Chapter XXV
[1] See description in MS # B-172, Army Group B Engineers, 1-25 January 1945 (Generalleutnant Richard Wirtz).
[2] The German order of battle for the period of 16 December-2 January was as follows: 1st SS, 2d SS, 9th SS, 12th SS Panzer Divisions; Panzer Lehr and 2d, 9th, 116th Panzer Divisions; 3d and 5th Parachute Divisions; 3d and 15th Panzer Grenadier Divisions; 9th, 12th, 18th, 26th, 62d, 79th, 167th, 212th, 246th, 272d, 276th, 277th, 326th, 340th, 352d, 560 Volks Grenadier Divisions; and the Fuehrer-Grenadier and Fuehrer Begleit Brigades. The American order of battle for the same period included: the 2d, 3d, 4th, 6th, 7th, 9th, 10th, and 11th Armored Divisions; the 82d and 101st Airborne Divisions; the 1st, 2d, 4th, 5th, 9th, 26th, 28th, 30th, 35th, 75th, 80th, 83d, 84th, 87th, 99th, and 106th Infantry Divisions.
[3] For the characteristics of this equipment, see H. A. Koch, Flak: Die Geschichte der Deutschen Flakartillerie (Bad Nauheim, Germany: PodzuhnVerlag, 1954).
[4] As an example see Vannevar Bush, Modern Arms and Free Men (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1949): "The proximity fuze may well have saved Liège," p. 31. The conclusions reached in the text above are based on the rigorous analysis in Royce L. Thompson's Employment of VT Fuzes in the Ardennes Campaign (1950). MS in OCMH files.
[5] Office of the Director of Intelligence, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, Allied Air Power and the Ardennes Offensive (n.d.).
[6] 2d Tactical Air Force Operational Research Section, Report 19, The Contribution of the Air Forces to the Stemming of the Enemy Thrust in the Ardennes, 16-26 December 1944 (September 1945).
[7] This section is based on the extensive research done by Charles V. P. von Luttichau in his manuscript German Rail Communications in the Ardennes Offensive 1944-1945, and Royce L. Thompson's equally careful and detailed study Tactical Air Phase of the Ardennes Campaign Neither of these manuscript studies has been published, but both should be of great interest to students of logistics.
[8] Adolf Galland, The First and The Last (New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1960), p. 242.
[9] This reserve was only fifty of the normal ammunition trains; each had been divided in two for protection against air attack. On 13 December the ammunition on hand and in shipment for Army Group B totaled 15,099 tons, but 5,353 tons were allocated to the Fifteenth Army, which did not, as planned, take part in the offensive.
[10] For these plans, see the LXVII AK: KTB Anlagen, 12 Dec 44.
[11] Manteuffel in MS # B-151a, p. 160. It is significant that the OB WEST G-4, Colonel John, also picks this date as the turning point in the German offensive. See Headquarters 12th Army Group, Consolidated Interrogation Report 1, 12 June 1945.
[12] Contained in OB WEST: KTB, 26 Dec 44.
[13] OKH: Org. Abt. KTB; see also Schramm, Merkbuch.
[14] Heer In Fesseln, p. 283.
[15] MS # A-874 (Waldenburg).
[16] The USSR Information Bulletin, 12 May 1948, and Novoye Vremya, No. 18, 18 February 1948. The most recent of such Soviet claims is that made by Marshall Grechko in Pravda, 9 May 1960.
[17] In answers to a questionnaire submitted by the Historical Section, USFET, on 20 July 1945, which answers were signed by both Jodl and Keitel.
 |
|
Last updated 13 December 2005 |