Bulge 16.01s alt

[Plain Ian]

Turn 81 Allied – Night 2am 25th Dec Snow – the south



The situation in the south. No plans for any attacks here until my main reinforcements arrive here. 

The US 35th Div and US 6th Armoured are due 06:00 26th December (90% chance of being on time) on the southern map edge south west of St Hubert. The quickest way to the front looks to be the main road through St Hubert. 

Cesar has halted the 212th VGD attacks for now but the Pz Lehr is still here (30 Panthers?)  and 5th FJD should have recovered fatigue a bit. 5th FJD starts off a large 9 Battalion unit each 700 men strong. Mostly C quality but one Regiment is B. He has suffered attrition but its still a unit to be wary of.

As he also hinted there could be up to 3 fresh VGD units (9th/79th/167th) available for use in this area as well. The 167th is a reasonable C quality unit but the 79th is a D/E inferior unit. I haven’t checked the 9th VGD.

At Mersch we have a cat and mouse situation. If I pull out 5th and 10th he can do the same with 9th Pz and whatever VGD unit he wants. We both shorten the front and free up reserves. Or he can leave them here anticipating me pulling them out and come across the river. Thats maybe a bit unlikely but who knows?

I’ve shown current strengths of my Armoured Divisions. The 4th Armoured is the best equipped at the moment with most of its tank battalions still at 40+ strength. In the 10th Armoured the average strength is around about 30+.

The 9th is a shadow of its former self. It deceptively shows the Division as having 111 vehicles. However that includes 7 x M5’s 10 x Armoured cars 8 x M18’s and 26 x M7 Priests.  Its infantry units however have still some strength left although the fatigue of the 60th/52nd is still 100+. The 27th is down to fatigue 51 but its taken several days to get there. I think it was Broken or Max fatigued early on and has spent a long time in the rear recovering. It almost ready for the front line again but since its D quality then its really just a temporary gap filler. 

(I checked my old files and on the 21st December the 27th was recovering at Recogne with fatigue 230 and 638 men. On the 20th it was fighting at Longchamps near Bastogne against 2nd Panzer with 629 men and fatigue 289)