive tools. 100,000 Panzer troops. So armoured troops. These are people that either drive armoured vehicles or panzer grenadiers, infantry that are used to fighting long alongside armoured vehicles. They had escaped the Battle of Normandy, they escaped the net in Falaise and Through the miracle of Albert Speer, his armaments minister, through the miracle of his armaments programmes, Hitler had managed to re equip two panzer armies. So two armies with tanks, self propelled guns, trucks for infantry. These two formidable strike formations were back on the chessboard. Now nearly all his generals begged him, for goodness sake, leave these armoured units in Germany proper. Leave one panzer army behind the Rhine in West Germany and one behind the Vistula in East Germany. That way, when the Allies cross those rivers, the Soviets from the east, the British, French, Americans, Canadians from the west, these two panzer armies could rapidly counterattack and drive those bridgeheads back into the rivers. Many of Hitler's generals believe that the real threat to Germany lay on the Eastern Front, where the Red army was making massive advances and bringing murder, criminality, violence, looting in their wake. But Hitler perhaps was influenced by history, perhaps all the way back to 1914. Hitler wants to pull a move that reminds you a little bit of the Schlieffen Plan. In 1914. He thought, what if I strike hard at the Western Allies? What if I batter them and then use my interior lines of communication to pivot round and deal with the Soviet menace? That's what the pre war planners had come up with in Germany in 1914. Hitler thought it might be applicable in 1944, particularly because he thought he'd found a strip of that front line which was being held thinly by Allied troops. And the Allied troops that were there were second rate. They were either divisions that had been battered by the summer's fighting and they were there to resupply, to recover, to replenish, or they were green units, they were freshly delivered over from the USA and they needed to train to work themselves up until they were combat ready. Hitler had a generally low opinion of the Americans. He thought they would panic and flee at the first onslaught. And so it was that Hitler's gaze fell on these American units at this very particular place on the Western Front. It was a place that also meant a lot to Hitler for another reason. It was the Ardennes. It's a very beautiful part of the world. It's very strange to visit there. It's magical. I highly recommend it. After you drive across this densely populated flat ground of northern France or Belgium and you suddenly find yourself in. Well, it feels like a very alp. You drive up onto these windy roads and you come across sort of Alpine villages nestled in amongst mountain peaks, in valleys. It's thickly forested, there are pine trees, there are ravines scoured out by rivers that still rage along the valley. Floors. The tight bends of those rivers have beautiful medieval castles on them, little settlements clinging around their battlements. There are none of the massive fields and industrial agriculture that you're used to in other parts of France and Belgium. Here, to be honest, it's rubbish terrain for tanks, for armour, very narrow tracks, weak medieval bridges, lots of potential for enormous traffic jams. But it was a place close to Hitler's heart, because the Germans had played on the assumption that it was an unsuitable place for offensive action. In 1940. It was through the Ardennes that they'd driven the largest armored column in history to that point in 1940. It was here that they'd astonished the French. They'd torn a massive hole in the Allied front line. The rock star. German generals. Manstein, Guderian, Rommel, they had made their names, they'd forged their reputations in pushing for this daring assault through the Ardennes in 1940 and then executing it, then leading it. So it had worked before. Would it work again? Adolf Hitler decided it was time to play the hits. And it was true. The Allies held this area thinly. They were certainly not expecting the Germans to drive a massive armored counterattack through this very, very difficult terrain. Here, Hitler thought, was his chance to give the Allies a bloody nose. He would try and capture the port of Antwerp, deny it to the Allies. He would certainly batter it with rockets. He would then pivot those armies, those same armies that had been used in this offensive. He'd pivot them east to smash the Soviets. He was feeling a little bit bullish at this point. He was encouraged by the fact that new jet aircraft were coming into service. He slightly ignored the fact that there are only a handful of these aircraft and just not enough to make a difference. But he thought there was a chance. Chance. And as usual, Hitler was a gambler. And in his fever dreams, he thought that once again, by passing through the Arden, he might be able to transform the strategic situation.

John C. McManus (13:29)

This is sort of who Hitler is and what he does. He tends to be aggressive and bold and he's certainly a risk taker. There's no problem there in that respect. But, you know, Hitler has a clear strategic goal in mind in launching the offensive in the West. His feeling is that the Western Allied coalition cannot possibly hang together with the Soviet Union in the long run. So in a sense, he's got some insight in that. He anticipates the Cold War, that these are not going to be natural allies and they will eventually fall out. What he doesn't quite understand is they're going to hang together as long as he's around. But what he hopes to do is to hit the Western army so hard and to drive a wedge between the British Canadians in the north and the Americans farther to the south that it'll fracture the coalition. It'll bring about political changes in Britain and the US short of the unconditional surrender policy and force them to the peace table of some sort of conclusion to the war that allows him to remain in place and perhaps even get them on his side against the Soviets. Long run, you know, it's a big gulp that's probably not going to happen, but that's at least the overall purpose of this offensive. I'd say more psychosis than genius because he's expending some of his last great assets that he can't quite afford and he's probably better serve to hunker down and fight a defensive war from this point forward. But I will say this, he does have insight into the future and anticipation that the communists are not going to remain allies with the Western Allies. I mean, that's just not going to happen long term. Again though, as long as he's around, they're going to be determined to finish this war. Hitler is the one thing that unifies them and probably the only thing the.

Dan Snow (15:07)

German army of 1944 was not. The German army of 1940, or perhaps more importantly, the American forces they would face were very unlike the French forces that had caved in back then. I asked John about the condition of the German army.

John C. McManus (15:23)

Yeah, I mean, it isn't quite to the point where he's sending orders out to units that don't exist. That's going to happen later in April 1945. And then, you know, he has this meltdown that we all know about in Berlin. But at this point, the German armed forces are like a wounded beast. I mean, they're, they're seriously damaged. They're having major manpower problems, they're having force readiness issues, command issues, equipment issues and so on and so forth. But they are still strong enough that they can inflict a heck of a bloody nose on the Allies. I mean, they can inflict a lot of damage, especially in a defensive battle. But they have enough offensive capability here because they have new equipment, they have some new weaponry, and you know, they have enough young soldiers who are willing to fight and some of whom are quite well trained that the Germans still do have that asset in their pocket. So I think there's a tendency for us on the Allied side to think, well, you know, these guys are pretty Much done. I mean, we've inflicted so much damage on them, they can't possibly win the war at this point. And of course the latter is probably true, but it doesn't mean that they can't inflict some serious damage in the meantime.

Dan Snow (16:29)

Their willingness to fight is so extraordinary. What do you think's going on with the German non commissioned officers, junior officer rank? Their generals are probably more war weary than anybody, but their front line infantry, they're prepared to fight. What are they doing there? Why are they risking themselves?

John C. McManus (16:45)

Yeah, I mean, that's what we're still coming to grips with all these decades later. I think in the east it's easy to understand why they're fighting. I mean, the fear of communism, the fear of the Soviets overrunning Germany and you know, exacting tremendous revenge for what the Germans had done in the Soviet Union and also in Poland. And you know, I think there's no question there's a great deal of motivation there. It's harder to come to grips with why they're willing to fight in the West. But I think part of it too in that respect is a couple of things. Well, there is still this kind of faith in Hitler that he's going to just sort of pull the cat out of the bag somehow and turn this around. And many of the German people had really attached their allegiance to him and that remained to the bitter end. But I also think too, they're fighting on home soil now too, and I think that in some cases they feel they're fighting to prevent the Allies from overrunning their homes and families. There is some level of anger against the Western Allies for the bombing campaign of Germany. And so the average German soldier might well have had a relative killed in Allied bombing. I think that adds to the mix. I think there's also some level of good military discipline that remains among enough formations, I guess, that they're going to be quite formidable. They're reasonably well armed too, so I think that helps.

Dan Snow (18:02)

Let's talk a bit about the equipment. People will have heard of the famous tanks, the famous panzers that are being introduced towards the end of the war. How does the quality of their, of their vehicles, of their personal weapons, how does that sort of compare to what they can be up against?

John C. McManus (18:16)

Well, they really are outclassed in terms of mechanization really through much of this war. I mean, one of the great myths of the German armed forces is that that myth of the automation and blitzkrieg and all this, a lot of that tends to be a byproduct of German propaganda at the time. The average German infantry division is moving most of its stuff via horseback. I mean, that's straight out of yesteryear. I mean, and of course when you talk about the US army especially, but also the British and Canadians at this point, I mean, they don't even know what a horse is anymore. Everything is mechanized. I mean, the level of vehicles is just off the charts. The US is the most automated society on earth at this point. And this is reflected on our armed forces. So not as if the Germans don't have trucking and armored cars and of course the famous tanks, they have even more self propelled guns that are often mistaken for tanks. So there's that sort of coexisting alongside this larger tendency of yesteryear. Move your supplies via horses and move your infantry on foot. And that's what it tends to be. You know, the aerial side, they're losing. The Luftwaffe still exists and there are some planes that will support Hitler's counteroffensive. But of course the Germans are badly outclassed in the air at this point and badly outnumbered.

Dan Snow (19:34)

You listen to Dan Snow's history. Don't go anywhere. There's more to come.

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Dan Snow (20:35)

In December 1944, Adolf hit Lewis carried on his special train to Kransberg Castle in West Germany. He had a command bunker there with a typically grand name, dramatic name. He called it the Eagle's Nest. Now he's a very superstitious man. And it was from here that that he had overseen the greatest triumph of his career. The campaign which had shocked the world, defeated the superior forces of the Western Allies. It's from here that he had directed that attack through the Ardennes in 1940. He was now hoping that he could pull off the same trick again. It all began in the early hours of 16th December 1944. It was snowing. Thick white snow carpeted the great ground. Young German troops stamped their feet, cursed as they handled icy cold magazines or check the steel bolts of their rifles at 5:30am Their wait was pretty much over well before the thin gray light that passed for dawn. At that time of year, 1500 German barrels opened up with a roar, spitting high explosive at their enemy. To the west, it had begun. The Ardennes offensive was underway. Above those artillery shells roared V2 rockets. Remember, they're the first man made objects to enter space. Ballistic missiles scudding like shooting stars across the winter sky. German commanders hoped that they would smash their target, Antwerp, into rubble, deny it to the Allies. Some of those rockets would hit Antwerp later that day. One of them landed on a packed cinema in the city, killing more than 500 people. In a flash, just before sunrise, the German infantry made their move. I asked John how it was that the Germans achieved surprise, because I thought the Allies were routinely reading their encrypted communications by this stage of the war.

John C. McManus (22:29)

Well, it shows that even when you have an intelligence coup like that, it's not a panacea for everything and that it's possible to miss intel. In this case. The Germans have limited their electronic communications that were the key to really Ultra to us intercepting much of their message trafficking and thus knowing something of their intentions, especially in relation to the Battle of the Atlantic, of course too. But in this case, if they're limiting some of that message trafficking, we don't really have as full a picture of what their intentions are. We're getting a sense of their capability because you can't mass those three armies in that sector without us at least having some indication of this. So we've got that and then there's photo recon on top of it. But the problem is the weather is getting worse. That diminishes the effectiveness of photo recon. So really, Dan, where you see the greatest anticipation for this coming offensive is those soldiers on the ground in the Ardennes because they're out there patrolling and they're manning this thinly held sector and they get a sense of the German buildup, hearing vehicles, sensing the German patrolling, intensifying, getting a sense of the mass of the German buildup and also civilians who are moving back and forth, who are sometimes an intel source, they're actually providing a better indication than Ultra is at this point. I won't say Ultra is worthless for understanding what's coming, but it is really severely diminished compared with other points in this war.

Dan Snow (23:53)

And this reminds me of my great grandfather was at the Battle of Cambrain in the winter of 1917. He was on the southern flank of the British assault and he was there saying there is a Massive German counterattack heading this way anytime now. And he was told not to be defeatist. What is going on? Are these voices being listened to? Did the Germans achieve strategic surprise?

John C. McManus (24:12)

They do achieve strategic surprise. There's certainly a detection of the buildup, but perhaps not the capability or the intention. I think there's a sense for people who realize that something is brewing, that there's going to be a local attack, maybe something like that, not a massive counter offensive that this is ultimately going to become. So what the interesting dynamic is that, like, from the private level on up, each level feels that the higher headquarters doesn't quite grasp the threat that's brewing. Privates and sergeants are out there patrolling around. They're like, oh man, you know, my captain doesn't get it. The captains are thinking that the colonels don't get it. The colonels are thinking the generals don't get all the way up to Bradley and his 12th army group. And so really there's some level of concern at each level. But the question too is what you could possibly do about it. Because again, the Hurricane Forrest battle is raging to the north. It's just sucking manpower to the south. We're fighting in the Vosges. I mean, Montgomery's 21st Army Group is badly understrength. So even if we anticipate this thing to the full, the question is what we can do about it at the beginning. I mean, it's going to take time to get people and stuff in place. So it's a bit of a misnomer to think that we have no indication and we're completely surprised or blindsided. We're not quite. But the Germans have enough of the surprise on their side to drive a bulge, hence the name of this battle in the US Line.

Dan Snow (25:39)

The Germans were now sending three armies into this narrow stretch of the Western Front. The main effort was being made by 6 SS Panzer army to the north and 5 SS Panzerarmee to the south of them. Everything depends on speed, lightning marches, coup de main, confusion, a sprint. If they slow down, if the Allies are able to respond and lock them into an attritional battle, bring their superior forces to bear, then the Germans will be crushed. This is a race now. The assault took different forms at various points along the line.

John C. McManus (26:09)

In some parts of the line, the Germans decided makes most sense to just infiltrate their people forward without an artillery barrage. And then, you know, when they run into opposition, wherever it's going to be, they'll call in artillery and reinforcements and whatnot, because they knew especially like in the sector of the 110th Infantry Regiment, 28 Division, which is really at the like the Vortex of where 5th Panzer army is going to be moving. They feel, you know what, we can kind of just infiltrate and move around them and envelop them. We don't necessarily need to telegraph what we're doing with artillery prep, but in other places there will be that massive artillery prep. They also, the Germans decide, because remember this is, they are den, it's mid December, there's not much daylight, so they decide they're going to have searchlights bounce off the clouds and that'll help their infiltrators and whatever move forward. This actually ends up really hurting them in many places because it silhouettes a lot of these attackers who are coming forward and they're just slaughtered in droves. So really this is a kind of an infantry assault in its initial stages. The armor is road bound and some of the heaviest armor. The problem is there aren't that many bridges that can hold up under say a Tiger tank or whatever. So it's an engineering problem too on that level. So the tendency is to have columns that are, are built up in traffic and at our choke pointed in these towns, the lead towns, the advanced towns where the American rifle companies are located that are going to hold off much longer than the Germans ever expected.

Dan Snow (27:38)

So that's interesting. So you've got the idea is that these would have been, well, a lot of them very veteran infantrymen. They've been fighting for years on the Eastern Front, they've been fighting on the Western Front and they're moving through Allied lines looking for weak points, encircling, pushing, pushing deep. And then the hope was that they'd be able to sow so much confusion and chaos and fear that the tanks could rumble on the roads and to catch up with them.

John C. McManus (28:03)

Yeah, mixture. And also the artillery too, the self propelled pieces that were going to provide a lot of that fire support and blast the buildings where the Americans might be resisting and whatever. So the infantry is a mix. Some of them are highly experienced, particularly in the SS Panzer units like the armored infantry men and whatnot. Panzergrenadiers the Germans call them. But then you also have these Volksgrenadier units too that are in play. And some of those are just brand new guys, teenagers, older guys or people thrown into the mix. So it's, it's like the German armed forces at this point, some kind of elite here and there, reasonably good formations that have been refitted in another spot and then completely raw Dudes just more or less, you know, almost taken off the street and thrown into this mix with a minimum kind of training, depending on where we're going.

Dan Snow (28:52)

One unit became particularly infamous. It's a unit commanded by Otto Skorzeny, AKA Scarface. He was Hitler's darling SS commando. He'd been a key part of the impressive raid that had managed to snatch Mussolini from prison in Gran Sasso. Mussolini, in September 1943 had been grabbed by German commandos and taken north where he could be set up as a puppet ruler of German occupied northern Italy. He would be leading a hand picked force of English speaking commandos. They'd wear American uniforms, they'd sneak behind American lines, try and infiltrate deep behind American lines and generally cause havoc. It's alleged. It's lots of myth making around these folks, but it's alleged that sort of part of their training was learning how to chew gum like Americans, slouch like Americans, although I always thought that's a bit of an exaggeration. Now they failed in their primary goal, which was to take the bridges across the River Meuse. But they did manage to sow chaos at a very critical time for the Allies. And that atmosphere they created, the vibe, the story, the legend they created, massively overshadowed their actual military activity on the ground. It's interesting, a day or two after the start of the offensive, we have a letter from General Patton to Eisenhower, the supreme commander. General Patton is this swaggering, gun toting field commander who has the reputation as the finest general in the US Army. He writes to Eisenhower saying krauts speaking perfect English, raising hell, cutting wires, turning road signs around, spooking whole divisions and shoving a bulge into our defenses. It's questionable to how many divisions were actually spooked by Skorzeny's men, but it appears they managed to put the wind up General Patton, the otherwise unflappable American commander. And partly result of this atmosphere of fear that they created, the Americans set up checkpoints all over the place every crossroads, with military police grilling passing troops on details, asking things that only Americans would know, like the names of Mickey Mouse's girlfriend or who was beating who in the baseball leagues or the capital cities of American states. And the story goes that even General Omar Bradley, one of the most senior American commanders in Europe, he was briefly detained when he rightly said that Springfield was the capital of Illinois because the military policeman who questioned him insisted that it was Chicago. Bradley managed to extricate himself. But it is a demonstration of the fact that units marching towards the SOUND OF THE GUNS Reinforcing units were slowed down. So Skorzeny's ruse was pretty effective. The German forces did make some progress in some places, some quite eye catching progress but, but unlike 1940, something odd was happening. Well, it was something odd anyway. To the German High Command it's a story as old as military history itself. The Germans were surprised to find out, frustrated to find out that their enemy were not playing the part that had been assigned to them in the planning phase. The American enemy were not conforming to their wishes. The Americans were fighting, they were fighting like cornered wildcats.

John C. McManus (31:53)

Yeah, the way this usually plays out is say you'll have an American rifle company that's been manning a town, say like Hosingen or Marnock or Wyler, whatever. So that's maybe 120, 130 guys. You possibly might have a little bit of tank or tank destroyer or self propelled support here and there. You have artillery behind you and that's supporting you to some extent. So the pattern was part of your company is out there in prepared foxhole type positions outside the town, protecting especially any access to the road net. Part of it is in sconce in the buildings. And so you can see that the Germans are going to run up against resistance in a lot of places and they're going to tend to, like you said, work around those weak points. So pretty soon in many cases these small groups are going to be surrounded or cut off or whatever and are going to be just fighting as best they can for as long as they can. And in many cases that's just a day or so, but that's a lot of time to cost them because they can't afford that. And so when they fight often to, sometimes to extinction, but more often to diminution to where they run out of ammo or whatever, then they're going to gravitate west the best they can to get out of there, refit. But some of them are captured. You know, you can imagine how chaotic this truly is. And so pretty quickly the front is just aflame with small unit engagements like this. And then at the higher headquarters there's a sense of this is a much bigger attack than we ever expected. We didn't think they were capable of this. We need reinforcements and that's going all the way up to Eisenhower then.

Dan Snow (33:29)

Okay, but John, let me ask about these American troops that are fighting so tenaciously. Cause this is such a key point. Was it their training, was it their leadership, was it their morale, equipment? Why did they just make decision after decision not to be spooks, not to worry about the fact that this was probably a hopeless task and the Germans already penetrating and getting in between them and their brigade headquarters and stuff. Why did these rifle companies just draw a line and stay where they were and fight it out till their ammunition ran out? What's that tell us about the US Army?

John C. McManus (33:57)

Yeah, I think it tells us that this is a pretty darn good army. I mean, these are reasonably well trained guys and reasonably committed to the mission and they're determined to fight and they have good enough leadership at the NCO and junior officer level. They're pretty well armed. Armed. I think that helps, too. They have a lot of firepower at their disposal. They have faith that they're probably going to win the war and that they have a higher command that's going to, you know, respond to their needs. I think there's all of that in play. And the culture is not in a sense of, oh, we're in a bad situation, so let's just pack it in. I mean, for the most part, these guys are going to fight, and of course not everybody, but most are going to fight really hard. And so the order that you're constantly getting is one of these guys, if you do have communication with hire, is hold at all costs. And I often think about that and say, let's step back and really understand what that means. All costs. What that means is our lives. I mean, that means we're told we have to sacrifice you for some sort of larger purpose. And I think it's amazing that so many of these guys do precisely that they hold at all costs. Now, it doesn't mean that they're going to be suicidal, say like the Japanese in the Pacific where they say, okay, well, we're just going to die here. I mean, we're never going to leave. No, they're going to fight as long as they can, and then in many case they're going to try and get out of there and in some cases fight another day. In some cases, they don't have the choice because they're chased down and apprehended and captured by the Germans. It's a mix. But you have enough people who are willing to fight, able to fight armed well enough to fight with enough ammo that they really are going to derail the German offensive within the first two days or so, especially in that sector to the north, like at lanzarath and the 99th Division and the 2nd Division at the twin villages Kringel and Rosharath. And of course the 28th Division east of Bastogne. That's where a lot of this is decided in the beginning.

Dan Snow (35:49)

There's a great example of this at the forgotten but absolutely essential battle of Elsenbourne Ridge. And this really did prove a crucial turning point in the Battle of the Bulge. The troops of the US 99th Division were untested. They'd been placed in that sector specifically because they were very unlikely to see fighting. They were stretched thinly over a 22 mile front and they had no reserves. All three regiments, because of the length of the line, were up in the front line. And against these 99ers, Hitler sent his hand picked warriors. The 6th Panzer army had been given priority when it came to equipment, supplies, gear. They'd been given the shortest possible route to the ultimate objective, Antwerp. A group within the sick Panzer army was commanded by the Nazi pinup, dashing tank commander, heartless genocidal SS Oberstumbanfuhrer Joachim Peiper. He led a Kampfgroup. He led a battle group consisting of nearly 5,000 men, 600 vehicles, and he was charged with leading the main effort. He was going to lead the dash to the sea. They'd been given everything they asked for. They'd been equipped with the newest, most powerful tank, the Tiger II heavy tank. This was to be blitzkrieg warfare. But the US troops, the 99ers, they hadn't read that script and they clung on an astonishing act of tenacity. They sent clerks, they sent cooks and drivers into the front line and they scrapped. They fought. They stubbornly held out against waves of German armour, German infantrymen. They bought the Allies time to prepare defence elsewhere, to shore up, to come to terms with what was going on. Kampfgru Peiper was actually forced to reroute. He didn't have enough fuel, even under best conditions to reach Antwerp. He was hoping to loot some on the way. Now he was having to do a U turn and go a longer route round, thanks to the tenacity of the 99ers wasting precious fuel that he didn't have. Here's John McManus.

John C. McManus (37:56)

The standard Elsenborn Ridge for the 99th Division, for a brand new division is really quite remarkable because, you know, they're outnumbered pretty significantly and they're on the wrong end of some pretty violent German attacks. The most famous part of this was probably what happens at landzerath with the INR platoon of the 394th Infantry Regiment under Lt. Lyle Boke, whose unit holds off major major German attacks for the better part of a day that cost them time that they don't have.

Dan Snow (38:25)

It was a similar story at the beautiful village of Clairvaux in North Luxembourg. There was a bitter battle here that was fought over the first two days. German forces did manage to encircle the American defenders, mostly troops in the 28th Infantry Division. But the Americans didn't give up. And this is the battle that John refers to as the Ardennes Alamo. One of the units Encircled was the 110th Infantry Regiment led by Colonel Hurley Fuller.

John C. McManus (38:50)

Colonel Hurley Fuller, this is just a guy who did not have very good luck. He was a crusty Texan. He had fought in World War I. He had actually attended the University of Texas as a young man. Man, but had never graduated, I don't think. And he had. He had left to go fight in World War I. He'd seen combat in World War I, and he had, you know, one of those military careers that progresses but is not particularly outstanding or brilliant or noticeable. And so he had become a regimental commander by D day. He was in the 2nd Division at that time commanding the 23rd Infantry. And if anyone knows about the rhythm and pace of the Battle of Normandy, the fighting around Saint Lo is just, just horrible for about two months. And he loses his job at that time as a regimental commander because his unit was not progressing much. But he had a friend in the 8th Corps, Commander Troy Middleton, Major General Troy Middleton, who, once he realizes that there's a regiment that's opened up in the 28th division, he helps make sure that Fuller gets that job. So this is a byproduct of the Hurtgen fighting that I was talking about, which the 20th Division had suffered horrifying casualties in that. And so the regimental commander had been wounded. And so Fuller takes over. So he takes over shortly before the Bulge. And so if you can imagine this unit, it's been beaten up in one of the worst battles in our history in Hurricane, horribly attrited, and they're sent to this Ardennes sector to rest as a quiet sector, get replacements and rehabilitate somehow. And here now you find yourself, himself right in the middle, smack dab in the middle of one of the biggest German offensives of the war. And Fuller is the guy who has to deal with this as a brand new commander who most of his people don't know him. Those who do don't have much confidence in him. He's a cantankerous, crusty dude, but he's been really concerned about a German offensive, actually, and he's been hollering to hire about that. And so his regimental headquarters is in a little town called Clairvaux in Luxembourg, and it's in a hotel called the Hotel Clarvallis. And so you can imagine how he's just trying to manage this battle. For the first couple days, it's one crisis after another, trying to create little counter attacks and salvage people and holler for reinforcements. And so he's on the phone with the chief of staff of the division, a colonel named Gibney, and he's convinced Gibney doesn't really know what's going on here. I mean, this is just, just horrendous. And so as he's on the phone, a German tank pokes its muzzle into the Clarvell and pumps around, like down the hallway. And Fuller is on the phone with the Chief of staff. And the guy hears this. He's like, oh, my God, is that what I think? He's like. Fuller's like, yeah, it is. Things are this bad. Help me out, you know? And so he's kind of vindicated by this. And so to him, in his mind, especially as a Texan, he was thinking, this is like the Alamo. And when I thought of that, I thought, oh, my God, that's exactly it. Alamo in the Ardennes. That's what this is. So he said he felt like Colonel Travis at the Alamo. So he has to manage that complete mess, if you can even imagine that. And eventually he has to escape the Clara Valis, across the fire escape, which is like three stories up, and it's like a ladder and it kicks you onto a ridge. And he has this whole odyssey with his other survivors trying to escape from the Germans. It's just a crazy situation.

Dan Snow (42:19)

I mean, that's what I love about history. It's when the spotlight of world affairs just lands on you. You can have a whole career being overlooked, under, promoted, frustrated, and then boom, one day you wake up and you're at the heart of world affairs. I love that.

John C. McManus (42:33)

That's so true. And it's so fascinating, isn't it, in this instance that this guy who's been sort of beaten up a little bit by the army admin and kind of a hard luck kind of dude, now ends up as the centerpiece of this whole thing. But I think he manages this thing about as well as we could expect for the, the 110th Infantry. Basically, his regiment fights to extinction in about a two day period. And the significance of this, it buys enough time for other units to come in and reinforce and get to Bastogne and hold on to it. And that matters in the larger context too.

Dan Snow (43:10)

This is Dan Snows history Hip. More after this.

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Dan Snow (43:56)

This was a soldiers battle. It was a story of heroic resistance by small groups of men. They were young, they were inexperienced, they were far from home, they were freezing cold, they were in the dark most of the time and they were facing the finest that the Third Reich could throw at them. And yet they fought on. They fought on when there was no hope. They fought on when they were surrounded. They fired their weapons so they had no more cartridges. They grappled in the forests with an unknown enemy until ice cold steel bayonets tore through flesh. They cradled screaming friends in their last moments. These men, their names are unknown to us. These places are forgotten. But they all played their part. They nudged the course of history in those dark, unseen places. One key crossroad, though, has become more famous, and I think it's served to embody, to memorialise all of those disparate battles. And that place's name is Bastogne. When you go there today, it feels like a very nondescript Belgian village. It's a place where it doesn't feel like history should happen, but it did. And Bastogne should have been a formality. It should have just been a waypoint, a place secured as the Germans advanced. But there as well, the US 22nd Division fought hard, slowed the Germans down, and just before they were about to relinquish Bastogne, US Reinforcements were able to slip in. In this case, the men of the 101st Airborne. Yes, that does include Easy Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment. The famous band of brothers, the 101st had been recuperating 100 miles away in Reims in France, and it had been a frantic scramble. They'd been told to quit their snug quarters and abandon their amorous adventures, hop on the back of trucks. They were driven 100 miles forward. Elements had started to arrive on the 18th and the whole division made it into Bastogne on the 20th, just, just before the Germans cut it off and were pressing in from all sides. The Americans weren't very well equipped, they were not very well dressed, they were unprepared, and they were heavily outnumbered. And Reflecting this, on 22 December, the German commander in the area demanded that his American counterpart surrender. He sent him a famous note, which I will quote at length because it's a good story. To the U.S. commander of the encircled town of Bastogne. The fortune of war is changing. This time the USA forces in and near Bastogne have been encircled by strong German armored units. And he warns him that more units on their way. He says there is only one possibility to save the encircled USA troops from total annihilation. That is the honorable surrender of the encircled town. In order to think it over, a term of two hours will be granted, beginning with the presentation of this note. If the proposal should be rejected, he said, the German artillery corps will be given orders to annihilate the USA troops in and near Bastogne. All the serious civilian losses caused by this artillery fire would not correspond with the well known American humanity. Signed, the German commander. This brusque note received a very terse reply. General McAuliffe, in command of US troops in Bastogne, wrote to the German commander, nuts, exclamation mark, the American commander. And apparently this had to be translated. For the Germans, nuts basically meant go to hell. And so the fighting continued. The Americans there called themselves the battered bastards of Bastogne. And they held out for days until eventually American troops mounted a counterattack that smashed through a corridor to them on Boxing Day. I've always been struck by an account left by Jack Pryor, who was a young army physician. He found himself in Bastogne and he did his best to administer aid to hundreds and hundreds of wounded soldiers. He particularly remembers in a makeshift aid station in town, there were two Belgian nurses. They were called the Forgotten Angels, and they helped him care for the wounded. One was Augusta Cheewi. She was a young woman from the Belgian Congo and she volunteered to help during the siege. And the second was Rene Lemaire, another Belgian nurse who volunteered. She was killed on Christmas Eve when a German round hit a building full of wounded soldiers. She was killed alongside 30American soldiers and prior captures. The madness of war he captures Christmas Eve spent surrounded by the wounded, running out of supplies, German rounds smashing into the ground all around him, but also drinking a celebratory glass of champagne that one of him or his men had liberated from a smashed house nearby. Now, Bastogne always gets talked about, but as John McManus explains, Strategically once the siege warfare there begins, it's an indication that the German plan has been completely derailed. It's dramatic but ultimately pointless in relation to Bastogne.

John C. McManus (49:03)

By the time we have the siege and all that that's gone on, it becomes anticlimactic. And the reason is Bastogne was really valuable to the Germans the first day or two when they could use it as a crossroads, pivot point, point to move north. Okay? And this is, I think, quite true on the northern shoulder, too, around Elsenborn, St. Vith, Verbamont, Lanzarath, Losheimer, Grave, whatever we happen to be talking about, these places matter. The quicker the Germans could get them, the longer this thing went on, the less point all of it had. And so by the 23rd, especially by the time the weather gets a little bit better, by that time, the German offensive is really unraveling, leveled. They've gotten into this thing of besieging Bastogne, which is not to their advantage. In the north. They have not had the kind of decisive breakthrough they want. Piper and his group starts to get turned back and hits something of a dead end. And you've had enough time for Eisenhower and his colleagues to scrape together enough reinforcements to throw in there. Famously, of course, the 101st at Bastogne, but the 82nd Airborne at Verbamont, but many, many, many others. Patton attacking north with his 3rd Army. I mean, all that has happened by now. So let's think about what the Germans are in this for. To get to Antwerp. Is there any possibility that's going to happen by December 23rd? No, no.

Dan Snow (50:22)

Yeah, it's a good point. If you're engaged in a dash to the sea, the fact that you find yourself in a brutal siege, although it may feel incredibly intense, awful, and traumatic for the people involved, you're nowhere near discharging the idea of the plan.

John C. McManus (50:37)

Now, the planet unraveled in that respect, and of course, they'd captured thousands of people. And, you know, we have to acknowledge that just how terrible and traumatic that is for Those who became POWs and they inflicted damage. And this is all terribly traumatic for those who were in the midst of it. But where, if we're thinking at the bigger picture level, it's already unraveling. For instance, Hasse von Manteuffel, who commanded the 5th Panzer army, later said that when he didn't get Bastogne by the end of December 17, he knew something was really badly wrong. And I think maybe that's a larger commentary that this was the pattern. Even though you may not have sensed it as a German soldier. By December 19th, 20th, 21st, this thing wasn't going in the right direction. And time favored the Allies, I suppose.

Dan Snow (51:24)

On the 23rd of December, the weather improved. Sun now flashed off the hoarfrost. The sky even had patches of blue. But this improved weather brought little cheer to the Germans because it also brought with it the unmistakable roar of Allied aviation engines. Frustrated by days of impotence, days on the ground due to poor visibility, the young aircrew now sprang on German positions like hungry wolves. The P47 fighter bombers, powered by their double warspite engines, scoured the landscape for German vehicles, its plethora of 50 cal guns spraying supersonic rounds. The aircrew also firing rockets or dropping bombs on German vehicles, for whom the low cloud was no longer a protective cloak. Alongside air power, the might of Allied logistics had really revved up. Troops had been trucked in from all over Western Europe. Bridges across the Meuse had been held, gaps had been stopped up. Hitler's offensive had run into the unstoppable obstacle that was Eisenhower's war machine. And as the New year approached, that machine switched to the offensive. It could have been more spectacular really. The ally didn't try and cut off the entire Bulge, encircle all the Germans within it. Instead, Patton and Montgomery hacked their way in from south and north respectively, into the heart of the Bulge. Bulge. The German troops ran out of ammunition and fuel. Now their units experience the horror of being surrounded, of fighting to the last in basements. The dreams of the Antwerp dash were themselves dashed. They were a distant memory. Hitler, as always, was obviously reluctant to order units to retreat. But eventually, as the Allies jaws got ever close to each other. Some units were withdrawn from the tip of the Bulge and by the beginning of February, the two front lines were pretty much back where they'd been in mid December. Hitler had nothing to gain for an enormous military effort. Winston Churchill addressed the House of Commons following the Battle of the Bulge. He said, this is undoubtedly the greatest American battle of the war and will I believe, be regarded as an ever famous American victory. What's the strategic consequence of the Allied victory at the Battle of Bulge?

John C. McManus (53:45)

Well, the strategic consequence I think is the Germans lose people and stuff. They can Never really replace General Omar Bradley, who commanded 12th Army Group and admittedly maybe his take is a little self serving, but he felt it hastened the end of the war in Europe and I think that's possible. I mean certainly this didn't do Germany any good to lose people they could never replace. I think it led to a tremendous sensation of pride in the US army that we could take this kind of punch and ultimately prevail. And it is largely an American battle, though not exclusively. There are about 1,000 British servicemen who lose their lives in the fighting along the northern part of the front. Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery will get command of the northern shoulder, including the better part of two US armies, 1st and 9th. But it is largely a GI fight. And I think there's a sense that they had fought pretty well, that they had prevailed, that we had adjusted that especially I think Eisenhower handles this battle very well. So I think there's some level of confidence, too, that's going to come out of this that's going to really help the US army once it plunges into conquering Germany in 1945.

Dan Snow (54:53)

Well, the only person doesn't agree with that is Field Marshall Montgomery, of course, takes all the credit himself for turning back the job as he's want to do.

John C. McManus (55:00)

Right. It's a tricky battle. The trickiest I've ever been managed. Right.

Dan Snow (55:04)

Yeah. I mean, what a character. John, thank you so much. Coming on the podcast, tell everyone what your brilliant book is called.

John C. McManus (55:10)

So the book is called Alamo in the Ardennes, the untold story of the Soldiers who Made the Defense of Bastogne possible. And it focuses on the 28th Infantry Division, Combat Command Reserve of the 9th Armored, Combat Command B of the 10th Armored, and then eventually the 101st that get there. And it's really just such a dramatic human story of all these individuals and all these little places. Like you said, Dan, the spotlight of history now shining on you. There's all these. I mean, I mentioned Fuller, but there's all these other guys who are in a similar circumstance and make a difference in the larger sense.

Dan Snow (55:45)

Well, that's it, everybody. Thank you so much for listening to this anniversary edition of Dan Snow's history the Battle of Bulge. Thanks so much to John C. McManus, the author of Alamo and the Ardennes, Then the Untold Story of the American Soldiers who Made the Defense of Basto possible. It's great to finally get to work with John. I've been a big fan of his podcast for a long time. Make sure you check out someone talked at we have Ways usa. But that's it for now, folks. See you next time. Thanks for listening.

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