When examining the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest it is key to understand not just the battle’s strategic context, but how terrain, weather, and straitened resources effected the course of the fighting and made life truly miserable for combatants.

The Hurtgen’s topography—dense forest, steep ravines, few roads—dictated that the infantryman could not depend on armor and artillery to abet his advance. In fact, the thickness of the forest itself made arty observation impossible beyond 20 or 30 yards.

For the German defender, who throughout much of the battle would occupy eminences such as Hill 411 overlooking the crossroads town of Schmidt, the dense forest increased the effectiveness of his artillery.

“Tree bursts”—artillery shells set to detonate at 80 to 100 feet above ground—feature prominently in histories and memoirs of the battle. Shells turned the close ranks of trees into bombs, raining a deadly mixture of shell fragments and wood splinters on GIs attacking in the open

The dense terrain itself made navigation a nightmare; although decent maps of the forest existed that delineated the breaks in sections of the forest, their numbers were limited (usually one per platoon) and they disintegrated in the mud and water, along with everything else.

Communications between units often took on a primitive aspect. The frequency modulated radios used by GIs required line of sight. The numerous terrain obstacles rendered radios useless during combat, increasing reliance on runners who made easy targets for enemy snipers.

With observation limited to only a few yards, American patrols struggled to orient themselves in an impenetrable sea of green. The observable trails and firebreaks were heavily mined. The detonation of a single mine would bring down a mortar barrage of devastating accuracy.

The German defenders wisely used the forest to its greatest advantage. Fields of fire were cut through the forest undergrowth and a natural abatis made from felled trees served to channel American attacks into mined obstacles covered by machine guns and pre-sighted for mortars.

The ever pervasive mud of the forest limited movement of vehicles and men of both sides. The high clay content of the soil in the Hurtgen makes a slippery, gelatinous mixture when wet, turning roads into axle-deep quagmires that stranded vehicles and sucked a man’s boots off.

Soldiers complained of never being able to get dry. Trench foot cases abounded despite the best effort of men to keep their feet clean and dry. Low hanging cloud cover that negated US airpower also contributed to respiratory illnesses; 37% of GI’s were treated by December 1944.

With priority of supply conferred on ammunition, basic items such as blankets and sleeping bags rarely made it forward. Men shivered night after night in water-filled foxholes, contributing to the rise in non-battle evacuations, often hitting hardest the most experienced men.

Cases of “combat neurosis” climbed to alarming levels during the battle, with more than 8,000 GI’s being evacuated from the Hurtgen fighting.

In 18 days in November 1944, the 4 ID’s 22nd Inf reported 39 nonbattle casualties per day, out of an average of 167 total casualties.

Hemingway famously called the battle “Paschendaele with tree bursts.” The men who fought there referred to it as the “death factory.”

It was, simply put, the worst place to fight a war. The 33,000 dead—a man per yard in cases—speaks to that.

#WWII #SWW #Hurtgen