Rawson - Battle of the bulge 1944-45

A dark sense of humour prevailed during the siege of Bastogne. (NARA 111-SC-226804)

Conceiving the Plan

Reinforcing the Wehrmacht

Jodl Draws up Hitlers Ideas

The Generals Reaction

The Ardennes Battlefield

The German Commanders

The Allied Commanders

The US Army Commanders

Army Group Bs Final Planning

Operation Wacht am Rhein: Army Group B Order of Battle and Objectives

The Allied Situation

The Soldiers

The Kit

The Tactics

The Days Before Battle

Deceiving the Allies

Assembling for Battle

1617 December Operation Wacht Am Rhein Begins

1819 December Army Group Bs Breakthrough Begins

2021 December The Battles for St. Vith and Bastogne

Protecting the Meuse Bridges

2223 December Army Group Bs High Water Mark

2425 December The Counteroffensive Intensifies

26 December Onwards Driving Army Group B Back

Operation Nordwind

Eliminating the Bulge

The Cost

Analysing the Ardennes Battle

The Place of the Ardennes Offensive in the Second World War

The bullet-scarred sign went back to Fort Campbell. (NARA 111-SC-200445)

On the morning of 6 June 1944 Allied troops made airborne and seaborne landings on the coast of Normandy and by nightfall they had established a slender beachhead. The long awaited battle for the Second Front had started and over the next six weeks the British and Commonwealth soldiers serving under Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery and the American soldiers under General Omar Bradley fought to expand their foothold in Nazi-occupied Europe.

While the British drew in German reserves around the town of Caen, the Americans fought inch by inch through the Normandy bocage as reinforcements poured into the beachhead. Finally, the breakthrough came on 25 July when First US Army launched Operation Cobra. As Montgomerys 21st Army Group advanced south from Caen, Bradleys 12th Army Group pushed south to Avranches before turning east in a huge arc to try and encircle Army Group B. General Eisenhowers plan nearly worked and large numbers of Field Marshal Walter Models men were trapped in what became known as the battle for the Falaise Pocket.

The Allied Armies advanced quickly across France while the remnants of OB West fell back in disorder towards Germany and the safety of the West Wall (also known as the Siegfried Line), a long line of fortifications along the border, the Allied Armies followed as fast as they could. While Montgomerys 21st Army Group entered Belgium and entered Brussels on the north flank, Bradley advanced east, liberating Paris before heading towards the German border. Following a second successful Allied landing in southern France General Jacob Devers 6th Army Group pushed quickly up the Rhne Valley and linked up with Bradleys advance. However, while progress was exceeding all expectations the advance started to falter by mid September because of mounting difficulties in keeping the front line troops supplied. The Germans either held onto ports or destroyed them, leaving the Allies reliant on bringing supplies over the beaches. The destruction of the French rail network meant that everything had to be moved by lorry. With summer turning to autumn, Eisenhower was concerned that his Armies would find themselves stranded in front of the Siegfried Line at the end of a tenuous supply line.

An attempt to outflank the fortified line by pushing through Holland was suggested by Montgomery and approved; on 17 September Operation Market Garden was launched. The plan was to cross the Maas, Waal, and Rhine rivers in southern Holland using British and American airborne troops to pave the way for the ground troops but after a fleeting glimpse of success, German reserves moved in to stop 21st Army Group just short of its final objective. The failure to cross the Rhine left Eisenhower needing to reconsider his options.

An attempt on Hitlers life in the Wolfs Lair on 20 July 1944 and the subsequent purge of the Armed Forces High Command, in which many senior officers were executed, had made the Fhrer paranoid. The purge had gone right to the top and Generalfeldmarschall Gnther von Kluge committed suicide when implicated in the plot.

With the Soviet Armies winning the battle for the Eastern front, Hitler wanted to focus on defeating the Allies in the West and on 31 July the Fhrer made the declaration that the war had to be won in the West and that the Allied armies had to be stopped from breaking out of Normandy. The Wehrmacht could not halt them and over the next six weeks they advanced across France and Belgium. As the Allied advance ground to a halt on Germanys border, Hitler conceived the offensive in the Ardennes; a counterattack designed to win the war.

The day before Operation Market Garden was launched, OKWs staff were holding a briefing at Hitlers headquarters in East Prussia, a place known as the Wolfs Lair. General Alfred Jodl, OKWs Chief of Operations Staff, was explaining the situation on the Western Front and it was looking bad for Wehrmacht. Allied divisions outnumbered the Germans by two to one and the Americans had just crossed the German border at Aachen. As he went on to describe how most divisions were short of manpower, armour, heavy weapons and ammunition, Hitler interrupted and announced; I have just made a momentous decision. I shall go over to the counter-attack, here, out of the Ardennes, with the objective Antwerp.

Hitler also had a new Commander in Chief, West, to plan the offensive following Kluges suicide. On 1 September Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt took command having been sacked two months earlier for urging Hitler to make peace following the D-Day landings on the Normandy coast. He was ordered to stall the Allied advance across France and Belgium to give time for the West Wall to be strengthened. Meanwhile, secret planning to gather enough men, armour, artillery and ammunition to smash through the Allied line began immediately. It was going to take a tremendous effort to prepare for the offensive but the stakes were high; the survival of the Nazi regime depended on the Wehrmachts success.

Jodl, Hitler and Rundstedt; while Hitler conceived Operation Wacht am Rhein, Jodl and Rundstedt argued over the pros and cons of the Big Solution and the Small Solution.