1944 Battle of the Bulge
Throughout the fall, Adolph Hitler had been putting the finishing touches on a large offensive designed to cut through the Allied armies at the lightly defended Ardennes Forest sector, hoping to repeat the success he had enjoyed against the French in 1940 in the same area.. The sector was considered a rest area and was lightly defended by the Americans with a mixture of worn out veteran divisions and green inexperience divisions only recently arrived on the continent. The goal was to capture the critical port of Antwerp, putting a serious crimp in the Allied supply situation and possibly cutting off the British Army altogether and causing a major retreat and perhaps buying another six months of time. The attack was scheduled for bad weather in the winter to minimize Allied air support.
Unfortunately for Hitler, Eisenhower and his staff responded to the crisis much faster than anticipated, pouring reinforcements into the sector and stopping most of the offensive by Christmas. On January 3, the Americans began a large counterattack which erased the "Bulge" by the end of the month and continued forward to the West Wall itself.
Below is the organization of the two armies with links to pages showing the tables of organization in game terms for each division at the time (as best as I can find). Also there is a small counter sheet of U.S. units needed for these sheets. As usual, the rest of the counters can be found at Imstrat. Please download the zip file for the full resolution sheet in pdf format.
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Allied Army
U.S. First Army
Army Troops
V Corps 2nd Infantry Div (from VIII Corps Dec 20) 9th Infantry Div (from VIII Corps Dec 18) 30th Infantry Div (to XVIII Corps Dec 21) 78th Infantry Div (to VII Corps Dec 18)
VII Corps 1st Infantry Div (to V Corps Dec 16-19) 2nd Armored Div (from XIX Corps Dec 20-23) 3rd Armored Div 9th Infantry Div (to V Corps Dec 18) 78th Infantry Div (from V Corps Dec 18) 83rd Infantry Div (from XIX Corps Dec 26) 84th Infantry Div (from XIII Corps Dec 21)
XVIII (Airborne) Corps 101st Airborne Div (to VIII Corps Dec 18) 7th Armored Div (from VIII Corps Dec 20) 30th Infantry Div (from V Corps Dec 21) 75th Infantry Div (from Ninth Army Dec 23)
U.S. Third Army
Army Troops
III Corps Corps Troops 4th Armored Div (from XII Corps Dec 20) 26th Infantry Div (from XII Corps Dec 12) 35th Infantry Div (from XII Corps Dec 23-26) 80th Infantry Div (from XII Corps Dec 19-25) 90th Infantry Div (from XX Corps Jan 6)
VIII Corps 4th Infantry Div (to III Corps Dec 20) 9th Armored Div (CCB attached to V Corps) 11th Armored Div (from England 17-23 Dec) 17th Airborne Div (from XVIII Corps Jan 1) 28th Infantry Div (112 Inf Rgt to V Corps Dec 20) 87th Infantry Div (from XV Corps 28-29 Dec) 101st Airborne Div (from SHAEF reserve Dec 17) 106th Infantry Div (survivors to V Corps Dec 20)
XII Corps Corps Troops 4th Armored Div (to III Corps Dec 20) 4th Infantry Div (from VIII Corps Dec 21) 5th Infantry Div (from XX Corps Dec 21) 10th Armored Div (from XX Corps Dec 21-25) 35th Infantry Div (to III Corps Dec 23-26) 80th Infantry Div (to III Corps Dec 19-25) 87th Infantry Div (to VIII Corps Dec 29)
British 21st Army Group
XXX Corps Corps Troops 6th Airborne Div 51st Infantry Div 53rd Infantry Div 29th Armored Brigade 33rd Armored Brigade 34th Armored Brigade |
German Army
Fifth Panzer Army
XLVII Panzer Corps
LVIII Panzer Corps
LXVI Panzer Corps |
