Battle of Monte Cassino-18.05.1944

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My father was at Monte Casino. I remember him talking about the Moroccans. He mentioned that no one wanted to be around them alone and how he saw them playing soccer with a human head.

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My understanding was that the Germans were forced to pull out of Cassino due to the imminent breakout from Anzio. The Anzio landing was intended to put pressure on the German Army units dug in on that particular line (the name escapes me...as happens so often these days), including Cassino. Clark and his subordinates played it cautious on the beachhead at Anzio....we caught the Germans with their pants around their ankles, and should've taken the hills around Anzio, which would've cut one of two highway supply lines to the dug-in Germans. Instead, we "consolidated our beachhead" and got the crap kicked out of us by German armor and artillery and infantry that was rushed into the area a few days AFTER the landing. When the Allies started to break out, they threatened to cut off several regiments in the Cassino line, and against Furher's orders the Germans pulled back to another defensive line north of Rome. Of course, then vanity kicked in and it became a race to see who would be first to Rome, instead of completing the encirclement of the Germans, which would've helped the war effort tremendously.

Then again, its easy to critique and anal-ize a campaign whilst sitting in my 'pooter chair 65ish years later. But from all the books I've read, the campaign through Italy was brutal no matter where the battles took place. Those hills and mountains were like nothing the Allied troops had ever seen, and were almost custom-built for defensive positions. Mistakes were made, wrists were slapped, and we learned on the fly.
 
Haztoys said:
What has become of the Monte Cassino these days...Anyone know..?
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Went past it about 5 years ago all rebuilt you would never know that anything had ever happened there. I read that over 250,000 mines where layed at foot of Monte Cassino and having driven past it thats one big concentration for such a small place.
 
NC the Poles as well as what was left of the 1st Fallshirm division fought each other with whatever they had, even throwing rocks at each other, one German para vet told me 20 years ago that they left upon orders of high command that they were going to be encircled with no relief at hand everyone but them had pulled back at least 10-15 miles. the reports were that to the North-east the French had secured the higher hills and were going to descend upon them..

I do believe of my own opinion had the German Paras not retreated in force the Poles would of been fought off with monstrous casualties knowing full well that the Para arms/men were dwindling down daily. Indeed this may well be one of the cruelist fought over pieces of real-estate during the whole war and still somewhat misunderstood today .......
 
Long time ago (so I may don't remember everything corectly) I heard a story told by a man who was there, he and his buddies were waiting in a tent for an assault, but he earlier volunteered to air service, because he thought it will be safer to be a pilot and always an adventure, and in the evening he got order to leave to some air training, next morning all soldiers from his tent died in the assault...



I don't remember his name but maybe someone knows who he was? (it's rather question to polish members but who knows maybe someone else will know)
 
Think of sitting on top of that hill when the Allied bombers started levelling the place! Talk about a scary experience!
 
The allies had some very good special forces in Italy under a chap named Frederick. There was a movie made about them called "The Devil's Brigade" William Holden played Frederick. They gave the Germans what for. I believe they were a joint American-Canadian group.
 
You mean the 1st SSF I suppose. Highly trained and bloody tough, definitely gave quite a few Germans a scare with those 'cya later for some more fun' cards they put on dead corpses. They suffered the same as they gave though, loosing around 12 to 13,000 men while causing around 12,000 German casualties. But one has to keep in mind that their operations didn't leave them very well protected and they were very aggressive, just driving head long into the Germans on many occasions.

Still no'one did better during the Italian campaign than the Green Devils, these guys caused horrendus amounts of Allied casualties while suffering much less in return. Most astonishin was their feat at Monte Cassino though where they despite being bombed repeatedly managed cause 55,000 Allied casualties in return for 20,000 casualties of their own, many being caused by the bombing.
 
And the Green Devils were given as much back in Ortona whicvh I believe was the toughest house to housr fighting in ETO but of course its much easier to defend
 
Soren said:
Oh yeah, and esp. when you're being carpet bombed by hundreds of heavy bombers..
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The Carpet bombing was only one part of the fight..And not a constant ...Were it was and what it was made of..And it is EZer to defend a hill and structure as in Monte Cassino..Thats why the Germans took it..No brainer and teh Allieds would of done the same if they had gotten to it first..

Not taking anything away from the Axis fighters and German commandos at Cassino...Lets not take away from the Axis who defended Cassino...But lets not belittle the the Allies who had to take it also.. The Germans had all the cards in that game... But if the Allies had Cassino history would of been saying the same about the Allied Commando.. Smart move my the Germans no doubt
 
The Italian campaign was a classic case of what happens when terrain that is made for defense is defended by good troops with good equipment. The traditional recipe is you need 3 to 1 numerical superiority to take well defended ground. The allies' problem was that the Germans, as soon as they were beginning to be overcome, would just pack up and retreat to another well prepared position and the same scenario was repeated. Alexander also had to contend with questionable decisions by Clark and some under him, green troops, many different nationalities with different command structures and all the attendent problems and reshuffling of his forces because his best troops were constantly being shuffled off by high command. He also had to feed the Italians and deal with diseases brought on by wartime problems as well as German mischief. The terrain and Italian weather was tailor made for defense and Kesselring used it masterfully. When you think about it, the US troops almost always were attacking against German defenders in the whole war.
 
I have the the most respect for Churchill ...But what was he thinking when he said "Italy was the soft under belly of the Nazi's"... One look at a map would tell you other wise...

Have done some sport bike riding in Italy ... Not a good place to have to have a war...
 
Haztoys,

Ofcourse the bombing was only one seperate part of the whole battle, I fully agree. However fact is that most German casualties were caused during this exact part of the struggle, and no wonder, they were sitting ducks on that hill.

Renrich,

I fully agree about the terrain being ideal for defense, and that the Allies had to attack, which leaves anyone more susceptible to fire. And this is undoubtedly one of the reasons that the SSF suffered more than they gave, despite mostly fighting against regular troops. However much of the terrain also made for good cover for the attacker, helping the Allies on many occasions.

The real problem facing the Allies was besides the difficult terrain they had to fight against experienced extremely professional troops which were well led (Which was not the norm considering Hitler usually always had his nose the wrong places) by Kesselring.
 
Actually, the allies were in much the same position in Italy as the Army of the Potomac was in 1864-65 except that the terrain and weather in northern Virginia was not as favorable for the defender as it was in Italy. Grant was facing an opponent who knew his ground and who led good troops who were fighting for their country's survival and would not give up easily. Lee almost always was able to position his army to anticipate Grant's next move. If you study the campaigns during that period, the Union army sustained terrible casualties. As did the allies in Italy. One of the US divisions which suffered terribly was the 36th, a Texas National Guard division. I am pretty familiar with their ordeal. Of course Audie Murphy's division, the 3rd, was there also. The US had one probably exceptional general, Lucian Truscott, who possibly should have replaced Clark. Clark is a dirty name in Texas.
 
Anyone read this book?

The author pulls no punches on the quality of the allied generalship in Italy.
 

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syscom3 said:
Anyone read this book?

The author pulls no punches on the quality of the allied generalship in Italy.
Click to expand...
I haven't yet, but it sounds like a good read...

As far as Italy goes, a close family friend (who passed away a number of years ago) would recall his experiences in the Italian campaign. He was U.S. Army and had some pretty intense encounters.

One of the things he remarked, was how the Germans had the mountain roads ranged in perfectly with thier artillery, especially the 88s. In the evening, the Allies would start moving up the passes and then all hell would break loose. Then, he remarked, would you hear the distant report of the 88s...he hated them with a passion.
 
I've read his first two books, Sys, both EXCELLENT accounts. First one, "An Army At Dawn", follows Patton's US Army from its kick-off in New York, to Africa, and to its eventual victory over the Afrika Korps. I'm lookin forward to reading the third book in the series, too!
 
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