Lest We Forget! December 7, 1941, and December 16, 1944
Frederick Krantz
Isranet.org, Dec. 19, 2019
Two dates this month, December 7, the 78th anniversary of Japan’s surprise 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, and December 16, 1944, the beginning of the Battle of the Bulge, have come and gone, little-noticed and, sadly, generally unremarked. The first, the ”date that will live in infamy”, as FDR termed it, marked the entry of the American colossus into the Second World War, which for Great Britain and the Commonwealth had already begun on September 1, 1939, with the German invasion of Poland. The second initiated Wacht Am Rhein, the “Watch on the Rhine”, the last great German offensive on the Western front, which had it succeeded might well not only have prolonged the war, but even split the Allies.
Churchill, who after the fall of France in June, 1940 had fought on, alone, recalled in his memoirs (1950) that, upon hearing of the Japanese attack, “I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and into the death. So we had won after all…Hitler’s fate was sealed. Mussolini’s fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder.” Hitler, who in losing the Battle of Britain lost decisive air superiority over the Channel, crucial to the success of Operation Sea Lion, had abandoned the invasion of Great Britain, and had already turned eastward, invading Russia in June, 1941.
On December 11, 1941 the Fuehrer made a second major mistake, declaring war gratuitously and prematurely on the United States. He was convinced that the U.S., now preoccupied in Asia with Japan, would not be “a threat to us in decades—not in 1945 but at the earliest in 1970 or 1980”. Wanting to strike at US Navy ships already escorting Lend-Lease fortified Britain-bound convoys, Hitler now enabled Roosevelt, who had already assured Churchill that Europe would come first, to maximize American military and industrial production.
In January, 1942 $52 billion of the $59 billion budget ($9 billion in 1940) presented to Congress by FDR was devoted to military production, a sum which would rise steadily across the war. As the historian Andrew Roberts notes (The Storm of War. A New History of the Second World War), by 1945 the U.S. was fielding a military of 14.9 million, as against 269,023 in 1941 (the world’s seventeenth largest, and smaller than Romania’s).
And the cumulative production figures are staggering: By 1945, 296,000 aircraft, 147 aircraft carriers, 932 warships, 88,000 landing craft, 86,333 tanks, 351 million metric tons of bombs, 12.5 million rifles, with 1941-1945 military budgeting totaling $180 billion, or 20 times the 1940 amount.
By early December 1944, as the Russians pushed ever westward, Allied armies under General Dwight D. Eisenhower and led by American Generals George Patton and Omar Bradley and the British victor over Rommel, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, had reconquered France. About to push into Germany itself, bets were being taken on whether the war might well be over within six months or less.
And then, on December 16, 1944, pushing (as in June, 1940) in complete secrecy and surprise through the Belgian Ardennes Forest , the weakest point in the Allied line, 50 SS Panzer-led German divisions, 500,000-men strong, sought to split the US and British armies along a north-south axis through St. Vith and Bastogne. The plan: to drive to the Rive Meuse and then on to the great prize, the Allies’ key supply-port, Antwerp. and the English Channel.
Hitler, rejecting the cautions of his leading generals, Manteuffel and Rundstedt, rolled the dice in one last, desperate move, hoping to extricate himself from the two-front vise in which his forces were trapped by dividing and destroying the Allies in the west, and then turning and blocking the Russian advance from the east. He attacked (as severe snowstorms and the worst cold in a generation blocked hitherto decisive American airpower) in the weakest sector of the 80-mile-long front, initially over-running several inexperienced or weakened American divisions (with SS outfits committing atrocities against captured US troops, executing 100 captured prisoners at Malmédy).
The initial rapid German advance, running out of fuel and steam, slowed, stalling before the dangerous “Bulge” in the American line, at the crucial cross-roads town of Bastogne. There the 101st Airborne’s desperate defense, under Brigadier-General Anthony C. McAuliffe, blocked the German advance. Their imperious demand, that the isolated Americans surrender, was met by McAuliffe’s eternal reply, “Nuts!”.
And then the weather turned, American fighter-jets scrambled (2,000 sorties on Christmas Day alone), and General George Patton’s armored divisions, quickly turning north to relieve Bastogne, helped transform the situation. “A clear, cold Christmas”, said the inimitable Patton, “lovely weather for killing Germans…the Kraut’s head is stuck in a meat-grinder, and I’ve got hold of the handle”.
The great winter offensive (the second such “surprise” suffered by the Americans in World War II, after Pearl Harbor) was largely spent by the second week of January; by the 28th, the “bulge” was in the Germans’ line, as they quickly retreated east, One hundred thousand of their 500,00 troops were dead, wounded or captured; almost all of the preciously-husbanded 1,000 Luftwaffe planes with which they had begun the attack were lost, along with the bulk of the German armor (including many of their best, 68-ton, Tiger heavy tanks). Allied casualties were similar, but with one major difference—they were, given the Allied manpower pool and combined industrial might, relatively easily replaced.
As a result of “Watch on the Rhine” German resources against the Russian offensive were seriously weakened–never again would the Wehrmacht be able to mount a major effort; soon, on April 25, 1945, Allied and Russian troops would link up at Torgau, on the Elbe River, Berlin would fall, and the war in Europe would indeed be over. Hitler, by committing yet another strategic mistake, had, once again, contributed to Allied victory.
The U.S. not only fought a global war simultaneously on two fronts, against Germany and Italy in Europe and Japan in the Far East (what Victor Davis Hanson’s recent study calls The Second World Wars), it supplied trucks (800,000), tanks (37,000), planes (43,000), innumerable ships, artillery, munitions and foodstuffs to the Allies, including China and, above all, Russia.
The Red Army—after initial reverses and aided by the earlier Allied invasions of North Africa and Italy, and above all of France, begun with the great amphibious landings in Normandy in June, 1944 and the defeat of Hitler’s last great offensive at the Bulge in December, 1944-January, 1945–rolled over the Wehrmacht in eastern Europe and Germany and into Berlin. (And it rolled, one should note, in tens of thousands of Studebaker and Dodge trucks, with Ivan, the eponymous infantryman, eating canned American food known generically in Russian as “spam”.)
As Roberts observes, “if Britain [fighting on alone after the fall of France in 1940] had provided the time, and Russia the blood [over 27 million fatalities, military and civilian—of every five Germans who died in battle in WWII, four died in Russia], it was America that produced the weapons [including, finally, the atomic bombs which brought the Pacific war to an end in August, 1945].” … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Israel Needs US-Made Weapons to Contain Iran’s Aggression: Gen (Ret.) Charles Wald and Michael Makovsky, The Hill, Dec. 9, 2019
NATO No Longer Serves American Interests: Doug Bandow, National Interest, Dec. 5, 2019
Virtual Jihad has an Enduring Legacy: Daniel Wagner, Sunday Guardian, Nov. 23, 2019
Matt Gurney: Canada’s Defence Free Ride Is Ending and Our Sovereignty Could be at Stake: Matt Gurney, National Post, Nov. 30, 2019
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Israel Needs US-Made Weapons to Contain Iran’s Aggression
Gen (Ret.) Charles Wald and Michael Makovsky
The Hill, Dec. 9, 2019
President Trump makes no secret of his desire for U.S. troops to leave the Middle East. But his administration still views the region as critical to national security, especially given Iran’s escalating aggression. As America departs and the burden of maintaining regional stability falls more on Israel’s shoulders, the United States should accelerate much-needed weapons deliveries for Israel to defend itself and U.S. interests, without adding any cost to the American taxpayer.
In 2016, the Obama administration and Israel agreed a 10-year memorandum of understanding (MOU) to provide Israel $38 billion in U.S. defense assistance, including for joint missile defense. Israel must spend the lion’s share of these funds in the United States, benefiting the U.S. economy and workforce. It also forms the centerpiece of America’s commitment under U.S. law to support Israel’s “qualitative military edge” by helping Israel counter military threats at acceptable cost to itself.
The MOU locked in Israel’s procurement of U.S. defense articles at a constant annual level through 2027. Yet the sharply deteriorating security situation in the Middle East means Israel now faces much more urgent and intensive threats than when the agreement was negotiated. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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NATO No Longer Serves American Interests
Doug Bandow
National Interest, Dec. 5, 2019
President Donald Trump returned early from the London NATO summit. Staged to satisfy British Prime Minister Boris Johnson—the official 70th-anniversary meeting was held in April—the latest gathering featured only one, mercifully short, session, to reduce the likelihood of a Trump eruption. Even so, before arriving he improbably chided French President Emmanuel Macron for being “nasty,” “insulting,” and “disrespectful” in suggesting that the alliance suffered from “brain death.” Then the session’s minimal substance was overshadowed by the president’s personal spat with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Of course, the assembled leaders filled their limited time together with happy talk. The greatest alliance ever is more necessary than ever as Europe faces the greatest security challenges ever. The Europeans are spending more and cutting Washington’s burden. NATO is preparing plans both to defend its members from conventional attacks and confront new threats. The Europeans even are ready to tackle the huge new challenge posed by increasingly aggressive China. All in all, the alliance is prospering greatly.
This is fantasy. A very pleasant one. But fantasy nonetheless. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Virtual Jihad Has an Enduring Legacy
Daniel Wagner
Sunday Guardian, Nov. 23, 2019
As a result of Trump’s widely criticised removal of the last vestiges of an American physical presence in Syria, foreign policy analysts continue to anticipate the physical resurgence of the Islamic State (IS). But many of them have lost sight of the IS’s enduring legacy – virtual jihad – which has become its foremost method of recruitment and operation. Cyberspace is the ideal platform for terrorists because, unlike conventional warfare, barriers to entry into cyberspace are much lower, since the price of entry is an Internet connection.
The surreptitious use of the Internet to advance terrorist group objectives has enabled the IS to gain thousands of new adherents each day in broad daylight, and by virtue of the Dark Web. Like the IS, other terrorist groups that have ceased to be a major physical threat remain omnipresent in cyberspace, promoting a virtual caliphate from their safe haven behind computer keyboards around the world. Islamic extremists are natural candidates to transition to a virtual world that offers them automatic citizenship beyond the nation-state.
Since the IS was founded, its leaders deftly and continually revised the narrative to claim that the group’s desired caliphate still exists, has a specific location, and maintains a defined group of devotees. Unconstrained by the absence of a definitive Quranic guideline for what constitutes a caliphate IS created its own self-promoting doctrine. The group expanded its caliphate narrative to include a wide range of options for participation: from the passive observer reading a blog or curiously following a Twitter feed to the keyboard jihadist editing Rumiyah or hacking a website to the real-world operators attacking a nightclub or running down holiday celebrants with a delivery truck.
IS has successfully exploited the socio-political environment and young adults’ obsession with technology to establish a growing community of devotees in the ungoverned territory of cyberspace, ensuring its ability to continue to coordinate and inspire violence well into the future. IS has found its own salvation via the Internet, particularly since it has already passed the peak of its real-world power. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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Matt Gurney: Canada’s Defence Free Ride Is Ending and Our Sovereignty Could be at Stake
Matt Gurney
National Post, Nov. 30, 2019
As my colleague David Bercuson wrote here on Friday, Canada is rapidly falling behind Russia in its ability to effectively enforce claims to sovereignty over the Arctic. If anything, Bercuson was probably too polite. To call our military capability in a vast swath of our own territory token dangerously overstates our means.
Canada was able to get away with neglecting not just the Arctic but our national defence in general for many, many years. I’m afraid for so many years that it will be an impossible habit to break. But I am not the only one who has noticed. The United States is becoming increasingly frustrated with us. This matters.
It’s hardly breaking news that the Americans are certainly aware of Canada’s lacklustre commitment to defence. That’s been true as long as I’ve been alive. But the problem is becoming increasingly acute. The world was a safe enough place over the last 20 years that we could slack off, contributing meaningfully in Afghanistan, true, with such a small military that that contribution tapped us out. While our military was tied up in Kandahar, we could be reasonably confident we wouldn’t need it elsewhere. And if something flared up, the Americans would have our back.
The world is getting tougher — and we are not adapting. … [To read the full article, click the following LINK – Ed.]
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For Further Reference:
2019 Military Strength Ranking: GFP –– The complete Global Firepower list for 2019 puts the military powers of the world into full perspective.
World Military Expenditure Grows to $1.8 Trillion in 2018: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Apr. 29, 2019 — Total world military expenditure rose to $1822 billion in 2018, representing an increase of 2.6 per cent from 2017, according to new data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
The Space Force Will Become the Sixth Branch of the U.S. Military: Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, Dec. 11, 2019 — It’s really happening. A bipartisan budget agreement for 2020 will see the creation of a new branch of the military specifically oriented towards space.
Israeli Civil Defense: A Critical Tactic, but a Poor Strategy: Elliot Chadoff, BESA, Dec. 16, 2019 — Britain introduced the concept of military civil defense after the German bombings of civilian areas during WWI.
