Posted on 05/30/2022 9:05:10 AM PDT by Retain Mike
The Army deployed 65 infantry divisions for the Second World War. Each was a small town with its own equivalents for community services within eight categories of combat arms. Units such as artillery, engineering, and heavy weapons engaged the enemy directly. Yet of all categories, the foot soldier faced the greatest hazard with the least chance of reward.
These civilians become warriors confronted the most dismal fate of all, and whose duty was uninterrupted by missions completed or a fixed deployment time. The infantryman was enveloped within a most deranged, barbaric, and brittle existence against a resolute enemy where victory often required actions pushing beyond prior limits for impossibility. Except for the Purple Heart and the coveted Combat Infantryman’s Badge, recognition often eluded these common men become citizen soldiers, because so few came through to testify to the valor of the many.
Omar Bradley said, “Previous combat had taught us that casualties are lumped primarily in the rifle platoons. For here are concentrated the handful of troops who must advance under enemy fire. It is upon them that the burden of war falls with greater risk and with less likelihood of survival than any other of the combat arms. An infantry division of WW II consisted of 81 rifle platoons, each with a combat strength of approximately 40 men. Altogether those 81 assault units comprised but 3,240 men in a division of 14,000…..Prior to invasion we had estimated that the infantry would incur 70 percent of the losses of our combat forces. By August we had boosted that figure to 83 percent on the basis of our experience in the Normandy hedgerows.”
Nearly a third of the 65 divisions in the Pacific and European theaters suffered 100% or more casualties. However, their regimental staffs saw frontline units obliterated three to six times over. To deal with this problem there were never enough infantrymen coming from the states, though large numbers were transferred from Army Service Forces and Army Air Forces to Army Ground Forces. Replacement centers overseas continually reassigned artillerymen, machine gunners, cooks, and clerks to infantry duties. The situation in Europe became so severe that rear area units in France and Great Britain were tasked to supply soldiers for retraining as infantrymen. Those suffering battle fatigue came off the line for a few days for clean uniforms, bathing, hot food, and sleep. However, scarcity compelled their repeated return until crippling wounds, mental breakage, death, or victory brought final relief.
For example, the 4th and 29th Infantry landed on D-Day and suffered about 500% battle casualties in their rifle platoons during the eleven months until VE-Day. Added to these numbers were half again as many non-battle human wrecks debilitated by trench foot, frost bite, pneumonia, hernia, heart disease, arthritis, etc. Many never returned to duty. In the jungles of the Pacific, non-combat losses often exacted a greater price. But somehow the infantry crossed Europe and the Pacific and always remained in the forefront of attacks.
Ernie Pyle said of them, “The worst experience of all is just the accumulated blur, and the hurting vagueness of being too long in the lines, the everlasting alertness, the noise and fear, the cell-by-cell exhaustion, the thinning of the surrounding ranks as day follows nameless day. And the constant march into the eternity of one’s own small quota of chances for survival. Those are the things that hurt and destroy. But they went back to them because they were good soldiers, and they had a duty they could not define.”
Partial bibliography:
A Soldier’s Story by Omar N. Bradley
Brave Men by Ernie Pyle (the quote named Tommy Clayton, but was generalized here because Ernie Pyle saw him as an example of the infantrymen he loved.)
Crusade in Europe by Dwight D. Eisenhower
The U.S. Infantryman in World War II by Robert S. Rush
Foot Soldier by Roscoe C. Blunt, Jr.
Links for Listings of United States Divisions during WW II
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Army_divisions_during_World_War_II http://www.historyshots.com/usarmy/
Army Battle Casualties and Non-battle Deaths in World War II
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/ref/Casualties/index.html
3rd 'Marne' Infantry Division
http://www.custermen.com/ItalyWW2/Units/Division3.htm Total casualties greater than 34,000
National 4th Infantry Division Association
http://www.4thinfantry.org/content/division-history Total casualties of 34,000
29th Infantry Division
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/29th_Infantry_Division_(United_States)
45th Infantry Division
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/45th_Infantry_Division_(United_States)
Remembering the Thunderbirds – Oklahoma’s 45th Infantry Division
http://www.baptistmessenger.com/remembering-the-thunderbirds-oklahomas-45th-infantry-division/ Total casualties of 62,640 When Gen. George S. Patton described the 45th Infantry Division, he said it was “one of the finest, if not the finest infantry division in this history of modern warfare.”
Churchill, Ike, & The "Epic Human Tragedy" Of The First Wave At Omaha
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-06-06/churchill-ike-epic-human-tragedy-first-wave-omaha
A D-Day Survivor Story
https://biggeekdad.com/2019/05/a-d-day-survivor-story/
I knew so many veterans. There was a man who used the first golf cart I ever saw, because as a brigade commander of the 41st infantry in New Guinea he was permanently debilitated by sickness in 1942. I remember one fairly good golfer who had a weird back swing. I found out he was crippled while serving with the Big Red One in Sicily. My Economics professor in college served with one of the first UDT teams to clear barricades and mines in the surf zone before Pacific landings. I often ended up as a dishwasher at the country club and noticed the chef always limped as he moved around the kitchen. He saw my puzzled look, and said he got the limp from a wound received when he was with the Rangers at Pointe De Hoc. Here was one of the men portrayed in the movie the Longest Day. One day Don had his brother Ken with him at the golf course. That seemed no big thing until someone mentioned he was an ace with the Flying Tigers. Here in real life was the character I saw John Wayne play in the movie about his squadron. I found out a friend of many years served with the 10th Mountain Infantry which landed in Italy in January 1945. He received two silver stars and was the only one of eight officers in his company to soldier through the102 days until the Germans surrendered in May.
Those are just a few of the stories I remember among so many others I could tell or have forgotten. I have the privilege today of attending a memorial service at a veteran cemetery, and I can still wear the Navy service dress blue uniform I bought at OCS in 1969.
Thanks for posting this.
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June 6th, 1944- Into the Jaws of Death
; Tom Jensen, sergeant with the 626th Engineer Light Equipment Company, told the Chicago Tribune that many of the men he served with had no idea where they were going on that day:
They didn't tell us anything we didn't need to know. Heck, some of the guys on our ship thought we were headed to Japan, not Normandy. Just months earlier, we were either in high school or working odd jobs.
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Just keep a steady hand on the controls, and try to stay frosty.
I’m reading about the 10th Division now. I just got to the part where Bob Dole gets wounded. Italy was a senseless killing field
"It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died.
Rather we should thank God such men lived."
Back when I was in my 20s I worked security for a major university. One of the campus cops - I’ll call him Bill - was fat and slow. He didn’t look anything like those slick cops you see on TV. Some of the younger campus cops made fun of him. Bill never argued back. He just took it.
Well, one day Bill brought a briefcase to roll call. He didn’t say a word, he just opened it up in front of us. In that briefcase were citations and rows of medals. Bill was an Army Ranger who landed on D-Day.
Nobody made fun of Bill after that.
Yes. Plus it didn’t help that General Mark Clark committed stupid strategic decisions that prolonged the Italian campaign.
Thank you the post and the reminder
Hell, I wasn't Infantry. I was a headquarters POG.
ant=and, obviously...
Churchill wanted Vienna but he lacked a viable strategy for getting there. Getting tied down in the mountains instead of breaching Rimini and heading for Bologna cost too many lives. The Germans would have to abandon their positions or get cut off.
All gave Some,
Some Gave All !
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Thank You for Your Service.
A couple of good movies this Memorial Day:
“Memorial Day” with James Cromwell about a grandfather explaining items in his WW II footlocker to his grandson-—who goes on to be a soldier in Iraq.
“Operation Mincemeat,” the Brits launch a long-shot counterintelligence plan to convince Hitler the Sicily invasion is really coming in Greece. With Colin Firth.
Only got,
‘Saving Private Ryan’
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It will have to do.
That’s a goodie. Still very hard to watch.
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