IronDuke_slith
Posts: 1595
Joined: 6/30/2002
From: Manchester, UK
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Von Rom
quote:
ORIGINAL: IronDuke
[EDITED FOR SPACE]
Please don't ask me to do my own research, because I don't believe this was possible, so I do not believe there is anything to research. You keep telling us this what he wanted, please explain how. I would not want to move the conversation forward without this information from yourself, so suspect this will be our last post.
Regards,
IronDuke
Well ID,
Thanks for keeping this thread derailed. 
As to Bastogne:
1) Patton broke through to it in FOUR days, not FIVE as you indicated.
2) You compared kursk to the Bulge.
Anyone with even a slight knowledge of these two battles, knows how foolish that comparison is. Yet, you persist in it.
KURSK:
1) One of the most heavily entrenched Soviet positions in the war.
2) It was summer and the conditions were fine.
3) The Soviets KNEW the Germans were attacking at the salient and stopped them cold.
The Bulge:
1) The Germans were mobile, low on fuel and on supplies.
2) They were over-extended, with no defense in depth.
3) The severe wintery conditions meant that ALL German vehicles HAD to remain on the roads, thus allowing Patton to cut them off easier behind the salient.
4) No one, not even the Allied commanders expected that Patton could attack from the south. The Germans didn't expect it either. With total surprise Patton could have cut off the German salient. This was te KEY to the entire Battle of the Bulge. Just as the Falaise Gap was te KEY to bagging all the Germans in the pocket.
Well, I could go on and on, but I think this indicates how tenuous your analysis of Bastogne and its comparison with Kursk is.
BTW, thanks again for hijacking this thread.
Although, I seriously doubt "Kev" will say anything to you about it 
This post (IMHO) illustrates one of the reasons you get into the arguments you do. Firstly, I asked several questions in my post, which if you wanted to debate with me, you could have answered. However, you seem to have completely ignored all my difficult questions:
quote:
Ironduke
Can I ask for the following facts/opinions/evidence.
Do you think encircling two Panzer Armees and an Infantry Armee was on with the three Divisions Patton wheeled northwards in 48 hours? If so, please explain reasoning. Where would they have attacked, for example, what do you think the german response would have been?
Do you think Patton could have achieved this pincer without a companion pincer being launched from the northern shoulder of the Bulge. If not, please outline which formations you feel would have been capable of launching this.
If you think he could have done it, please give a little more detail on how. How flanks would have been covered given the troop numbers he employed; how the German counterattacks across his lines of communication from east and west would have been handled etc. Some information on where he would have made the assault (near what town, how wide a frontage etc)and what objectives he would have set along the way would also be helpful to us in visualising this masterstroke
Instead, you've gone back a page or two and pulled out this, or rather the sentiment, not the quote (or context) which you didn't reproduce.
quote:
IronDuke
Any offensive further east with just the three divisions used would have failed, bearing in mind how much trouble they got in the drive on Bastogne. Also, without any corresponding attack from the north (which wasn't about to come) then any drive further east would have had to go right across the base of the Bulge from north to south. It would have looked a bit like Kursk, and such a drive wasn't on.
The phrase "It would have looked a bit like Kursk" was comparing the shape of the battlefield. My point was that without an attack from the north, any success Patton had in the south would have been like Kursk where (if you are familiar with this battle) the SS Panzer Corps penetrated in the south as far as Prokhorovka, but Model's troops in the north made no ground, leaving the southern pincer (as Patton's would have been) dangling in the air. This entire piece from you, therefore, seems like a straw man. You seem to have deliberately taken the wrong context for my words, and then argued against something I never said in order to hide the fact you don't want to answer the real points in my post.
This is what frustrates forum users, because you've avoided my valid points, and instead made up an argument about Kursk to insult me with. My real points are above, if you want to continue this debate.
quote:
As to Bastogne:
1) Patton broke through to it in FOUR days, not FIVE as you indicated.
I took the morning of the 22.12.1944 as day one (let me know if you dispute the dates I'm using). A tenuous link (but a link non-the-less) was established to Bastogne around 17.00 on 26.12.1944. This was day five of the offensive if 22.12.1944 was day one. It's a moot point, but the actual time for the offensive was around 4 and a half days. I suppose it depends on whether you round up or down.
quote:
The Bulge:
1) The Germans were mobile, low on fuel and on supplies.
In addition to the questions above, I have another. How can you be mobile and be low on fuel? Doesn't having no fuel somewhat restrict the mobility of mechanised forces? In addition, can you tell us which of the forces that faced Patton's drive on Bastogne were mobile (whether with or without fuel?)
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2) They were over-extended, with no defense in depth.
Makes you wonder why it took four or five days to break through, then.
quote:
3) The severe wintery conditions meant that ALL German vehicles HAD to remain on the roads, thus allowing Patton to cut them off easier behind the salient.
 Are you suggesting here, that wintery weather meant all German vehicles had to be on the roads, but that Patton's vehicles (his trucks for example) could go cross country quite happily in the weather prevalent at that time? Some of the heavier (and in terms of deployment, statistically small) German tanks (Tiger II for eg) didn't like the Ardennes very much at all. However, all vehicles seems a little harsh. Would Patton have been better off on the roads in these conditions? If so, wouldn't his attack have come across the same problems of bottlenecks that the German attacks did?
quote:
Well, I could go on and on, but I think this indicates how tenuous your analysis of Bastogne and its comparison with Kursk is.
Very tenuous, since my Kursk argument seems to have been manufactured to avoid the following, which I'll ask again:
quote:
Ironduke
Can I ask for the following facts/opinions/evidence.
Do you think encircling two Panzer Armees and an Infantry Armee was on with the three Divisions Patton wheeled northwards in 48 hours? If so, please explain reasoning. Where would they have attacked, for example, what do you think the german response would have been?
Do you think Patton could have achieved this pincer without a companion pincer being launched from the northern shoulder of the Bulge. If not, please outline which formations you feel would have been capable of launching this.
If you think he could have done it, please give a little more detail on how. How flanks would have been covered given the troop numbers he employed; how the German counterattacks across his lines of communication from east and west would have been handled etc. Some information on where he would have made the assault (near what town, how wide a frontage etc)and what objectives he would have set along the way would also be helpful to us in visualising this masterstroke
IronDuke
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