Battle of Monte Cassino-18.05.1944

Erich · 05-19-2006, 09:47 PM

problem was the Monte, and it is still thought today as to why it was bombed, but it was . . . .

Germans made a huge mistake by not reinforcing the mount and the ridges and leaving it up to one Fallschirm division. Also not enough artillery. . . . I do not care how strong it was it could not take on such heavy Allied offences and live, as the Fallschirm vets thought it was suicidal to remain on the big hump they were to do their duty till ordered off the rock and northward. Allied commanders were as inept as can be believed. Clark was a fool and in the opening stages wasted away two US infantry divisions, cross the Rapido and die but keep attacking at any cost, as the ground was too important not to give up in a struggle

Soren · 05-20-2006, 06:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soundbreaker Welch?

I suppose the germans made no mistakes at Monte Cassino?

The Germans made some of the biggest...

plan_D · 05-21-2006, 04:35 PM

The gravest error of Clark was after Cassino, instead of rushing to cut off the German 10th Army, he marched on Rome. Allowing the German forces to escape and set up a new defence line further north, which held until the end of the war.

The German forces at Cassino were overwhelmed with the increasing numbers of men and material being thrown at them. The Fallschirm were the best of the best in that theatre, but no matter how good they were the Allies had the material to overwhelm the spirit and skill of them.

v2 · 05-19-2008, 02:22 PM

YouTube - Monte Cassino

Haztoys · 05-19-2008, 05:52 PM

What has become of the Monte Cassino these days...Anyone know..?

Negative Creep · 05-19-2008, 06:23 PM

Didn't some Polish soliders fight with rocks and bayonets when they ran out of ammunition?

comiso90 · 05-19-2008, 06:36 PM

My father was at Monte Casino. I remember him talking about the Moroccans. He mentioned that no one wanted to be around them alone and how he saw them playing soccer with a human head.

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RabidAlien · 05-20-2008, 12:56 AM

My understanding was that the Germans were forced to pull out of Cassino due to the imminent breakout from Anzio. The Anzio landing was intended to put pressure on the German Army units dug in on that particular line (the name escapes me...as happens so often these days), including Cassino. Clark and his subordinates played it cautious on the beachhead at Anzio....we caught the Germans with their pants around their ankles, and should've taken the hills around Anzio, which would've cut one of two highway supply lines to the dug-in Germans. Instead, we "consolidated our beachhead" and got the crap kicked out of us by German armor and artillery and infantry that was rushed into the area a few days AFTER the landing. When the Allies started to break out, they threatened to cut off several regiments in the Cassino line, and against Furher's orders the Germans pulled back to another defensive line north of Rome. Of course, then vanity kicked in and it became a race to see who would be first to Rome, instead of completing the encirclement of the Germans, which would've helped the war effort tremendously.

Then again, its easy to critique and anal-ize a campaign whilst sitting in my 'pooter chair 65ish years later. But from all the books I've read, the campaign through Italy was brutal no matter where the battles took place. Those hills and mountains were like nothing the Allied troops had ever seen, and were almost custom-built for defensive positions. Mistakes were made, wrists were slapped, and we learned on the fly.

trackend · 05-20-2008, 01:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Haztoys

What has become of the Monte Cassino these days...Anyone know..?

Went past it about 5 years ago all rebuilt you would never know that anything had ever happened there. I read that over 250,000 mines where layed at foot of Monte Cassino and having driven past it thats one big concentration for such a small place.

Erich · 05-20-2008, 02:24 PM

NC the Poles as well as what was left of the 1st Fallshirm division fought each other with whatever they had, even throwing rocks at each other, one German para vet told me 20 years ago that they left upon orders of high command that they were going to be encircled with no relief at hand everyone but them had pulled back at least 10-15 miles. the reports were that to the North-east the French had secured the higher hills and were going to descend upon them..

I do believe of my own opinion had the German Paras not retreated in force the Poles would of been fought off with monstrous casualties knowing full well that the Para arms/men were dwindling down daily. Indeed this may well be one of the cruelist fought over pieces of real-estate during the whole war and still somewhat misunderstood today .......

marshall · 05-20-2008, 02:59 PM

Long time ago (so I may don't remember everything corectly) I heard a story told by a man who was there, he and his buddies were waiting in a tent for an assault, but he earlier volunteered to air service, because he thought it will be safer to be a pilot and always an adventure, and in the evening he got order to leave to some air training, next morning all soldiers from his tent died in the assault...

I don't remember his name but maybe someone knows who he was? (it's rather question to polish members but who knows maybe someone else will know)

Soren · 05-25-2008, 02:49 AM

Think of sitting on top of that hill when the Allied bombers started levelling the place! Talk about a scary experience!

renrich · 05-29-2008, 06:29 PM

The allies had some very good special forces in Italy under a chap named Frederick. There was a movie made about them called "The Devil's Brigade" William Holden played Frederick. They gave the Germans what for. I believe they were a joint American-Canadian group.

Soren · 05-29-2008, 06:55 PM

You mean the 1st SSF I suppose. Highly trained and bloody tough, definitely gave quite a few Germans a scare with those 'cya later for some more fun' cards they put on dead corpses. They suffered the same as they gave though, loosing around 12 to 13,000 men while causing around 12,000 German casualties. But one has to keep in mind that their operations didn't leave them very well protected and they were very aggressive, just driving head long into the Germans on many occasions.

Still no'one did better during the Italian campaign than the Green Devils, these guys caused horrendus amounts of Allied casualties while suffering much less in return. Most astonishin was their feat at Monte Cassino though where they despite being bombed repeatedly managed cause 55,000 Allied casualties in return for 20,000 casualties of their own, many being caused by the bombing.

pbfoot · 05-29-2008, 07:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soren

You mean the 1st SSF I suppose. Highly trained and bloody tough, definitely gave quite a few Germans a scare with those 'cya later for some more fun' cards they put on dead corpses. They suffered the same as they gave though, loosing around 12 to 13,000 men while causing around 12,000 German casualties. But one has to keep in mind that their operations didn't leave them very well protected and they were very aggressive, just driving head long into the Germans on many occasions.

Still no'one did better during the Italian campaign than the Green Devils, these guys caused horrendus amounts of Allied casualties while suffering much less in return. Most astonishin was their feat at Monte Cassino though where they despite being bombed repeatedly managed cause 55,000 Allied casualties in return for 20,000 casualties of their own, many being caused by the bombing.

And the Green Devils were given as much back in Ortona whicvh I believe was the toughest house to housr fighting in ETO but of course its much easier to defend