cover image A Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945

A Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945

Edward G. Miller. Texas A&M University Press, $32.95 (250pp) ISBN 978-0-89096-626-6

This tale of the disaster suffered by U.S. forces in Germany near the end of WWII is based on government records, veterans' accounts and the author's visits to the battlefield. Assigned to clear Germany's Hurtgen Forest of enemy troops, the U.S. 7th Corps high command concentrated on terrain features, road junctions and towns, failing to realize that the more important objectives were the nearby dams controlling the level of the water obstacle standing between the Americans and the Rhine, i.e., the Roer. Miller vividly describes the bloody confrontation in the forest near Aachen from late 1944 into early '45, with the Germans conducting a well-executed delaying action that bought time for a buildup of forces for their last-ditch Ardennes campaign. The ferocity of the fighting was typified by the experience of the 22nd Infantry, which lost 108 officers and 2575 enlisted men in exchange for four miles of tactically useless woods. Miller's detailed account of the climactic assault on the Schwammenauel Dam by the 78th Division drives home the theme of this well-researched study: the overriding importance of defining a clear and logical objective at the beginning of a military campaign. Major Miller is on active duty with the U.S. Army in Germany as an ordnance officer. Illustrations. (Oct.)