Tim Ripley - Waffen-SS Panzers The Western Front

This book is dedicated to the heroes of the US Armys 291st Engineer Combat Battalion, who at the moment of crisis blew the strategic bridges on 18 December 1944 to stop the advance of SS-Obersturmbannfhrer Jochen Peipers Kampfgruppe at the height of the Battle of the Bulge. Men like Corporal Fred Chaplin, who pushed the plunger to blow the bridge at Habiemont as Peipers tanks bore down on him, were in the vanguard of turning back Hitlers Waffen-SS panzer lite, so freeing Europe of Nazi tyranny for good.

The author would like to thank the following for their help during the researching and writing of this study: Neil Tweedie and Micky Brooks for their assistance in providing an understanding World War II Blitzkrieg strategy; the records staff of the Imperial War Museum in London for their help with research into German World War II documents; the British Army Staff College, Camberley, for allowing me access to rare German World War II records in their possession; Stewart Fraser for proof-reading my text; Pete Darman, of Brown Partworks, for at last giving me the opportunity to fulfil my long-held ambition to write about the Waffen-SS; and, last but not least, Major Hasse Resenbro of the Danish Guard Hussar Regiment for his help retracing the escape route of Kampfgruppe Peiper from La Gleize.

Christmas morning 1944. Just under 800 cold and half-starved Waffen-SS men emerged from the morning gloom to pass through the frontline German trenches to safety. At their head was the charismatic 29-year-old SS-Oberstrmbannfhrer Jochen Peiper, who had led them for almost two days through thick woods, pursued by American patrols and spotter planes. The Waffen-SS officer was still joking with his men, slapping their backs and encouraging them to keep moving.

Only eight days before, Peiper had led a Kampfgruppe (battle group) of some 5800 men forward into battle. They had at first swept all before them, penetrating deep behind enemy lines, before their luck and petrol had started to run out. Captured American petrol dumps kept Peipers 100 Tiger II, Panther and Panzer IV tanks moving for the first few days of Operation Autumn Mist, as the Ardennes Offensive had been codenamed by Hitler. In the heady days of the advance, the Kampfgruppe ensured its eternal notoriety when it machine-gunned a group of unarmed US Army prisoners of war in a field outside the town of Malmdy.

Peiper drove his men hard. He was often seen at the head of his huge column of tanks and vehicles, sorting out traffic jams, or exhorting them to attack yet another American position blocking their route to the River Meuse, the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte Adolf Hitlers objective.

Heavy mist, snow slurries and incessant rain kept the Allied fighter-bomber squadrons at bay most of the time, but it made life miserable for the Waffen-SS men, shivering in their freezing tanks or open SdKfz 251 armoured halftracks. Few men got any sleep as the column weaved its way along single track roads and around hairpin bends. The key to victory was the handful of bridges that crossed the swollen rivers of the Ardennes.

The bad weather and the element of surprise worked in Peipers favour for the first couple of days. They stormed past confused and disorganized American troops, capturing bridges and supply dumps with ease. One US general was just able to flee his command post less than half an hour before the arrival of Peipers panzers, much to his chagrin.

As the Americans regained their composure, they started to rebuild their defences. Time and again, Peipers men found their route blocked by dug-in and determined defenders. On three occasions, for example, the Americans managed to blow up a vital bridge just as a group of Waffen-SS panzers was coming into view. Slowly Peiper found his options being closed down, one by one.

A week into the advance, Kampfgruppe Peiper was badly battered by almost constant fighting. Its ammunition and fuel was nearly exhausted. The 1000 or so men still capable of fighting had not eaten a proper cooked meal since they had left Germany on 16 December, at the start of the attack. Peiper realized his attack had run out of momentum and started to pull his men back to the hilltop village of La Gleize to make a last stand. American tank columns were pushing against his force from the west, north and east. The Luftwaffe attempted to make a supply drop to the beleaguered Waffen-SS men, but most of the containers of ammunition and petrol ended up behind American lines. Peiper repeatedly radioed his divisional commander, SS-Oberfhrer Wilhelm Mohnke, asking for permission to break out.

La Gleize had been turned into a fortified strongpoint by Peipers men. Tiger II tanks with massive 88mm cannons blocked all the approach routes, making it impossible for the lightly armoured US Shermans to get through. Waffen-SS panzergrenadiers were posted in the woods around the town to stop US infantrymen infiltrating. Attack after attack was repulsed with heavy American losses. The solid Belgian houses of the village made safe havens from the almost hourly American artillery bombardments that were raining down on La Gleize. Hundreds of captured Americans were hiding in the cellars, alongside the steadily increasing numbers of German wounded. Peiper was often seen touring the improvised field hospitals to raise morale among his boys. The English-speaking Waffen-SS officer struck up a rapport with a senior American prisoner, Major Hal McCowan. Even as he was planning the escape of his decimated Kampfgruppe, Peiper was still maintaining to McCowan that Germany was winning the war and that the Fhrers new secret V-weapons would turn the tide of the conflict in the Third Reichs favour.