European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 1, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                849 my tangled tragedy of the Hurtgen Forest continued from Page 9 armies across France the temporary reverse at the bulge followed by the smashing of the Siegfried line the crossing of the Rhine an the fall of Berlin. Somewhere among All the stunning victories the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest got fought. And fought. And fought. And not much got reported about it then or later. Perhaps because it was supposed to be just another routine Victory a Quick drive through the retreating Dregs of the wehrmacht limping old men with Glass eyes big eyed boys with weak stomachs. The conventional Wisdom held that the yanks were glory bound and no Little walk through a Forest of losers was going to deter them. But something went badly sickeningly wrong on the Road to glory. Somebody forgot to Tell the poor bloody infantry and tankers How easy it was to get lost in the dark. While the entire Allied rampage from Normandy to the Gates of Berlin took but 11 months the americans found themselves ensnared in this one strange ugly going nowhere Battle from september 1944 into february 1945. It would be their longest Battle in world War ii. Indeed in the harsh judgment of historian Charles Whiting this Quot longest single Battle in the history of the . Army Quot was fought Quot for an objective that was not Worth the death of a single american  on the maps Back at Headquarters the Hurtgen perhaps looked More benign. Lovely dark and deep but no great threat to Stop the Yankee steamroller. What it was was Vietnam before its time. 50 Square Miles of Remote Hilly Ravine slashed gloom shrouded Forest broken with Farmland along the belgian German Border below Aachen. Military historian Charles Macdonald called it Quot that labyrinth of gloomy Glens. Nowhere in the ardennes Eifel Are the draws and valleys deeper the slopes More. Precipitous. Entering the Hurtgen Forest thick with dark Green fir Trees 100 feet tall so densely interwoven that they obscure the sky a Man might experience for the first time the stifling embrace of the kind of forests he had heard or read about in old German Folk tales. Like Hansel and Gretel he might be inclined to drop things behind him to Mark his path. Quot but it was hardly Likely that trouble lurked in the Forest. For the germans a it was obvious to All but the germans a were  it was not just the rough country it was the tactics. Basically the americans could have gone around it rather than through it stresses Whiting. But instead of out flanking and sealing off the Hurtgen with the Superior weight of their armoured and air forces allowing it to just Wither the tacticians introduced one yank division after another into the grinding Teeth of the hungry Forest a a Vietnam like War of attrition in Vietnam like terrain. Such sturdy divisions As the 4th, 9th, the big red one and crack smaller units like the 2nd Ranger in which had scaled the Normandy Cliffs on a Day frontally assaulted those Woods and slopes that had been turned into a lethal Maze by German engineering. Pillboxes anti tank Quot dragon s Teeth Quot and deep earthen log covered bunkers Able to withstand everything but a direct hit were positioned for interlocking fire everywhere in the Woods. Mines of All sizes designed to destroy everything from toes to tanks were scattered like exploding confetti through the Green tangle. In one stretch engineers found a Teller mine every eight paces for three Miles. In a single break in the Forest they unearthed 500. They found Booby traps Booby trapping Booby traps. Suddenly the vaunted yank mobility that had plunged hundreds of Miles to rip the nazi heart out of France could t Budge a mile. It got Down to night fighting Man a a a some of the munitions recovered from the area recently. The Woods Are still a deadly trap full of live rounds. Vii amp a Vav. If .\0 is amps Ken Georges amps Ken George to Man Hole to Hole in the ghostly mists. Though there were ferocious artillery duels and bombings it got Down to bayonets and fists and waking up with a Frozen headless German beside you. Men were Cut off for hours or Days from each other and the Strain showed itself in a near epidemic of combat fatigue cases. The Battle of the bulge came and went but the fighting in the mangled Forest staggered on. Quot in the six months of the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest eight . Infantry and two armoured divisions plus other smaller outfits Quot trudged into the stalemate wrote Whiting. Quot in a matter of Only 14 Days most of the Rifle companies suffered up to 50 per cent casualties. In the 90th inf div s 60th regiment. The losses were a staggering 100 . In All More than 120,000 yanks were cranked into that supposedly Quick Conquest. More than 30,000 of them became dead wounded and missing and thousands More fell victim to combat fatigue. The germans would suffer even More casualties finally. It was t what americans were used to Reading. Officially the front had gone to sleep. The reports were of Quot penetrations Quot and Quot local skirmishes Quot of yanks Quot consolidating their  As Macdonald noted there was also the Quot disturbing practice Quot of the Success ethic blinding commanders to reality of Quot some subordinate commanders in the Hurtgen fighting to conceal from their superiors the extent of their  of units reporting their combat conditions As Quot excellent Quot when they were in fact miserable. Of army censors keeping a tight wrap on the Grimmer aspects of the truth. A it a \ r a  illusion  were of the Rah Rah variety noted Whiting used to reporting Success after Success of Quot our  even when they weren t having any it seemed almost unpatriotic to report defeat. Reportage took on a sporting event Quality As the allies Quot raced Quot and Quot smashed Quot and Quot trounced Quot their Way through Europe. As for the Hurtgen few correspondents ventured into it to report anything at All. Or a who did was writer Ernest Hemingway accompanying his Friend col. Buck Lanham commander of the 3,000-Strong 22nd regiment 4th inf div. Well before the Battle was Over Lanham would lament Quot my magnificent command has virtually ceased to  by the end of november his riddled regiment had suffered 2,678 casualties. Macdonald who fought As a Rifleman near the Forest and later became a . Army historian wrote that Quot the tragedy in Battle is when men suffer and die for objectives to at Are not commensurate with the