90th Division remarks *DELETED*

[baggypants]

Post deleted by baggypants

[Marek_Tucan]

90th had several another river crossings incl. Marne, Moselle, which meant a mile of water due to flooding, and Saar. During the Ardennes battle the 90th was hurriedly withdhrawn from beachhead, trucked and sent north.
The unit seemed to do well after two commanders were relieved, so it seems that problems with slow advance in Normandy were considered to be rather commander's fault than division's as the whole.

By the way, by War's end Patton was to recommend 10% of his units for Presidental citation, he recommended 5th ID and 90th ID, but this was refused as it was over 10%, final recommendation was then a full regiment plus various minor units from 5TI and still the full 90ID.

[PanzerBob]

Thanks for the AAR, I would hardly class this as breaking in combat. These guys were fighting an enemy well dug in in an easly defended position in amongst the cursed hedgerows.

Prosit!

[Marek_Tucan]

I'd compare it to 43rd Wessex (IIRC it was) during Arnhem campaign - the soldiers fought well but the div commander was too slow in getting them to place where they were needed the most (well, in Market-Garden it wasn't just problem of 43rd, but that's another story).

[narwan]

PanzerBob said:
Thanks for the AAR, I would hardly class this as breaking in combat. These guys were fighting an enemy well dug in in an easly defended position in amongst the cursed hedgerows.

Prosit!

Hmm, possibly but the story reads as a one sided combat report. The repeated referring to 88's and little else is a bit of a give away as it probably being less than objective. What's also interesting is the complete lack of reference as to who they were exactly fighting. How strong was the enemy? If I check the available german forces and their dispositions they weren't exactly fighting the cream of the wehrmacht (not even thinking about SS or fallschirmjager!) nor were there very many of them. The americans had a lot more men, a lot more firepower, air supremacy, etc and still did poorly.

[baggypants]

Post deleted by baggypants

[narwan]

baggypants said:
The german resistance strength may not have been large but it had been effective against the 90th.

Which is the point exactly. The easy conclusion is to assume that that means the germans were 'strong'. The other side of the coin though is that it's just as easy to assume that the 90th was 'weak'.
The german 'strength' here lay in 1 simple fact, they made far better use of what the situation allowed for or dictated. Loosely translated, the 90th didn't and that's quite likely in large part due to (lack of) training.