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hen the caravan carrying the 101st Airborne Division got to Bastogne, Gen.
Troy Middleton, whose VIII Corps had taken the brunt of the attack, was
still there. Supreme Allied Commander Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower used the
101st, as well as the 17th and 82d Airborne Divisions, as his emergency
reserve in the Battle of the Bulge. All three divisions fought as
infantry. The 101st had been sent to Bastogne, where they were to receive
further orders (see The Ardennes Offensive, Part
III, “The Battle Begins”).
Gen. Middleton, whose orders said nothing about holding Bastogne,
had stayed, though his headquarters had now moved to Neufchâteau. He was
convinced that Bastogne was a vital road center that needed to be held.
Though he was not able to get through to First Army on the north, he did
get through to Bradley, whose headquarters were at Luxembourg. Bradley
readily agreed. Bastogne, then with a population of 4,500, had a vital
communication net of seven roads and three railroads radiating out in all
directions. It was surrounded by gently rolling, forested hills, with
numerous open spaces, and its setting generally lent itself to defense.
Von Manteuffel’s southern panzer corps had closed
rapidly on Bastogne on the 18th, as the 101st Airborne was moving in. The
panzers were held up by about 600 men of the 28th Infantry Division with a
few tanks from VIII Corps near Wiltz. The American defenders suffered
heavy losses in the fighting here, but they had bought precious time for
the 101st and other American units to establish themselves in Bastogne. In
fact, much of the early disposition of the Battle of the Bulge was
determined by small groups of men who had positioned themselves in
critical locations.
When the Americans in Bastogne and the
Germans
outside the perimeter faced each other on 20 December, there were about
18,000 Americans and 45,000 Germans. However, as the two sides prepared
for the battle to begin in earnest, the odds began to change dramatically.
Von Manteuffel was under strict orders to bypass pockets of resistance,
and that is what the biggest part of his force did.
Gen. Freiherr von Lüttwitz, commander of von
Manteuffel’s 47 Panzer Corps, sent his 2 Panzer Division around the
north side of Bastogne in pursuit of the Meuse, which it very nearly
reached. That same day, von Lüttwitz sent his other panzer division,
Panzer Lehr, around the south side of the town. By the morning of 21
December, the remaining Germans had Bastogne cut off.
On 20 December, Gen. Middleton left for Neufchâteau
to rejoin his VIII Corps HQ. Bastogne was now under the command of Brig.
Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe, 101st artillery commander, filling in for Gen.
Maxwell Taylor B/Gen. Gerald J. Higgins, who was second in command. Taylor
was in the U.S. and Higgins was in England. The 101st was attached to the
VIII Corps for this stand, while the 82d A/B and its attached units came
under the control of Gen. Ridgway’s XVIII Airborne Corps.
The 101st Airborne Division included four field
artillery battalions, one anti-aircraft battalion, three parachute
infantry regiments, one glider infantry regiment (which during this battle
included four battalions), one engineer battalion, and numerous other
units. Attached to it within the perimeter of Bastogne were Combat Command
B of the 10th Armored Division,the
705th Tank Destroyer Battalion, the 755th and the 969th Field Artillery
Battalions.
In the meantime, Panzer Lehr had left one tank
regiment to help the 26 Volksgrenadier Division and miscellaneous attached
units to take Bastogne. The odds had evened out nicely—for a while.
However, several ugly problems had cropped up for
the Americans. Their division field hospital had now been captured along
with its surgeons, and they had some seriously wounded men who were
getting minimal care. Earlier the Divisional convoy of QM supplies
and gasoline, while enroute to Bastogne, had been attacked and sustained
heavy losses. Thus, food supplies ran low after two days, and troops had to
forage for food sources in the town; most ominously,
their ammunition was running low.
The weather so far had
worked for the Germans. Air resupply, air reconnaissance and air cover had
been virtually impossible—a
foreboding deficiency. By the afternoon of 22 December, McAuliffe had
ordered his men to conserve their ammunition by not firing “until you
see the whites of their eyes” (Rapport & Northwood, 528).
The ammunition
shortage was not lost on the Germans. On 22 December von Manteuffel’s
forces began to move closer in and set up new positions, knowing the
American gunners could not engage in offensive activity. “Tanks and half-tracks
loaded with German infantry moved freely and contemptuously along the
lateral roads, making no effort at concealment although they were within
easy range of the howitzers. It made the defenders frantic” (Rapport
& Northwood, 528).
By the evening of 22
December, the batteries had on average less than 10 rounds of ammunition
each, and troops were running out of small arms ammo; “out on the fire
line, friends shook hands as the darkness came.” It looked as if the end
was near (Rapport & Northwood, 529).
The morning of the 23 December the clouds broke and
the sky was blue. The Two C-47s from
IX TCC Pathfinder Group came in shortly after 0935, jumping 10 men each in
the area where Col. Harper’s 327th Glider Infantry 2d Battalion was
deployed. The Pathfinders rapidly set up markers on
the designated DZ. At 1150, 21 C-47s from 50th Wing appeared from the
northwest, and by 1606, 241 C-47s came in directly from bases of the 53d
Wing in England and dropped more than 257 tons of ammunition, food,
medicine, and supplies. Troops all along the frontlines saw the formations
coming, and according to historians Rapport and Northwood of the 101st
Airborne, “it was the most heartening spectacle of the entire siege” (Rapport & Northwood,
530).
Though the initial parachute resupply missions
gave the defenders of Bastogne a vital shot of hope, the need for resupply
remained in emergency proportions. Not all the ammunition sent was that
requested. Heavy ammunition, more readily carried in gliders, was running
low.
Most of the supplies that was dropped by parachute was loaded in parapacks
(attached to the underside of the aircraft), but the parapacking equipment was
still in England. Only the groups of the 50th Wing were now on the
Continent. Some in those groups were even now busily recovering gliders
from the LZs in Holland. In December, most of the gliders that were
available for use on missions to Bastogne were those that had been
recovered from Holland.
The “commanders of Bastogne were certain that
as long as the artillery ammunition lasted, Bastogne would hold.” By
Christmas Eve, food was again depleted, and most of that available from
civilians in town had been found and consumed. Medical supplies remained
critical and surgeons were needed. Troops lacked enough blankets to
protect themselves from the bitter cold. And, by Christmas, just over 400
gallons of gasoline remained to the defenders (Rapport & Northwood,
531f).
After the bulk of von Manteuffel’s 5th Panzer Army
had pushed west of Bastogne, Hitler reluctantly agreed that those left to take
the town were going to need more help. By 23 December German positions
near the southern perimeter had begun to compress under pressure from the
northward advance of the U.S. Third Army. German General Heinz Kokott, CG
of the 26 Volksgrenadier Division, who now had the primary responsibility
for directing the attack on Bastogne, said in interrogations after the war
that upon seeing the Troop Carrier aircraft making their drops on 23 December, he and
others believed the 101st was receiving paratroop reinforcements. This
sight, he remarked, “increased the disorder in [the German] ranks . . .
.” (Rapport & Northwood, 583).
Not long after this, Hitler gave the
order that
reinforced German army units would attack Bastogne on Christmas Day, and
on the night of 23 December Gen. von Manteuffel arrived back at
Kokott’s CP to issue specific instructions. The 15 Panzergrenadier Division,
veteran of the Italian fighting and part of Hitler’s reserves, would be
committed to Kokott’s effort, and at least two of its regiments would be
in position to attack by 0300 on Christmas morning. The division set up
its CP one mile west of Flamierge (Rapport & Northwood, 584; Bauer,
1984).
Kokott decided that he now needed to redirect his
main thrusts at Bastogne. He reasoned that the Americans were probably expecting heavy
attacks to continue from east and south, and that therefore he would direct his
attacks to the western perimeter, initially northwest of Bastogne. Kokott
hoped for the element of surprise (which he obtained), and he hoped the
perimeter was weak (the southwestern perimeter was in fact the weakest
part of the American line, but the northwest perimeter, according to 101
Airborne records, was one of the strongest).
However, Kokott knew that an
approach from northwest of town would provide him the opportunity to
operate his armor in firmer and more open terrain. He now moved his
divisional CP from Bras to Gives, and moved most of the units of the 26
Volksgrenadiers into this sector. The attack would come in the area near
the junction of the line held by the 327th Glider Infantry and the 502d
PIR, with units of both 15 Panzergrenadiers and 26 Volksgrenadiers pushing
toward Bastogne in a three-pronged thrust: from Givry toward Champs, from
Flamizoule, just east of Flamierge toward Hemroulle, and farther south
from Senonchamps in toward the main Bastogne-Marche-en-Famenne road.
Early
Christmas morning, between 0300 and 0400 the concerted offensive began,
though “the schedule for the attack was tight—imposed by the fear of
the ever-present Jabos [Allied
fighter-bombers].” By 1200, the attacks had been blunted by intense
American resistance from both ground and air, and Kokott asked von Lüttwitz
for time to reorganize. He was turned down. Bastogne must be taken now, he
was told (Rapport & Northwood, 582-84; Pallud, 337).
Another thrust on the northwest of the perimeter took
place on the 26 December, and was also contained. On the night of 26
December, Hitler ordered the first units from Dietrich’s 6th Panzer Army
to divert south to Bastogne. Prior to this diversion, however, Hitler
loyalist Gen. Otto Remer’s
Führer Begleit Brigade was ordered to disengage immediately at Hotton,
north of Bastogne, and proceed through the area west of the perimeter
toward Sibret and the position of the U.S. 4th Armored Division.
German
artillery for the renewed offensive was concentrated in the area around
Flamierge and Givry. By 27 December the area west of Bastogne—from NNW
to SW—was heavily bristling with German army units including troops,
armor, and artillery. Command Posts in the area included not only 15
Panzer Grenadiers and 26 Volksgrenadiers, but 47 Panzer Corps in the
vicinity of Roumont, and 5th Panzer Army near Bertogne. (Bundesarchiv, 2;
3).
After 26 December, when it was clear that the German
Ardennes offensive would fail to cross the Meuse, Adolf Hitler changed
his goal to the liquidation of all Allied forces within the Bulge.
Bastogne was singled out as the initial objective (Merriam, 153f).
See
Glider Mission to Bastogne.
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