World Outraged By Crude Surrender Response

BASTOGNE (Routers) A generous German offer of surrender terms was crudely rebuffed by an American general in this besieged Belgian town today, reinforcing the growing image of America as a brutish cowboy in the OK Corral, and almost certainly dooming it and its inhabitants.

The town has been under attack by German artillery almost since the beginning of the latest successful German offensive six days ago, and has been surrounded by German troops for the past two days. Its only defense has been the US 101st Airborn Division, under the command of General Anthony C. McAuliffe.

At 11:30 AM this morning, the German commander, General Heinrich von Luettwitz of the XLVIIth Armored Corps, sent negotiators in to arrange for the peaceful handover of the town. There are varying stories about what occurred next.

Some say that General McAuliffe's response was a single word--"Nuts!"--a word that the German officer sent to negotiate had trouble translating back to his superiors. Other firsthand reports suggest, however, that the General actually issued a two-word reply, one in the imperative case suggesting that the unfortunate officer have someone engage him unwillingly in activity of a sexual nature, but one that was also more readily and universally understood.

In either case, the negotiations were ended, and with them any prospects for saving the town. As a result of the general's needlessly insulting recalcitrance, the destruction of the town is now all but certain, and the lives of its terrified residents and defenders likely forfeit.

Surprisingly, some have defended the general, pointing out that the value of German surrender offers had been severely debased after the "massacre" of American POWs at Malmedy just five days earlier.

However, back in Washington, many were privately appalled. One State Department official noted that this could only diminish Americans in the eyes of the world as a heartless and base people, who don't understand the exigencies and nuance of war. "General von Luettwitz is a noble aristocrat--not the SS troops at Malmedy, and anyway, we still don't have all the facts on that. That town could have been spared," he went on, "but General McAuliffe put his own ego and stubbornness ahead of the lives of the townspeople and his own men. But then, what do you expect from a hick who went to the University of West Virginia?"

Some at the Pentagon were dismayed as well. "Now we're going to have to risk many more men to go in and save his sorry ass," groaned an undersecretary. "Maybe Patton can do it, in between slapping enlisted men."

The White House had no official comment, but staffers indicated that the general was perfectly justified in light of the Malmedy incident. It was clear that despite his incompetence and rashness, the general continues to have the president's full support, and that the war effort would continue, despite its seeming hopelessness, as the tide of world opinion continues to turn against the nation.

http://www.army.mil/cmh/books/wwii/7-8/7-8_19.htm
(The real story)
The airdrop laid on for the 22d never reached Bastogne-bad flying weather continued as in the days past. All that the Third Army air liaison staff could do was to send a message that "the 101st Airborne situation is known and appreciated." Artillery ammunition was running very low. The large number of wounded congregated inside Bastogne presented a special problem: there were too few medics, not enough surgical equipment, and blankets had to be gathered up from front-line troops to wrap the men suffering from wounds and shock. Nonetheless, morale was high. Late in the afternoon word was circulated to all the regiments that the 4th

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Armored and the 7th Armored (so vague was information inside the perimeter) were on their way to Bastogne; to the men in the line this was heartening news.

What may have been the biggest morale booster came with a reverse twistthe enemy "ultimatum." About noon four Germans under a white flag entered the lines of the 2d Battalion, 327th. The terms of the announcement they carried were simple: "the honorable surrender of the encircled town," this to be accomplished in two hours on threat of "annihilation" by the massed fires of the German artillery. The rest of the story has become legend: how General McAuliffe disdainfully answered "Nuts!"; and how Colonel Harper, commander of the 327th, hard pressed to translate the idiom, compromised on "Go to Hell!" The ultimatum had been signed rather ambiguously by "The German Commander," and none of the German generals then in the Bastogne sector seem to have been anxious to claim authorship. [14] Lt. Col. Paul A Danahy, G-2 of the 101st, saw to it that the story was circulated-and appropriately embellished-in the daily periodic report: "The Commanding General's answer was, with a sarcastic air of humorous tolerance, emphatically negative." Nonetheless the 101st expected that the coming day-the 23d-would be rough.

The morning of 23 December broke clear and cold. "Visibility unlimited," the air-control posts happily reported all the way from the United Kingdom to the foxholes on the Ardennes front. To most of the American soldiery this would be a red-letter day-long remembered-because of the bombers and fighter-bombers once more streaming overhead like shoals of silver minnows in the bright winter sun, their sharply etched contrails making a wake behind them in the cold air.

Given the way things are nowadays with journalists, they would probably report that we shot surrendering germans, or germans in full retreat who posed no threat to us.

Sigh. Where is Patton when you need him? Ah well, Rumsfeld is a good substitute...:)

For Freepers pleasure, this has to be the best quote from him:

REPORTER:
What are you trying to do with those bunker busters?

RUMSFELD:
Kill people.

REPORTER:
I meant what do you hope to find when you go to the place you dropped the bombs?

RUMSFELD:
Dead people.

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