Battle of the Ardennes: Hitler's Last Stand

In June 1944, nearly three million Allied troops landed in Normandy, successfully opening the second battlefield in Europe; in September, although Operation Market Garden, a planned air landing on the Arnhem Bridge, failed, the German army on the Western Front had gradually fallen into despair. On December 16, Hitler launched his "last ditch effort" - concentrating his forces to launch a counterattack in the Ardennes region at the junction of Belgium, Germany, and Luxembourg, in order to seize Antwerp, the main Allied supply port, and attempt to create a second "Dunkirk retreat." The Allied forces, who mistakenly believed that the German army was no longer able to launch a strategic offensive, were caught off guard. Some soldiers were defeated by the German offensive, fled or surrendered, but more soldiers stood bravely and resisted tenaciously, delaying the German attack. Driven by despair and revenge, coupled with the harsh winter climate, the Ardennes Campaign was as brutal as the Battle of Stalingrad on the Eastern Front. Both the Allied and German forces suffered nearly 100,000 casualties in this battle. Anthony Beaver, a famous British military historian, described in great detail this tragic battle that ultimately crushed the German Wehrmacht in terms of days.