Battle of the Bulge + 67

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A commenter at this Neptunus Lex post reminds us that Friday was the 67th anniversary of the desperate German assault in the Ardennes that began the Battle of the Bulge.

Here is a remarkable set of photographs of the battle, including some in color, recently released by Life Magazine.

There is also a Battle of the Bulge thread at Ricochet.

5 thoughts on “Battle of the Bulge + 67”

  1. My daughter saw that series of pictures this morning, and scrolled down as I looked over her shoulder. She observed that the trucks looked for all the world like the ones that are still in use here and there by the USMC, and asked “If a tank falls in the forest, does it make any sound?” She was honestly shocked by the picture of the fifteen-year old German soldier, having not realized until then, how young some of them were. Fifteen – that was a kid, who had been made to see and experience things that he should not have been made to see and do.
    And she just then realized, how careful the producers of ‘Band of Brothers’ were, in re-creating the look of the Bulge, around Bastogne.

  2. You’re right, David, the comments are even more interesting than the photos. F.i., the last one, about a HitlerJugend kid who was captured, ended up living in Odessa,TX and after 40 years still remained a Nazi…

  3. I read that in the closing months of the war, the Hitler Youth were far more fanatical than the average German soldier – 1000s armed with the Panzerfauste – the tank killing bazooka. I am sure our soldiers had to kill 1000’s of these “kids”.

    I think every Bulge veteran remembers the blood – and the snow.

  4. Sgt – that truck is the ubiquitous “deuce and a half” used by the Army and Marines since the 1930s. It has changed little but has changed ;-)

    Like most heroes I discovered that one, Clarence Hester, was an officer in that famous regiment – he owned a roofing company for years and lived not far from my parents.

    Said nothing about his war history; had to find out from others.

  5. That first photo looks like a German Panther tank, not a Sherman. Although there is no muzzle brake. Some of the comments are a bit fatuous. One by an American woman complains that elite men brought on the war and boys had to fight it. In fact, one man brought the war, Hitler, and the French and British tried desperately to avoid it. She probably has a degree in women’s studies.

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