Does anyone know if the first battle scene in Battle of the Bulge is true. You know the part were the german tanks are going through the woods and there is only Infantry and like two tanks to defend the area.
For the most part yes. The Allied forces in the Ardennes were scattered pretty thin. Many believed that the Germans were beaten and had no fight left and that it was now just a waiting game.
Battle of the Bulge has got to be one of the most BOGUS war movies ever – I’m sure it makes everyone’s list.
However, the German Ardennes offensive was on a pretty broad front with several spearheads, over several days over vast territories. A scene that you describe is fairly plausible regardless of how the BOB movie director chose to use it. Only thing is that tanks nd infantry hated operating in wooded areas – bad fields of fire and high ambush potential for defenders – increased lethality of tree bursts from artillery onto infantry. Most of the “punching” action was on roads, not heavily forested areas.
Many books are available at your local library TL. The Battle of the Bulge is a favored subject in US circles.
TL: If you must, even just jump over to www.wikipedia.com and look up the subject
Yup, a little research will yield wonders. Give it a try, you may surprise yourself.
and all this time i thought the battle of the bulge had to do with how much you ate on thanksgiving
lol
…and since the subject of the Battle of the Bulge came up, I have to recommend renting and watching “Saints and Soliders” (if you haven’t already). Very good movie set around that battle.
Now that movie I have seen but I always come into the movie late whenever its on the History channel.
Ok I did some Research on the Battle of the Bulge off of google and I got this Website http://www.ss501panzer.com/Battle_16-18_Dec.htm its really cool and what I learned is there were Volksgrenadiers in Piepers front. He had been waiting for them to brake thhrough the lines but it took them till the Afternoon of December 16th the starting date and Pieper and his tanks were still in the Assembly area.
PS. If you scroll down to the Photos of the knocked out Tiger II Im thinking of building a diorama of just that Tiger.
The one thing that I liked about the movie is that I found out the germans were the first to use the M-47 Patton in combat. And that’s that!
Band of Brothers covers much of the Battle of the Bulge in very realistic and accurate images.
For all of the armor used, much of the heaviest fighting was between the paratroopers and the volkgrenadiers.
Tanks may have been used in intial attacks through forrested areas but most tanks avoided wooded areas like the plague.
The same was true of American deployments. the units throughout the Ardennes were there for rest and refitting - not up to full combat strength.