Quote:
Originally Posted by Dog 6
or the last stand of the 106th
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The fights that the 28th and 106th Infantry Divisions, 9th Armored Division, 14th Cavalry Group and their attached units are seldom heard about in any discussion of the Battle of the Bulge. Most people fix on the 101st Airborne at Bastogne as the turning point. Not discounting the bravery of the airborne; but the true, unsung heros of the Bulge were the infantrymen, tankers and artillerymen who held the line for the first, crucial 48-hours.
One of the critical fights was for the twin villages of Krinkelt-Rocherath, were the 3rd Battalion, 393rd Infantry, 99th Infantry Division and 3rd Battalion, 23rd Infantry, 2nd Infantry Division fought fought major elements of of the 277th Volksgrenadier Division and the 12th SS Panzer Division. To give an idea of the scale of the fighting, the 3rd Battalion, 23rd Infantry went into the battle for the twin villages with a strength of 600 men, 217 men survived to rejoin the US lines.
The defense of the twin villages brought precious time for the remainder of the 2nd Infantry Division and for the 1st Infantry Division to build up a defensive line along Elsenborn Ridge that held the northern shoulder of the Bulge.
For the Germans, the twin villages were just as bloody, the 277th Volksgrenadier suffered the loss of all of its battalion commanders, 80% of its company commanders and the majority of its NCOs (the poor training and poor quality of the new troops required its leadership to lead from the front) as well as the loss of an estimated 1,500 soldiers. The 12th SS Panzer suffered the loss of about 60 AFVs in the fight and its 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment suffered 60% losses.