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/
See “The Best Years od our Lives”, an excellent 1946 movie about returning American WW2 veterans, on the Internet for free:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiPbcX26nr4
1zt ID 75-77. No mission too difficult, no sacrifice too great.
May the Lord hold them in the palm of His hand. Amen.
5.56mm
Sheesh.
First Infantry 1976-77.
Fingers are not working properly.
5.56mm
Watching videos of that scene ——— from a shore view ———I always think of one of the troops going down just as he reaches the beach. My thoughts of him and his family right now —— as well as the thousands of others who gave for us.
Thank you for this thread. It is times like this that I remember stories of my Dad’s friends were conscripted to WWII and killed in action, but Dad was spared. He was a GE electrical engineer, and had his role in the Manhattan Project. GE was responsible for the critical components, including, for example, the neutron “trigger” for US nuclear bombs.
RIP, Dad.
James Cromwell? The guy who just superglued himself to a Starbucks counter?
Why is the sky blue? Because God loves the Infantry!
God bless my blue-cord brothers. Some gave all.
Patton was a glory seeking sociopath. My father, who for a while was in the Third Army, said that the line troops hated him.
The Germans considered Patton the best US general, according to transcripts of the German’s higher level meetings.
Thanks!
But the “Best Years of our Lives” is not a war movie. It is a movie about what happened to veterans who returned from war.
When will anyone make a good movie about returned Afghanistan/Iraq veterans?
U.S. Marines advance on Japanese pill boxes, Tarawa, November 1943
“Best Years of our Lives” is a triple story of the returns home of three soldiers, one rich, one poor and one disabled.
96th Infantry “Deadeyes” bump
No, the actor who recently died.
Great post. God bless you and thank you for your service
Thank you.
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